The Declaration of Emergency

Manmohan Choudhury

Translated by Sailen Routray

Jayaprakash Narayan (1902-1979)
Narayan was a key figure in the opposition
to the emergency imposed by Indira Gandhi in 1975
Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons/Nehru Memorial Museum

It was the 27th of June. I had gone to my brother-in-law Sri Krusnapada Bhowmik’s house, to paint an oil portrait of my mother-in-law. Krusna was then a highly placed official with the police. I would have hardly painted for an hour or so, when the telephone rang. I picked the receiver, someone from Gunanidhi Bhavan was calling me. Kshetrabasi Pati informed me over phone that Jayprakash Ji and other leaders had been arrested at the crack of dawn. A state of emergency had been declared in the country. I immediately returned home, packing up my paints and brushes.  Hearsays bandied that the censoring of newspapers had started. However, the rules for this purpose were yet to be created. News reached the offices of newspapers courtesy organisations like PTI. The full range of the day’s events was published in a special edition of The Samaja and later when proper censorship was instituted, all those news items were made to fit the official structures. 

After speaking with others, it was decided that a meeting would be called that afternoon at our home to discuss this development. According to the decision, around twenty-five people from Cuttack were informed about this. They assembled at our place around four. Amongst them were Harekrushna Mahtab, Nilamani Routray, Purnachandra Parida, Srikanta Panda, Biraja Ray, Bou, Syamali Mahapatra, Biswambhara Parida, sarvodaya activists such as Surendra Mohanty, Kshetrabasi Pati, Nikunja Das, and Gopal Prasad Das, etc. Dada was at Angul, so he arrived later. There were a lot of speculation in the meeting. It was evident that the declaration of a state of emergency had stunned everyone. After a long discussion it was decided that it must be opposed and as there was no possibility of the truth coming out in newspapers, some steps needed to be taken to inform the people of the real situation.

It was decided that if a small pamphlet were to be published and distributed at the railway station and the Badambadi bus stand, it would reach across the whole of Odisha overnight. Hence, a pamphlet was drafted. When the question arose as to who all would sign it, it was agreed that it would come out with Ramadevi’s signature. It seemed some friends were reluctant to put their names down on paper. It was also seen later that among the friends assembled that day, a few remained silent and did not engage in the unsettled state of affairs.

The pamphlet was immediately printed in the Gramsevak press and activists took it to the Badambadi bus stand and the railway station and came back after distributing copies of the pamphlet. That evening it was raining heavily. But who cared? It was observed that people were very eager to have a copy of the pamphlet.

On the second day, dada came and a meeting was held again. In this meeting, it was decided that a civil disobedience agitation would be held against the declaration of emergency. Then Section 144 of the IPC had been imposed in Cuttack. Immediately, Biraja Ray, Shyamali Mahapatra and Surendra Mohanty came forward, and were arrested after sloganeering and attempting to lecture near Gourishankar Park. Another pamphlet came out the day after exhorting all Indians to oppose the imposition of the emergency. Arrests were expected any time and someone shared the news that there was an order to arrest nine people including Nabakrushna Choudhury. In the midst of all this, it was decided after a discussion that I would not immediately come out to be arrested. Instead, I would organise the movement against the emergency in hiding for five to seven days before showing up for civil disobedience.

However, when a place for my hiding was looked for, all those friends whose homes were proposed in the discussion were hesitant citing multiple problems. On the other hand, rumour had spread that dada would get arrested. Hence, he was waiting, having packed his clothes and books on 28th June. But nothing was heard about my arrest. Later some people said that in order to hoodwink us, some of our friends were fed with wrong information from official sources.

Meanwhile, after having made arrangements for sharing news with the activists in various districts, I had started writing a letter to Vinobaji. In the letter, I had written that, “Indira Gandhi’s intention to end democracy and institute an authoritarian regime is now evident and I request you to raise your voice in support of democracy and civil rights.” I had not finished writing this letter. It was quite late in the night and no arrangements could be made for me to stay elsewhere, and therefore, I slept there. The police arrived in the wee hours of the morning of the 29th of June at around three o clock. Dada was sleeping in the room along the corridor. He got up and said, “I’ve been waiting for you since yesterday.” Then he got ready, wrapping up his bedding, etc. Bou got this news in Thoriasahi over telephone. Nikunja and others also got up from sleep and reached there. We were all getting ready to bid adieu to dada, and some people had started picking up his bedding, when dada asked the police, “Could you please show me the warrant?”

Lo and behold! When we saw the warrant, it had my name on it. Then I started packing my clothes and bedding, etc. I ended the incomplete letter to Vinoba by just writing, “I am getting arrested before I could finish writing this letter.” I left the letter in Sumitra’s care, told her to mail it to Vinobaji and left. There were two sub-inspectors of police. After we sat in the jeep, the driver had some difficulty in starting it. In the end, we had to push the jeep. I sarcastically said, “Now the government’s condition is like this jeep. It does not move until it’s pushed.” The police inspectors smiled.

I was taken to the jail in Cuttack. The very familiar ward number seventeen… On reaching there, I saw that Madan Sahoo, Anadi Nayak, and Manmohan Mishra, etc., had just arrived after being arrested. Later, other fellow workers also arrived. Ashok Das from Jajpur was also amongst them. It was a lively mess and the day was spent in commotion.

Conversations, flights of imagination, rights of the first-class prisoners, discussions and arguments with prison officials regarding the expectations from the jail, all these went on and on. Slowly we started settling down on our respective platforms. The readers might remember that I had described before that in prisons there were platforms that were six feet long and two and half feet wide, which were meant for the prisoners to sleep on. On one end of it lay a ridge that functioned as a pillow. You were meant to spread blankets and sheets on top of this and use it for sleeping and sitting.

We were getting ready to settle down in ward number seventeen. However, something else had been planned for me. At around ten in the night of the third day, Manmohan Mishra, Ashok Das and I were called and told that we would be taken elsewhere. We bundled up our belongings and went to the jail’s gate. I started singing a song of Kazi Nazrul–

কারার ঐ লৌহ কপাট

ভেঙে ফেল কর রে লোপাট

রক্ত জমাট শিকল পুজোর পাষাণ বেদী

The prison’s iron gates —

Break them, shatter them!

Destroy the blood stained stone altar

where chains are worshipped.

We were made to sit in two jeeps. The vehicles started moving towards Buxibazar and soon crossed the river Mahanadi and went further. Ashok babu and I were in one vehicle. The police officials made no reply when we asked them where we were being taken to. There was a desire to shout slogans while passing through the bazar, but it was eleven in the night and all the shops were shut. No one moved about on the streets. Who would hear our slogans?

The vehicle carrying Ashok and I started moving towards the road to Dhenkanal. It seemed we were being taken to either Dhenkanal or Angul. It could have been Sambalpur as well. However, the vehicle stopped in front of the gate of the jail in Dhenkanal at around one in the night and after dropping me there, the police officials left with Ashok. The jailer took me with him to a small ward located in a corner of the prison. I was alone there. I fell asleep in no time.

Note: This is a translation of a chapter from 'Kasturi Mruga Sama', the autobiography of Manmohan Choudhury (1915-2003). Choudhury was a freedom fighter and sarvodaya activist from Odisha who participated in almost all the popular socio-political movements of his times that happened in the state. He was also a noted writer of non-fiction in the Odia language who won major awards for his writing.