'Ring Out the Old, Ring In the Old'

It is easy to ride a tiger, but not so easy to get off.

An opposition member of India's Parliament cited that familiar saying last week when he was asked to comment on Prime Minister Indira Gandhi's latest steps to preserve her firm rule over India's destiny. At the annual convention of her ruling Congress Party in Chandigarh, 150 miles north of New Delhi, Mrs. Gandhi announced, to no one's great surprise, that she would ask Parliament to prolong the state of emergency she declared last June and to postpone next month's elections for another year. Since the Congress Party enjoys a two-thirds majority in the Lok Sabha (lower house), and since about 30 opposition Members of Parliament are still under detention, both measures will sail through with ease.

Although her mandate had seemed assured, Mrs. Gandhi apparently decided that she could not afford to take any chances. Free parliamentary elections in 1976 might well have triggered state elections in Kashmir and Tamil Nadu --two states where opposition forces remain strong. Moreover, in order to hold elections, Mrs. Gandhi would presumably have felt obliged to lift the state of emergency, if only to give a semblance of a free campaign. That she was not prepared to do. If the emergency were lifted, she told the convention, neither her 20-point social and economic program nor any other program could be effectively carried out--a claim that opposition MPs scoffed at.

Mrs. Gandhi also insisted that there could be no restoration of civil liberties because of possible foreign influence.

Climaxing a torrent of anti-American speeches at the convention, she charged that "some powers that had tasted success in their destabilization game in Chile nurtured similar designs against India." In response to this implicit attack on U.S. policies, Washington officially expressed its "concern and dismay" to New Delhi. "Mrs. Gandhi genuinely believes that Indian society must be transformed," says one veteran diplomat in New Delhi. "But, all the disclaimers to the contrary, she probably also believes that she is the only person who can do it." For the time being at least, many of India's 600 million people are willing to go along with the Prime Minister. This year's harvest will be good, and prices, thanks to the government's tight money policy and crackdown on black marketeers, are down. Moreover, the government announced last week that the emergency had produced one windfall: voluntary disclosures of "black money" (undeclared and untaxed income) have so far amounted to $1.7 billion. Of that, the government will reap $350 million in taxes--which will just about wipe out the current budget deficit.

Modest Rebellion. The elite, who since independence have been the stewards--and the main beneficiaries--of Indian democracy, are beginning to feel that the changes of 1975 will be permanent, or at least long-lasting. Perhaps the country's most unhappy lot (apart from the thousands who are still being detained without trial) is the now-shackled press. Somnambulant since June, it was stung to modest rebellion by harsh new controls in early December, which among other things abolished the right of newspapers to report parliamentary debate without restriction, a privilege they had enjoyed for 19 years. The result was a rash of mildly sarcastic cartoons. After the Chandigarh announcement last week, the Indian Express (whose once virulent criticism of the government has now been effectively brought to heel) came out with one showing two elders holding up a New Year's banner. The message: RING OUT THE OLD, RING IN THE OLD.

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