On the 50th anniversary of the Emergency, Prime Minister Narendra Modi took to X (formerly Twitter) on June 25, 2025, and flayed the Congress party of the great 1975 Emergency, saying it was one of the dark chapters of Indian democratic life. It appears that BJP has turned June 25, into more than just a mere calendar date: they have declared June 25 to be, henceforth, the new "Samvidhan Hatya Diwas" or Constitution Murder Day, this to be implemented and enforced by a dedication, a solemn reflection and possibly, candle light vigils (with possible re-enactments) also in the legislature.

Democracy melts down or theatrical performance?

The post written by Modi could have passed off as precisely targeted, brutal satire: countries' basic rights suspended, press freedom crushed … it was as though the Congress Government … put democratic rules into custody! It stretched back to jailing journalists and censorship of the press as Modi and BJP leaders created a colourful, even cinematic montage of Indira Gandhi-era constitutional subversion.

Official estimates show that more than 110,000 individuals, including political affiliations, people who voiced out their opinions, and dissenting news reporters, were jailed under draconian laws such as MISA and DISIR. It is of interest that Ravi Shankar Prasad told the audience that 253 journalists alone were in jail-wonder what the editorial hanger-on economy is. And as a final point of closure, the report (that was suppressed) of the Shah Commission had proved that the Emergency was neither necessary nor constitutional, which the BJP keeps on repeating.

The strangler of democracy to courtroom drama

Defence Minister Rajnath Singh joined in, terming the Emergency a great evil effort to choke democracy, and added it was similar to a malpractice of power, laying aside the Constitution and transforming democratic governance into dictatorship. Health Minister J.P. Nadda went even further in saying that it was an act of murder on the Constitution, a visceral statement, to be sure, to wonder what additional body armour the Indian Constitution may require.

Home Minister Amit Shah even got into the fray, saying the country never bent over into dictatorship and that the government was going to observe June 25 as Samvidhan Hatya Diwas every year to keep the memory fresh. India is now the fourth-largest economy in the world, and so, the BJP storyline goes: we have not only been able to get out of that autocratic phase but now have recovered to take up the duty of policing democracy with pride.

Spicing it up: Preliminary adjustments and political shots

Union ministers and Chief Ministers jumped at the chance to hone their arrows some more:

• Yogi Adityanath described the Emergency as a sin that can never be forgotten, mocked the fact that Congress had added seculars and socialists as a swipe at the soul of India, and demanded an apology—because nothing says “sorry” like yelling about secularism from the parliamentary pulpit.
• CR Patil went after Congress, citing the 42nd Amendment as a document bent to its will and the report of the Shah Commission as something that the party had been keeping under wraps to conceal an incriminating piece of evidence and disparaged the de rigueur pocket Constitutions of Rahul and Priyanka Gandhi: — “There is no document in that Constitution,” he quipped. Ouch.
• Sudhanshu Trivedi, Eternally-worldly, charged that the Congress is still in the Emergency mode, that its leaders think they are above the Constitution, and insanely jibe that on the waving of a red-booked Constitution by Rahul Gandhi, that it is just political theatre. Big hand out for the cliches.
• Samrat Choudhary and Dilip Jaiswal in Bihar staged seminars that talked of the Emergency as a murder of democracy and hailed the BJP government as the one with two engines, for pushing forward with the economy. Nothing puts a sign of progress more clearly than a comparison between capitalism and constitutional crackdowns.
• Keshav Prasad Maurya said Indira’s decision “crushed the soul of democracy,” and laid round reproach on parties such as SP who chose to support Congress, possibly the BJP.

Congress strikes back, time-travels to 2025

Naturally, political confrontation is incomplete without quips of comeback. Congress leader Mallikarjun Kharge called it a so-called Commemoration of Clout by the BJP and said that the party wants to use the 50th anniversary of the Emergency to distract from the failures of the Modi government. He went to the extent of attacking even the Election Commission, claiming it to be a puppet. Enough with the idle diversions, Congress wants to shift gears to the current threats of democratic decline touted by democracy alarmists.

Historical nails meet modern parallels.

To place the Emergency into perspective

• Civil liberties were suspended on June 25, 1975, and ended after almost 21 months: on March 21, 1977.
• More than 110000 arrests, closing down of the press, including blank editorials, mass vasectomy campaigns under Sanjay Gandhi, arrest of opposition leaders such as Atal Bihari Vajpayee, Jayal Prakash Narayan, and Morarji Desai.
• Historians continue to disagree on whether this period significantly transformed democratic norms, and some historians caution that it still has reverberations to the present-day governance.

Is the BJP warning of 2025 an alarmist?

On the one hand, bringing the citizens to mind about the past authoritarian excesses is not only right but also essential after almost 50 years. The government of Modi is selling itself as the guardian of democratic norms, wondering whether people of the coming generations will remember the price of complacency.

However, critics are also erratically blaming the present-day institutions. Among others, universities such as V-Dem refer to India as an electoral autocracy in the year 2023 due to the use of sedition laws as well as investigation agencies to intimidate critics. Indeed, probes against opposition leaders under the BJP dispensation occasionally resemble Indira practices, not with the sounding of sirens and the dawn swoop, but with income-tax notices and cases.

Therefore, does the fact that the BJP stage-managed emergency commemoration represent a genuine appeal in the defence of democracy, or is that cunningly masked smoke screen against encroachments on democracy as it sees it? That would mostly be dependent on your political horoscope.

Professional humour note:

•  Punch-line moment: In 2025, Congress is said to have an emergency mentality where emergencies just apparently consist of, to take an example, a lack of hotel rooms in Goa or a delayed delivery by Amazon.
•  Plot twist: The Constitutional Red book of Rahul Gandhi, which is cherished by party loyalists, appears to contain no document in it, going by his own words of CR Patil. It is like having a Harry Potter book, and there are no chapters. Magic? Nah.
• Time travel irony: Yogi Adityanath decries Preamble alterations as a type of wound to the soul of India, but since then, we have included LGBTQ + rights, the re-emergence of the local dialects, and also the World Cups in cricket. Isn't identity a thing of life and not of the creation of fossilised plaster?

Closing quip

After 50 years, June 25 is no longer merely a date: a political field in which memory, history, and power meet head-on. Whether the Emergency retrospectives of today are the genuine attempts to stay alert in the constitutional sense or the elaborately executed acts, there is one certain thing, and gladly so: democracy is always on trial and deservedly so. And 1975 taught us this: rights once foregone may be difficult to recover. Thankfully, we continue to possess punchlines, barbs, and red-book theatrics to remind us once again that democracy requires, must be defended through humour, vigilance, and yes, on occasion, a zinger on Twitter.

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