5.12 The 1971 Mid-Term Election — A Bold Gamble

The 1969 split had reduced the Indira Gandhi government to a minority. Yet her government continued in office with the issue-based outside support of a few other parties — including the Communist Party of India (CPI) and the DMK. During this period the government made conscious efforts to project its socialist credentials. It was a phase of vigorous campaigning to implement the existing land reform laws and to bring in further land-ceiling legislation. Bank nationalisation had already happened (July 1969); the abolition-of-privy-purse battle was being fought in courts and parliament.

In order to end her dependence on outside parties, to strengthen her party's position in Parliament, and to seek a popular mandate for her programmes, Indira Gandhi recommended the dissolution of the Lok Sabha in December 1970. It was another surprising and bold move — the term of the Lok Sabha elected in 1967 had not expired. The fifth general elections to the Lok Sabha were held in February 1971.

5.12.1 The Contest — Grand Alliance vs Indira

The electoral contest appeared to be loaded against Indira Gandhi's Congress (R). After all, the New Congress was just one faction of an already weakened party. Most observers believed that the real organisational strength of the Congress lay with the Old Congress — Congress (O). Worse for Indira Gandhi, all the major non-Communist, non-Congress opposition parties stitched together a single electoral umbrella known as the Grand Alliance^?.

Against this Grand Alliance, the ruling Congress (R) had only one strategic ally — the Communist Party of India (CPI). On paper, the contest looked unfair.

5.12.2 An Issue, an Agenda, a Slogan — "Garibi Hatao"

Yet the New Congress had something its big opponents lacked: an issue, an agenda, and a positive slogan. The Grand Alliance had no coherent political programme. Indira Gandhi mocked them: their only common slogan, she said, was "Indira Hatao" (Remove Indira). In contrast, she put forward a positive programme captured in the famous slogan "Garibi Hatao"^? (Remove Poverty).

5.12.3 The Outcome — A Sweep

The results of the February 1971 Lok Sabha elections were as dramatic as Indira's decision to call them. The Congress(R)–CPI alliance won more seats and votes than the unified Congress had ever won in the first four general elections. The combine took 375 seats in the Lok Sabha and secured 48.4 percent of votes. Indira Gandhi's Congress(R) on its own won 352 seats with about 44 percent of the popular vote.

Compare this with the Old Congress: a party with so many stalwarts could secure less than one-fourth of the votes that Indira Gandhi's party secured, and won merely 16 seats. The Grand Alliance of the opposition proved a "Grand Failure" — its combined tally of seats was less than 60. The Congress led by Indira Gandhi had established its claim to being the 'real' Congress and had restored Congress dominance in Indian politics.

5.13 After the Election — Bangladesh and the "Iron Lady" Image

Soon after the 1971 Lok Sabha election, a major political and military crisis broke out in East Pakistan (today's Bangladesh). As you read in Chapter 4, the crisis culminated in the December 1971 Indo-Pak War and the establishment of Bangladesh as a new nation. Indira Gandhi's confident handling of the war added to her popularity. Even opposition leaders admired her statesmanship. Across the country, she was now seen as both the protector of the poor and a strong nationalist leader.

5.13.1 The 1972 State Assembly Elections — A Second Sweep

Riding this dual wave of Garibi Hatao and the Bangladesh victory, the Congress (R) swept the State Assembly elections held in 1972. With two successive election victories — one at the Centre (1971) and one at the State level (1972) — the dominance of the Congress was restored. The Congress was now in power in almost all the States. It was popular across very different social sections. Within a span of just four years (1967 → 1971), Indira Gandhi had warded off the challenge to her leadership and to the dominant position of the Congress party. Opposition to her — within the party or outside it — simply did not seem to matter.

5.14 Was the Old Congress System Really Restored?

But did this dramatic comeback mean the old Congress system had been restored? Not really. What Indira Gandhi had carried out was not a revival of the old Congress party — it was a re-invention of it. The party occupied the same dominant position in terms of popularity, but it had become a different kind of party.

Indira Gandhi had thus restored the Congress system by changing its very nature. The new Congress did not have the old party's capacity to absorb the country's tensions and conflicts. While the Congress consolidated its position and Indira Gandhi assumed unprecedented political authority, the spaces for democratic expression of people's aspirations actually shrank. Popular unrest and mobilisation around development and economic deprivation continued to grow — and eventually, as Chapter 6 explains, that unrest produced a political crisis that threatened the very foundation of constitutional democracy: the Emergency of 1975–77.

5.15 Conclusion

The 1960s were a hinge in Indian political history. The Congress system that had been established under Nehru in the 1950s came under twin pressure — from a more united opposition (1967) and from internal factional struggle (1969). Indira Gandhi met both challenges with bold initiatives: she went over the heads of the Syndicate to the Indian voter; she gave the party a new Left-of-centre ideology of Garibi Hatao; and she turned the 1971 mid-term election into a personal mandate. She won, but the Congress she rebuilt was a different party — more centralised, more personality-driven, less factional, and unable to absorb the wide range of opinions that the older Congress had once stitched together.

The chapter therefore answers all four of the questions it had set out to address: it has shown how the political transition after Nehru took place; how opposition unity (1967) and the Congress split (1969) challenged Congress dominance; how the new Congress under Indira Gandhi overcame those challenges (1971); and how new policies and ideologies — bank nationalisation, abolition of privy purses, Garibi Hatao — facilitated the restoration of the Congress system on entirely new foundations.

5.16 NCERT Exercises — With Model Answers

Below are all ten end-of-chapter exercises from the NCERT textbook, each with a complete model answer. Tap "Show Answer" to reveal.

1. Which of these statements about the 1967 elections is/are correct?
   (a) Congress won the Lok Sabha elections but lost the Assembly elections in many states.
   (b) Congress lost both Lok Sabha and Assembly elections.
   (c) Congress lost majority in the Lok Sabha but formed a coalition government with the support of some other parties.
   (d) Congress retained power at the Centre with an increased majority.
   Show Answer ▼
   Correct option: (a) — The Congress did manage a majority in the Lok Sabha (with its lowest tally of seats and votes since 1952) but lost majority in seven states and was prevented from forming a government in two more — losing power in nine states in all. Options (b), (c) and (d) are factually incorrect.
2. Match the following:
   (a) Syndicate · (b) Defection · (c) Slogan · (d) Anti-Congressism
   
   (i) An elected representative leaving the party on whose ticket s/he has been elected
   (ii) A catchy phrase that attracts public attention
   (iii) Parties with different ideological position coming together to oppose Congress and its policies
   (iv) A group of powerful and influential leaders within the Congress
   Show Answer ▼
   Matching:
   (a) Syndicate → (iv) A group of powerful and influential leaders within the Congress
   (b) Defection → (i) An elected representative leaving the party on whose ticket s/he has been elected
   (c) Slogan → (ii) A catchy phrase that attracts public attention
   (d) Anti-Congressism → (iii) Parties with different ideological position coming together to oppose Congress and its policies
3. Whom would you identify with the following slogans/phrases?
   (a) Jai Jawan, Jai Kisan · (b) Indira Hatao! · (c) Garibi Hatao!
   Show Answer ▼
   Answers:
   (a) Jai Jawan, Jai Kisan — coined by Lal Bahadur Shastri (PM 1964–66) during the 1965 war and food crisis to honour the soldier and the farmer at the same time.
   (b) Indira Hatao! — the slogan of the Grand Alliance of opposition parties (Congress (O), SSP, PSP, Jana Sangh, Swatantra and BKD) in the 1971 Lok Sabha election.
   (c) Garibi Hatao! — given by Indira Gandhi as the central campaign slogan of Congress (R) in the 1971 Lok Sabha election.
4. Which of the following statements about the Grand Alliance of 1971 is correct?
   (a) was formed by non-Communist, non-Congress parties.
   (b) had a clear political and ideological programme.
   (c) was formed by all non-Congress parties.
   Show Answer ▼
   Correct option: (a) — The Grand Alliance was formed by non-Communist, non-Congress parties: SSP, PSP, Bharatiya Jana Sangh, Swatantra, Bharatiya Kranti Dal and Congress (O). It did not include the CPI (which had aligned with the Congress (R)) — so option (c) is wrong. It also lacked a coherent programme, beyond opposing Indira Gandhi (its only common slogan was "Indira Hatao") — so option (b) is wrong.
5. How should a political party resolve its internal differences? Here are some suggestions. Think of each and list out their advantages and shortcomings.
   (a) Follow the footsteps of the party president
   (b) Listen to the majority group
   (c) Secret ballot voting on every issue
   (d) Consult the senior and experienced leaders of the party
   Show Answer ▼
   Model Answer:
   (a) Follow the party president — Advantage: quick decisions, clear command. Shortcoming: autocratic; ignores genuine minority views; the president can become a dictator (this is what the Syndicate did to Indira Gandhi initially, and what Indira later did to Congress (R)).
   (b) Listen to the majority group — Advantage: democratic; majority support legitimises decisions. Shortcoming: tyranny of the majority; legitimate minority concerns may be ignored; the majority view may be wrong.
   (c) Secret ballot on every issue — Advantage: protects voters from intimidation and gives a true reading of opinion; this was how Indira Gandhi defeated Morarji Desai in January 1966. Shortcoming: turns every internal debate into a vote-count; weakens deliberation; not practical for daily decisions.
   (d) Consult senior leaders — Advantage: uses experience and institutional memory; the Kamaraj-led consultation in 1964 produced a smooth Shastri succession. Shortcoming: can entrench an old guard / "Syndicate"; may stifle younger leaders and new ideas.
   Best practice combines all four: a credible president, broad consultation with seniors, regular reference to the majority view, and use of secret ballot for the most contested questions.
6. State which of these were reasons for the defeat of the Congress in 1967. Give reasons for your answer.
   (a) The absence of a charismatic leader in the Congress party
   (b) Split within the Congress party
   (c) Increased mobilisation of regional, ethnic and communal groups
   (d) Increasing unity among non-Congress parties
   (e) Internal differences within the Congress party
   Show Answer ▼
   Reasons that were valid causes:
   (a) Yes — Nehru's death (1964) and Shastri's death (1966) had left the Congress without a tall, charismatic leader; Indira Gandhi was still untested.
   (c) Yes — anti-Hindi agitation in Madras (lifting DMK to a majority), regional mobilisation in Punjab, and communal tensions in the north all hurt the Congress.
   (d) Yes — Lohia's strategy of Non-Congressism united ideologically diverse parties on seat-sharing arrangements, preventing vote-splitting.
   (e) Yes — internal factionalism, half the Indira cabinet losing their seats, and the looming Indira-vs-Syndicate fight all weakened the Congress.
   Reason that was not a cause:
   (b) No — The formal split of the Congress happened in 1969, after the 1967 elections; it could not be a reason for the 1967 defeat. (However, the internal differences that led to the eventual split were already a factor — captured by option (e).)
7. What were the factors which led to the popularity of Indira Gandhi's Government in the early 1970s?
   Show Answer ▼
   Model Answer: Several converging factors lifted Indira Gandhi's popularity in the early 1970s.
   (i) The 1971 mid-term election victory: Congress (R) won 352 seats with about 44% of the popular vote — a sweeping personal mandate that established her as the supreme leader of the Congress and the country.
   (ii) The "Garibi Hatao" agenda: The slogan and the policies behind it — public-sector growth, land-ceiling laws, urban property ceiling, removal of disparities, abolition of princely privileges — built a direct support base among the landless, Dalits, Adivasis, minorities, women and unemployed youth.
   (iii) Bank nationalisation (July 1969): The takeover of 14 leading private banks projected the government as pro-poor and pro-credit-for-the-rural-economy.
   (iv) Abolition of privy purses (1971): A symbolic victory of republican equality over hereditary princely privilege.
   (v) The 1971 Bangladesh War: Decisive victory in the December 1971 Indo-Pak war, the surrender of 90,000+ Pakistani soldiers, and the creation of Bangladesh transformed Indira Gandhi into a strong nationalist leader admired even by opposition leaders.
   (vi) The 1972 State Assembly sweep: Confirmed nationwide dominance and made Congress the ruling party in almost every state, completing the "restoration" of Congress dominance.
8. What does the term 'syndicate' mean in the context of the Congress party of the sixties? What role did the Syndicate play in the Congress party?
   Show Answer ▼
   Model Answer: "Syndicate" was the informal name given to a group of senior Congress leaders who controlled the party's organisation in the 1960s. It was led by K. Kamaraj (former Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu and then Congress President). Its members included S. K. Patil (Bombay/Mumbai), S. Nijalingappa (Mysore/Karnataka), N. Sanjeeva Reddy (Andhra Pradesh) and Atulya Ghosh (West Bengal).
   
   Roles played by the Syndicate: (i) It engineered the smooth succession from Nehru to Lal Bahadur Shastri in 1964 through consensus among Congress MPs. (ii) It ensured Indira Gandhi's election as Leader of the Congress Parliamentary Party in January 1966, expecting that her relative inexperience would make her dependent on it. (iii) It had a decisive say in the formation of Indira Gandhi's first Council of Ministers and in policy formulation. (iv) It nominated N. Sanjeeva Reddy as the official Congress candidate for the 1969 Presidential election against Indira Gandhi's wishes — leading to the open showdown.
   
   After the 1969 split, the Syndicate stayed with the Congress (O). After Indira Gandhi's sweeping victory in 1971, all these powerful state-level kingmakers lost their political prestige and influence.
9. Discuss the major issue which led to the formal split of the Congress Party in 1969.
   Show Answer ▼
   Model Answer: The immediate trigger for the formal Congress split was the 1969 Presidential election, but the deeper causes lay in a long-running power struggle and ideological conflict between Indira Gandhi and the Syndicate.
   
   Background: After becoming PM in January 1966 and surviving the difficult 1967 election, Indira Gandhi began to assert her independence from the Syndicate. She got the Congress Working Committee to adopt a Ten Point Programme in May 1967 with a Left orientation — including social control of banks, ceiling on urban property, public distribution of food, land reforms and house sites for the rural poor — which the Syndicate formally approved but privately opposed.
   
   The flashpoint — 1969 Presidential election: Following the death of President Zakir Hussain, the Syndicate nominated N. Sanjeeva Reddy as the official Congress candidate against Indira Gandhi's wishes. She retaliated by encouraging Vice-President V.V. Giri to contest as an independent. She also announced two big populist measures: nationalisation of 14 private banks (July 1969) and the move to abolish privy purses. Finance Minister Morarji Desai resigned in protest.
   
   The whip vs the conscience vote: Congress President S. Nijalingappa issued a whip directing all Congress MPs/MLAs to vote for Sanjeeva Reddy. Indira Gandhi's supporters requisitioned an AICC meeting (which is why her faction was called "requisitionists") and she publicly called for a 'conscience vote'. V.V. Giri won; Sanjeeva Reddy lost.
   
   The split: Nijalingappa expelled Indira Gandhi from the party on 11 November 1969. She declared her group was the real Congress. By November 1969, the Congress had split into Congress (O) — Old/Organisation, led by Nijalingappa and Morarji Desai — and Congress (R) — Requisitionists/New, led by Indira Gandhi. Indira Gandhi projected the split as an ideological divide between socialists and conservatives, between the pro-poor and the pro-rich.
10. Read the passage and answer the questions below:
    "...Indira Gandhi changed the Congress into highly centralised and undemocratic party organisation, from the earlier federal, democratic and ideological formation that Nehru had led..... But this... could not have happened had not Indira Gandhi changed the entire nature of politics. This new, populist politics turned political ideology... into a mere electoral discourse, use of various slogans not meant to be translated into government policies...... During its great electoral victories in early 1970s, amidst the celebration, the Congress party as a political organisation died....." — Sudipta Kaviraj
    (a) What according to the author is the difference between the strategies of Nehru and Indira Gandhi?
    (b) Why does the author say that the Congress party 'died' in the seventies?
    (c) In what way did the change in the Congress party affect other political parties also?
    Show Answer ▼
    (a) Difference between Nehru's and Indira's strategies: According to Sudipta Kaviraj, Nehru ran the Congress as a federal, democratic and ideological formation — power was shared with state-level leaders, internal debate was tolerated, and policy was driven by ideology. Indira Gandhi, in contrast, made the party highly centralised and undemocratic: power was concentrated at the top around her personality, and ideology was reduced to slogans meant for elections rather than translated into actual government policy.
    
    (b) Why the Congress 'died' in the seventies: Even as Congress (R) won landslide victories in 1971 and 1972, it died as a political organisation because: (i) state-level leaders and factions — the building blocks of the old Congress — had been sidelined; (ii) internal democracy had been replaced by top-down command; (iii) policy was driven by populist slogans (Garibi Hatao) more than by genuine ideological debate; and (iv) the party's ability to absorb diverse opinions, which had been its great strength, had been hollowed out.
    
    (c) Effect on other political parties: Once the Congress had been turned into a personality-driven, slogan-based party, opposition parties faced new pressures: (i) they too began to centralise around charismatic leaders (the rise of "supreme leader" politics across parties); (ii) they began competing through slogans rather than detailed programmes (e.g. "Indira Hatao" against "Garibi Hatao"); (iii) they had to build their own grand alliances post-poll to challenge Indira's dominance, often without coherent programmes; and (iv) the long-term consequence was a weakening of internal democracy in many Indian parties — a pattern that continues to shape Indian politics decades later.

5.17 Let Us Do It Together

5.18 Chapter Summary

5.19 Key Terms — Glossary