JOIN USEmergency then, Emergency now
Living in a ‘Modified’ world and thinking back 48 years to the state of Emergency imposed by Indira Gandhi in 1976, my mind goes into a tailspin. Memories of that dark past still haunt those of us who lived through it. Indira Gandhi declared a national Emergency, suspending civil liberties and imposing censorship on the media in a desperate attempt to cling to power. Protests, and any form of dissent or resistance, were countered by vicious crackdowns. My family was one of the victims of the Emergency.
“Past midnight, a loud banging on the door of 20B. I am alone at home. About 10 plainclothes Core of Detectives (COD) officers and policemen barge in. They ransack the shelves, pull the telephone cord out, and throw things about. I feel it is a copy-paste of what they have seen in American movies. I am in my pyjamas. They ask where my parents are, I say they have gone to a wedding in Madras. They force me outside, there are three jeeps waiting and they put me in one of them. I overhear them on their walkie-talkies. They have also picked up Lawrence Fernandes from his house in Richmond Town.”
My parents were Socialists, greatly influenced by Ram Manohar Lohia. Our home, popularly known as 20B, at the end of a cul-de-sac off St Marks Road, was an open house…literally open. We never locked the front door! Artists, musicians, writers, photographers, politicians of all hues – far left to far right – and anyone needing refuge, a cup of tea or a hot meal – were welcome.
It was June 25, 1975. The last day of filming Chanda Marutha (Wild Wind), a film my parents were making based on P Lankesh’s play Kranti Bantu Kranti that prophesied the Emergency. There was a feeling of relief as the shooting was completed, but also an inexplicable sense of unease. By noon, the news that Indira had imposed Emergency had spread. We received some surreptitious phone calls and were asked to listen to BBC radio as they were the only media broadcasting this news.
“I was taken to the CoD building, Carlton House, in my pyjamas and taken into an interrogation room. Five or so CoD officers sat in front of me, held a bright light on my face, and questioned me. 'What do you know about the underground?’ I was just back from a beautiful trip to the Himalayas with my friend. So, I replied, ‘I love the underground.’
They seemed visibly excited by this answer and asked me to elaborate. I said, ‘The underground is perfect! Why don’t we take all the crowded streets of the city and place them underground and then have parks and places of rest overground’.
I was questioned many times, with a good cop-bad cop attitude. In-between my repeated interrogation, I could hear Lawrence screaming in the other room as they started beating him up. Finally, they allowed me to sleep in a locked room, with the Carlton House gardener for company. He gave me a smoke and related stories of how the garden staff would dig up the bodies of women with long hair and sell the hair to the CoD officer’s wives!
The next day, I was taken to the High Grounds police station and locked up. They removed the nada from my pyjamas, saying it was an alleged suicide risk. They also tortured a young man for loitering in Cubbon Park and beat him up with a ‘laati’ as his mother watched. When the sub-inspector arrived, to prove his lofty position, he beat him up even harder, till he lost control of the ‘laati’ and it ricocheted off the station walls.”
The Emergency is still a recurring nightmare that haunts us. We lost our mother Snehalatha Reddy, an innocent victim, among the thousands of others who were tortured and killed for opposing this draconian proclamation.
Unfortunately, there is no balm to heal these wounds, and now there is no climate for healing. The environment is toxic, permeated with fear and self-righteous arrogance. We have lost the appetite to resist and are tired of shadowboxing on numerous fronts. Indira Gandhi’s Emergency had a face, and the enemy was visible and tangible. But the ‘Modification’ of India is a more sophisticated strategy, surreptitious and Machiavellian.
This is a repeat performance. Only the cast is different. Our allies then, the Bharatiya Jana Sangh, who fought against the Emergency, are now, in their new avatar, the main characters in the play, and they have learned their lessons well from the prime architect of 1976. And the Congress party, led by Indira’s grandchildren today, are the ones enunciating much-needed democratic slogans such as, Nafrat ke bazaar mein, Mohabbat ki dukaan khol raha hoon.
There has been a steady rise in fundamentalism and divisive politics. A new population of thugs, cutting across all class barriers, infused with the saffron hue, have sprung up in the past few years. Ignorant while apparently ‘educated’, arrogant, egotistic, brash and aggressive, they strut around, newly empowered and liberated by their idol Modi, the ultimate dictator of what India should be and how she should be defined.
“My mother was in Bangalore Central Jail now. We were allowed half hour visits once a week. She was locked up in the women’s prison along with criminals, including murderers and thieves. There was no segregation in the women’s ward, unlike for the male prisoners. When she had a severe asthma attack, she had to inform the female warden, who was locked in with the women prisoners. The warden had to ring a bell. The guard from the front gate of the prison had to come and open the door, understand the problem, and call a doctor. This usually took hours. So, my mother blacked out many times. Fearing her death in prison and my father’s outrage, they allowed her to give herself adrenaline injections, which was quite contrary to my pyjama-nada experience in the lock-up.”
India lacks basic infrastructure, food, shelter, education, livelihood, and healthcare. The Covid pandemic brought this into stark relief and battered what was an already wounded economy. This pandemic, unpredictable and devastating as it was, was an asset for Modi’s agenda. Social distancing, long periods of isolation, the dread of contagion, a general sense of fear and anxiety, suspicion of other human beings, including close family and friends, assisted the ‘divide and rule’ Hindutva agenda. The two years of Covid have taken the wind out of our sails. With no possibility to protest, and facing a bigger threat, our appetite for democracy and freedom abated and all we wanted was ‘to survive’ at any cost. Something in our psyche has changed. Passivity, apathy, submissiveness and compliance has replaced our motivation for militancy and dissent.
During the Assembly elections in Karnataka, Modi’s campaign included a drive past my home on New Tippasandra Road. His ‘parade’ was scheduled for Sunday morning, but we were barricaded inside our homes from Friday evening itself. Shops were ordered to close, hawkers and vendors driven away, trees chopped down, and electrical lines cut because they were hanging lower than the required clearance of 20 feet for his convoy. Young BJP workers scaled my compound wall without permission, climbed my tree, and invaded my compound. The whole street was saffron-ised. Saffron buntings, flags, posters, and placards. On Sunday morning, van loads of people were ferried in and given caps, shawls, and flower petals. Modi’s drive-past lasted less than 10 seconds. Surrounded by Black Cats carrying AK 47s at the ready, the paramilitary, several hundreds of policemen, police vans and ambulances. He stood inside his bullet-proof casing, grumpy, expressionless, waving like a marionette. For the first time in 70 years, I felt fear and considered locking my gate and front door, but resisted the temptation.
“Because of an angry showdown I had with the assistant supervisor of jails, Mr Chablani, about them delivering food to my mother on time, he suspended our visits and did not give her the food we delivered for a month. He also told my mother that the family had lost interest in her. This was a lie, and I hope his karma takes care of that.
My mother was scared that the Emergency would get worse, and that they would target me. So, she wanted me to go to Boston and study music at the Berklee College of Music. This was her wish, and also my deep regret, that I did not stay back and try to save her.
I remember the last time I saw my mother. She was in a terrible state but put up a brave front for my sake. I was speechless, confused, and just sat there with her, knowing I was leaving. The one thing I am happy about is that I touched her feet before I left…That was the last time I saw my mother.”
Priyanka Gandhi took the same route a week before. There were no Black Cats, no fanfare, no barricades. Traffic was disrupted for just 45 minutes when she stood on top of her van and made her speech.
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One wonders – Why is Modi so afraid, and Priyanka, not?
What a flip around! The roles are reversed. The chaiwallah does not drink chai in a wayside tea stall, but Priyanka and Rahul Gandhi – high pedigree, foreign educated -- do.
“So many years later, I feel that now, the only person who speaks my language is the grandson of the person who was the sole reason for my mother’s death. So, what is this world?! Millions of atoms running from force field to force field? Does energy, both good and evil, move from side to side or is it just like the rise and fall of waves?”
Is India going to submit to dictatorship or fight to save democracy? Will constitutionality triumph, or will we continue to bow our heads and allow Modi to redefine India and us?
(Nandana and Konarak Reddy are the daughter and son of the late artist/activist couple Snehalata and Pattabhirama Reddy. Snehalata Reddy was arrested during the Emergency on May 2, 1976, in the Baroda Dynamite Case, involving George Fernandes, held as an accused merely because of her friendship with him. She was not named in the final charge-sheet in the case and was released on January 15, 1977, as her health deteriorated. Five days later, she died, aged 51. Nandana was 23 and Konarak 20 in 1975. Nandana is the founder of Concerned for Working Children (CWC), an NGO that was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in 2012; Konarak is an internationally renowned guitarist who briefly attended Berklee College of Music. Pattabhirama Reddy died in May 2006, aged 86. In the above presentation, the part highlighted in blue is Konarak Reddy’s narration of his experience in detention).
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