[On Wednesday June 25th fifty thousand people at…]

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On Wednesday June 25th fifty thousand people at a rally in New Delhi were urged by Jayaprakash Narayan, veteran anti-corruption campaigner, to start a nationwide campaign of civil disobedience to force Mrs Gandhi's resignation as Prime Minister, following her conviction on June 12th for corrupt election practices.

Only hours later a power cut early Thursday morning stopped the Delhi printing presses and by 5 a.m. police had dragged from their beds to jail some 700 people, mostly leaders of political opposition to Mrs Gandhi. She then spoke on radio of the national state of emergency called to defeat what she called "a deep amd widespread conspiracy to cause internal disruption"

All the Indian press is now under censorship, but the government claim that around 900 are now in jail, with no right of appeal to the courts, one third of whom are political party officials.

These include 'JP' Narayan himself, and Morarji Desai, a member of the Gandhian old guard whom Mrs Gandhi defeated in 1969. After his victory over the Congress Party in the Gujarat state elections earlier this month he has been a leader of the campaign for Mrs Gandhi's resignation, along with socialists and Maoists.

It is clear that the jailed oppthumbs of rich farmers, landlords and moneylenders - labourers may work 20 years to repay a debt of £5.

In this situation JP Narayan's campaign in Bihar state, where these contradictions are most acute, drew a following greater than any movement since the fight for independence no meeting even in remote villages being under 10,000 strong) to a programme of decentralisation of government, electoral reform and "fairer" land ownership.

DEFENCE

But without a programme to connect with defence of jobs and living standards of urban workers, and without setting up independent workers' and" peasants' committees to fight for the control of transport, credit and for land nationalisation and collectivisation of agriculture, this movement has joined a motley right-wing crew some of whom Mrs Gandhi has compared to Nazis.

Mrs Gandhi has announced broad measures of "reform" to be introduced in the next few weeks but the very base of her party will prevent any improvement in the lot of the masses.

What is more, she has followed these promises by actually banning 26 political and religious organisa tions which oppose her continued rule. These include Maoist as well as right-wing political groups anc within hours of the announcement their various headquarters were subject to raids by police.

It is conspicuous however that throughout the whole of this clampdown the Moscow-line Communist Party has defended Gandhi's actions, continuing their craven support for her corrupt and demagogic regime. This has much delighted both Gandhi and the capitalist class internationally, exposing yet again the treacherous politics stemming from the Stalinist concept of "peaceful coexistence"

It is the bankruptcy of political leadership alone that now holds back the workers and peasants of