The IC 410 Hijacking Case: A Shameful Example of the Congress’ Dangerous Contempt for the Rule of Law

Dr. A Surya Prakash, 

Distinguished Fellow, VIF

On December 20, 1978, Bhola Pandey of Azamgarh and his friend Devendar Pandey of Ballia hijacked Indian Airlines flight IC 410 from Lucknow to Delhi, soon after it took off from Lucknow.There were 132 passengers on board. The hijackers, who appeared to be armed, made several demands and forced the aircraft to land at Varanasi. They said they were members of the Youth Congress. They wanted Indira Gandhi to be released from jail; all criminal cases against her and Sanjay Gandhi to be withdrawn; and the Janata Party Government at the Centre to tender its resignation. They demanded that the authorities should convey “their regards” to Sanjay Gandhi and summon the Chief Minister of the state for talks. The Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh, the Inspector General of Police and the Chief Secretary took a special flight to Varanasi and arrived at that airport soon after 1 a.m. the following morning, to negotiate the release of the passengers. The hijackers also demanded that arrangements be made for them to address a press conference at the airport lounge and that the Prime Minister and All India Radio should be informed of the hijacking.

Following protracted negotiations with the Chief Minister and senior state officials, the two hijackers released the passengers and surrendered. The hijacking incident created quite a stir in Parliament and the Minister of Tourism and Civil Aviation Mr.Purushottam Kaushik made a statement the following day and explained the sequence of events beginning with the hijack of the aircraft soon after it took off from Lucknow the previous day.¹

That week was marked by large-scale violence in many states triggered by members of the Congress Party in protest against the arrest of Ms.Indira Gandhi in a breach of privilege case and her disqualification from Parliament on December 19. Tha Pandeys hijacked the plane on December 20 to protest against Parliament’s decision to punish Ms.Gandhi. On December 21, Congress mobs went to the extent of hurling bombs into the Calcutta residence of Mr.Samar Guha, the Chairman of the Committee of Privileges of the Lok Sabha, which had indicted Ms.Gandhi. Congress goons also went on the rampage in Bangalore and Hyderabad and targeted public property. Several persons were killed in these incidents. These violent incidents became the subject matter of an intense debate on December 23 in the Lok Sabha.

MPs belonging to other political parties condemned the hijacking and said that such trends smacked of fascist tendencies, which the Congress Party had in any case displayed in abundant measure during the dreaded Emergency imposed by Ms.Indira Gandhi for 19 months from June, 1975. However, leading lights of the Congress Party including Mr.R.Venkataraman, who later became President of India and Mr.Vasant Sathe, sought to rationalize the conduct of their party members and even tried to dismiss the hijacking incident as nothing more than a joke. They went to extraordinary lengths to defend Bhola Pandey and Devender Pandey when the Lok Sabha debated the incident. Their comments said a lot about the respect that the Congress Party had for Parliament and its committees. It showed that despite the humiliating defeat suffered by the party in the March, 1977 Lok Sabha election, when it was punished for imposing a dictatorship on India, it had learnt few lessons. The debate once again exposed the Congress mindset, its fascist inclinations and revealed a lot about the party’s respect for the rule of law.

Among those who stood up to defend the violence unleashed by the party was Congress veteran R.Venkataraman, who went so far as to talk about the right of every citizen to express dissent.”It is a lesson we have learnt from Gandhiji…..when in South Africa, he protested against discriminatory laws and courted imprisonment…..When Gandhiji broke the salt laws in the country for the purpose of agitating the peoples’ right to freedom , he exercised the right to dissent. Therefore, the people of the country feel that a certain punishment is out of proportion or is unwarranted (expulsion of Indira Gandhi from the Lok Sabha and her arrest) and they have a right to dissent and to take recourse to such things as to bring forth their point of view…..”.²

After this near shameful justification of country-wide violence, including the hijacking, Mr.Venkataraman claimed that the Congress Working Committee had passed a resolution condemning violence. However, “if in spite of it (the resolution), certain people take to certain measures, it is not because of the bidding, it is in spite of it”. Therefore, he claimed, the party was not to blame. He then went on to claim that “there are always recalcitrant and intransigent elements in every party. There are always extreme elements in every party and extreme elements cannot be shown or brought up as an argument for condemning the party as a whole”.³

This argument sounds hollow today because the Congress Party has rewarded the “recalcitrant and intransigent and extreme elements” with party tickets to contest not just the state assembly election in Uttar Pradesh but the Lok Sabha polls four times in a row! It shows that those who hijacked the aircraft in 1978 are deeply loved and respected by the Nehru-Gandhis and the Congress Party.

Finally, Mr.Venkataraman dismissed the hijacking as nothing more than a joke. He said when they first heard the news about the hijacking, there was great deal of anger in the country. “But, ultimately, when it turned out to be nothing more than a toy pistol and a cricket ball, Sir, it has become the joke of the year”. On hearing this, the Speaker said “fortunately” Mr.Venkataraman was not in that plane.⁴

Mr.Vasant Sathe, another senior parliamentarian in the Congress ranks, said at the outset that he was not justifying the conduct of the Pandeys but said he did not know how to describe the incident. Was it hijacking, skyjacking or skyjoking? According to him, it was “a prank by misguided young men” because they had deployed a cricket ball and a toy pistol.⁵

Mr.Janardhana Poojary blamed the ruling Janata Party government for the violence that culminated in the hijacking. He said there was an overwhelming sentiment across the country in favour of Ms.Gandhi and people were willing to sacrifice their lives and their property for her sake.

Lok Sabha records show that Mr.K.P.Unnikrishnan informed the House of the political connections and antecedents of the two Pandeys. He said they were closely connected with a confidant of Ms.Gandhi and were “very active” in the campaign to oust Mr.Bahuguna from the Chief Ministership of Uttar Pradesh.⁶

Mr.Yadvendra Dutta spoke of how members of the Congress Party were saying that “if Indiraji goes to jail, rivers of blood will flow”. The Congress had just a single point programme – “release the queen bee or the honey bees will die. Is this not sycophancy of the highest order?”⁷

Mr.Dutt compared the Congress Party’s tactics to “Hitlerian tactics”. He said the technique of a dictator is to bring the institutions of democracy into disparagement, disregard and disgrace” and all this one can see when Sanjay Gandhi is taken to court, followed by a howling mob which is abusing every court officer. He recalled that in Hitler’s time this is what happened in Germany. In the streets of Munich or Hamburg, jack-booted storm-troopers marched on the streets to give people the impression that democracy was useless. “And that is exactly what they (Congress Party) want to show…that Mrs.Gandhi and Shri Sanjay Gandhi are above the law and they are above everything. Nothing can be done against them except to worship them by garlanding. That is what they want to establish in this country”.⁸

Mr.Saugata Roy said Mr.Dharam Bir Sinha, a former MP was on the hijacked plane. He told him that the hijackers were dressed in khadi kurta and pyjama . They came out of the cockpit and addressed the passengers and told them why they were hijacking the plane. They said they wanted to focus the attention of the world to Ms.Gandhi’s arrest. “There may not have been specific instructions; but these young men had a specific purpose in mind – to demand the release of Mrs.Gandhi”. He said he heard from Varanasi that groups of Congress Party supporters went to the Varanasi airport that day and raised slogans like “Pandeyji ki jai”.⁹

Mr.P.G.Mavalankar, a member of the Committee of Privileges which found Ms.Gandhi guilty of breach of privilege of the House, said ‘there was ample proof of her guilt”. He did some plain speaking and said he was shocked to hear of the bomb attack on the house of Mr.Samar Guha, Chairman, Committee of Privileges. He said the House must stand as one and condemn this incident and build up public opinion against such behavior. He said neither Mr.Guha nor other members of the Committee of Privileges would be intimidated by such conduct. He said such protests were highly objectionable “as they lead to disruption, dislocation and sabotage” and we cannot tolerate it. He said some public decency and standards of morality had to be maintained in politics. Mr.Mavalankar was also amused at Mr.Venkataraman talking of the right of dissent in a democracy after Indira Gandhi had crushed dissent during the Emergency and jailed MPs who spoke against her in Parliament.¹⁰

Prime Minister Morarji Desai lambasted Mr.Venkataraman and other Congress MPs who were trying to down play the hijacking. He said it was fortunate that the incident did not end in a disaster.”If the pilots had lost their nerve, anything could have happened”. This was the gravity of the hijacking. He said he was pained to hear Mr.Venkataraman’s comment that the incident was a joke. “How was it a joke? Such a thing can never be defended, whether it was a toy pistol or whether a ball was presented as a bomb. How was it possible for the pilot to know that it was a toy pistol? They could not take a risk. If anything had happened, I do not know how many lives would have been lost”. He also referred to the large scale violence unleashed by the Congress Party in the country including the bomb attack on the house of the Chairman of the Committee of Privileges of the Lok Sabha; the violence in Karnataka and the attack on the house of another MP, Mr.Shejwalkar in Gwalior the previous night; and attempts to burn the office of the Janata Party in Delhi.¹¹

The Congress hatched a plot to split the Janata Party in Parliament in 1979 and succeeded in doing so by weaning away Chaudhary Charan Singh and his followers. The Congress Party tempted him with prime ministership if he broke away with his MPs. It offered him support to form the government. These moves led to the fall of the Morarji Desai Government. Mr.Charan Singh was sworn in as Prime Minister by the President, but he never faced Parliament as Prime Minister because the Congress Party withdrew support before the next session and thus forced elections. Meanwhile, the Charan Singh Government, under pressure from the Congress Party, initiated the process to withdraw the case against the hijackers. The case against the two Pandeys was dropped.¹²

Thereafter, the Congress Party honoured both of them by giving them tickets in the 1980 Uttar Pradesh Assembly election. They were elected to the assembly. Devendra Nath Pandey too has held key posts in the Uttar Pradesh Congress Committee apart from successfully contesting elections to the state assembly.¹³

Since then, Bhola Pandey has been a favourite of the Nehru-Gandhis and given tickets to contest Lok Sabha elections in 1999, 2004 and 2009. On all these occasions, he has been unsuccessful. Further, Bhola Pandey has had his brush with the law on several occasions since the hijacking. For example, he was arrested and remanded to judicial custody by a local court in Ballia in March, 2009 following a non-bailable warrant in an extortion case dating back to 1982. Though remanded to judicial custody, the magistrate permitted him to file his nomination papers for the Lok Sabha election.¹⁴

However, his clout with the Nehru-Gandhis is such that he has been once again given the ticket for the Salempur Lok Sabha seat in 2014! Who knows? Given their persistence, the Nehru-Gandhis may well succeed in their efforts to bring the man who hijacked a plane in 1978 into their ranks in Parliament!

References:

1. Lok Sabha Debates, December 21, 1978, Cols 331-335
2. Lok Sabha Debates, December 23, 1978, Col 16
3. Ibid, Col 17
4. Ibid
5. Ibid, Col 41
6. Ibid, Col 3
7. Ibid, Col 37
8. Ibid, Col 39
9. Ibid, Col 47-48
10. Ibid, Col 59-61
11. Ibid, 107-108
12. P. 124, Indian Airports (Shocking Ground Realities), Kishin R. Wadhwaney,Diamond Pocket Books, 2005
13. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bholanath_and_Devendra_Pandey
14. http://zeenews.india.com/news/general-election/cong-candidate-from-salem...

Remembering the Dreaded Emergency: Lesson for Future of Indian Democracy

Dr. A Surya Prakash, Distinguished Fellow, VIF

June 25 marks the 38th anniversary of the dreaded Emergency that turned a vibrant Indian democracy into a dictatorship. It was imposed by the then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi in 1975 to gain absolute power after she was found guilty of corrupt electoral practice by the Allahabad High Court. Unwilling to accept the judicial verdict, Ms Gandhi got a pliant President to issue a proclamation under Article 352 of the Constitution to impose an “internal emergency”. The emergency, which lasted 19 months, constituted the darkest hour for India’s democracy. The Constitution was mutilated, parliament was reduced to a rubber stamp and the media was gagged. Even the judiciary failed to stand up to the tyrannical regime. As a result, the people of India lost their basic freedoms and came face to face with fascism. Democracy was restored after the defeat of the Congress Party in the March, 1977 Lok Sabha election.

Here is a brief account of how it all started and what the Indira Gandhi government did to Parliament, the Media, the Judiciary and more importantly, to the basic freedoms of the people. The political crisis that led to the imposition of the emergency began on June 12, 1975 when Justice Jagmohanlal Sinha of Allahabad High Court held Prime Minister Indira Gandhi guilty of corrupt practice in the Lok Sabha election of 1971. The judge held her election to parliament as void and barred her from contesting elections for six years. On a request by Indira Gandhi’s lawyer, the judge stayed his own order for 20 days to enable her to go in appeal.

Indira Gandhi’s lawyers filed an appeal in the Supreme Court. Justice V.R.Krishna Iyer, passed orders on this petition on June 24, but the interregnum was used by the Congress Party to stage a series of rent-a-crowd-rallies in support of Indira Gandhi outside her residence. The biggest rally was held on June 20 and for this the Delhi administration and the Delhi Police commandeered 1700 buses and the railways ran special trains from far and near. Since all buses were forcibly requisitioned for the rally, citizens of Delhi had to do without public transport that day.

Indira Gandhi had hoped that the Supreme Court would provide her relief but that was not to be. Justice Iyer granted a “conditional stay” of Justice Sinha’s decision. He barred Indira Gandhi from participating in debates or voting in Parliament and referred the matter to a larger Bench of the Court.

Meanwhile, the opposition parties got together to press for Indira Gandhi’s resignation in the light of the Allahabad High Court judgement. Justice Iyer’s order, prohibiting the Prime Minister from voting in parliament or participating in debates, had made her position even more untenable, they said and demanded that she must quit office forthwith. They held a massive rally in the Ramlila grounds on June 25, which was addressed by the Sardovaya leader and freedom fighter Jayaprakash Narayan, who was leading the movement to cleanse politics, and a host of other leaders. The Prime Minister, they said, was moving towards dictatorship and fascism. On the other hand, Indira Gandhi’s son, Sanjay Gandhi and many of her friends and political associates were pushing her towards a confrontation and were even suggesting measures that could wreck the Constitution. Siddhartha Shankar Ray and several others came up with suggestions which had the same effect – snuffing out democracy. Every member of the Prime Minister’s household appeared to be gravitating towards the same idea – crush political opponents and cling to power at any cost.

In the months preceding the Allahabad High Court judgement, Sanjay Gandhi had emerged as an extra-constitutional authority and people in government and the Congress Party were seen cringing and crawling before this new centre of power. When he found Congressmen and officials at his feet, Sanjay “summoned” Chief Ministers to the Prime Minister’s residence and began preparing lists of opposition politicians who, in his view, deserved to be put away. As congressmen vied with each other to produce hired crowds before her house, Indira Gandhi called S.S.Ray and told him the country needed “a shock treatment”. Ray said she could give India the shock treatment by imposing an “internal emergency” under Article 352 of the Constitution.

Thereafter, Indira Gandhi, accompanied by Ray, went to the President and asked him to impose an internal emergency under Article 352. She said there was no time to call a meeting of the Union Cabinet to discuss the proposal. On her return from the President’s House, she sent a letter to the President accompanied by a proclamation. President Fakruddin Ali Ahmed, who was a rubber stamp President, signed on the dotted line. The rules governing conduct of business in government prohibit a Prime Minister from taking unilateral decisions in matters such as these. It is mandatory that this be placed before the Cabinet. But the President lacked the moral fibre to protect the Constitution. As a result, he meekly succumbed and signed the Emergency proclamation.

Once the deed was done, India Gandhi’s household got out the lists and the police forces across the country were directed to arrest leaders of opposition parties. Jayaprakash Narayan, Morarji Desai, Atal Behari Vajpayee, Lal Krishna Advani, Madhu Dandavate, S.N.Mishra, Subramanian Swamy and a host of other leaders were arrested and sent to jails in Delhi, Bangalore and other places. Next, on Sanjay Gandhi’s orders electricity was cut off on New Delhi’s Fleet Street – Bahadurshah Zafar Marg, to prevent publication of newspapers next morning.

Having thus succeeded so effortlessly in wrecking the Constitutional scheme, Indira Gandhi summoned the Union Cabinet at 6 a.m on June 26 to “inform” it of her decision to impose an internal emergency under Article 352. The Cabinet capitulated and without discussion gave post-facto ratification to this decision. Soon thereafter, the Home Ministry imposed censorship on the media and prohibited newspapers from publishing news about detentions. A Chief Censor was appointed to keep a close watch of newspapers and journalists.

Once this infrastructure for dictatorship had been laid, other things followed. On June 27, 1975 the President issued an order suspending citizens’ right to move the courts for enforcement of fundamental rights guaranteed under Article 14 ( equality before law and equal protection of the law), Article 21 ( no deprivation of life and liberty except by procedure established by law), Article 22 ( no detention without being informed of the grounds for it). With the passage of this order, citizens lost their fundamental right to life and liberty. Later during the emergency, the President passed yet another order suspending the right of citizens to move court for enforcement of freedoms under Article 19.

Armed with these draconian powers, the government went about arresting politicians, journalists, academics and persons from other walks of life who opposed the Emergency.

Most of them were locked up under the dreaded Maintenance of Internal Security Act (MISA) with officials fabricating charges. MISA itself was amended to prohibit courts from applying the principles of “natural justice” in MISA detention cases. Even more extraordinary was the amendment which said disclosure of grounds of detention were not necessary, that the grounds were ‘confidential” and should not be communicated to the detenues or the courts and to bar representations against detention.

Meanwhile sycophancy reached the zenith. Dev Kant Barooah, President of the Congress Party declared “ Indira is India, India is Indira”.

One of the most ugly features of the Emergency was forcible sterilisation of the population and cleaning up of cities on Sanjay Gandhi’s order. In order to achieve quick results, Indira Gandhi assigned sterilization targets to all Chief Ministers, who in turn passed on targets to all government servants including teachers and policemen. The police went about target achievement in the only way they know. They surrounded villages, nabbed all males a la municipal squads which trap street dogs, and carted them off to the nearest primary health centers to be vasectomised. When villagers resisted, the police opened fire killing and injuring many protestors. Villages largely inhabited by Muslims were specially targeted because the government believed this community was against population control. Similar atrocities were perpetrated in the name of cleaning –up Delhi. Backed by a strong police force, municipal officials in Delhi swooped on residents of Turkman Gate and other areas and bulldozed hundreds of homes. Dozens of citizens lost their lives in the riots that broke out in the area.

A word about the conduct of different organs of the State. Parliament buckled under pressure and passed some of the most atrocious constitutional amendments including the 42 Amendment which stuck a big blow against the foundations of democracy. The speeches made by Congress MPs during these debates constitute the most shameful acts of sycophancy. The Supreme Court did not cover itself in glory either. Tragically, this institution too failed to stand up for the fundamental rights of citizens. The most glaring example of its capitulation to the ruling establishment was its infamous judgement in A.D.M.Jabalpur Vs Shiv Kant Shukla delivered on April 28, 1976 in which it declared that in view of the presidential order suspending fundamental rights, no citizen had the right to approach a court to safeguard his right to life and liberty. Barring honourable exceptions, the media, which came under harsh censorship on a daily basis, buckled under government pressure. The conduct of the bureaucracy was pathetic. Most bureaucrats succumbed to pressure and meekly complied with all illegal orders and caused endless misery to common people.

Democracy was restored after the defeat of the Congress Party in the March, 1977 Lok Sabha election. The first act of the Janata Party government that succeeded Indira Gandhi’s dictatorial regime was to restore democracy and remove the fascist amendments made to the Constitution. The cleaning up was done via the 44 Amendments and changes in many other laws that had been mutilated during the Emergency.

We must remember the Emergency and all the horrors that were inflicted in its name, if we want to prevent such tyranny hereafter. This is a story that must be told and retold so that citizens understand the value of democracy and fundamental rights and remain eternally vigilant to safeguard these freedoms. And the 25th of June is a befitting occasion to do that every year.