As the nation remembers the 50th anniversary of the Emergency, the story of Sanjay Gandhi is once again being widely discussed. His name has resurfaced in the media thanks to Congress MP Shashi Tharoor, who has written articles recounting the atrocities committed by Indira Gandhi’s son during that dark period in Indian democracy. But Sanjay was much more than what Tharoor described, he was a political psychopath with fascist tendencies and unrestrained power.
In the 1970s, if one saw a green Matador van racing through Delhi’s Safdarjung Road, people would instinctively turn their backs. That vehicle didn’t follow traffic rules, nor did it obey Newton’s laws of motion. It was the chariot of a fascist prince who hadn’t been crowned but ruled anyway. It was driven by Sanjay Gandhi himself, the unelected son who had more power than most ministers and even controlled Prime Minister Indira Gandhi. He flew helicopters and airplanes as effortlessly as he drove cars. His childhood hobby of flying planes would eventually lead to his death.
Sanjay’s Iron Fist: Sterilizations, Slum Demolitions, and the Rise of a Tyrant
Sanjay Gandhi admired Joseph Stalin and operated by the brutal philosophy of ‘a tooth for a tooth, an eye for an eye.’ According to Vinod Mehta’s The Sanjay Story, he formed a personal gang of enforcers within the Congress Party. If Sanjay made even a subtle signal, they would destroy the reputation or career of any prominent leader. They could demolish a building or silence dissent within hours. Slowly but steadily, he gained control over every sphere of political power. Even Indira Gandhi, once the undisputed centre of the Congress universe, became a puppet in Sanjay’s hands.
By the early weeks of the Emergency, Sanjay Gandhi had become his mother’s chief political advisor. Several major government policies of that period came directly from him and his close associates. One of the most infamous was the forced sterilization programme, launched under the guise of family planning. Initially, people were lured with incentives, but those who resisted were dragged from their homes by the police. Poor villages were invaded, and brutal atrocities were committed in the name of population control. In some states, up to six lakh sterilizations were carried out in just two weeks.
Between 1975 and 1977, a staggering 1.1 crore men and women were sterilized. Another brutal operation was the clearance of slums near Turkman Gate in Delhi. When residents resisted the demolition of their homes, police opened fire. Many people were shot dead in a single night. But due to strict press censorship, these horrors never reached the international media.
As Sanjay began running government ministries from behind the scenes, I.K. Gujral, then Information and Broadcasting Minister (and later Prime Minister), resigned in protest. Gujral refused to take orders from an unelected dictator-in-the-making. Sanjay responded with fury. He pressured Indira Gandhi relentlessly to extend the Emergency as long as possible.
In March 1977, there was even an assassination attempt against Sanjay, he was shot five times. When the Janata Party came to power, it launched an investigation into the Emergency-era crimes. Sanjay was imprisoned but when Indira returned to power in the 1980 elections, Sanjay once again became all-powerful.
Maruti Scam: Nepotism on Wheels and a Monument to Failure
One of Sanjay’s most infamous and ill-conceived ventures was the Maruti car project. At the age of just 23, he told his mother, the Prime Minister of India, that he wanted to build a cheap car for the common man. Indira Gandhi, blinded by maternal affection, opened the national treasury for him.
In June 1971, a company named Maruti Motors Limited was formed. Sanjay Gandhi, who had never built even a toy car, became its Managing Director. Despite his lack of qualifications, he was given a contract to produce 50,000 cars. Though critics raised concerns, Indira’s popularity after the Bangladesh War of 1971 silenced them. But the company did not produce a single car during Sanjay’s lifetime. It turned into a white elephant, a hotbed of corruption, shady contracts, and misuse of power. When the Janata government took office in 1977, it dissolved Maruti Limited.
In 1980, after Sanjay’s death, Indira revived the project. With the help of family friend and industrialist V. Krishnamurthy, the company was reborn as Maruti Udyog Limited. Today, many people call Sanjay Gandhi the ‘father of the Maruti car,’ but the truth is that he had no role in its actual success. His version of the company was a financial disaster and a monument to nepotism.
Kissa Kursi Ka: When Satire Was Burned by Dictatorial Rage
Another terrifying example of Sanjay’s fascist nature was his response to the film Kissa Kursi Ka. This satirical movie, directed by Amrit Nahata, mocked Indira and Sanjay Gandhi, especially Sanjay’s car project. It also lampooned several Congress leaders including Indira’s private secretary R.K. Dhawan, spiritual advisor Dhirendra Brahmachari, and socialite Rukhsana Sultana.
The film was submitted to the Censor Board in April 1975. The board sent it to a revising committee and then forwarded it to the government. The Ministry of Information and Broadcasting issued a show-cause notice listing 51 objections. In response, Nahata stated that the characters were entirely fictional and not based on real individuals. But by then, the Emergency had already been declared.
Soon after, all copies and master prints of the film were seized from the Censor Board and taken to the Maruti factory in Gurgaon. There, they were burned on the direct orders of Sanjay Gandhi and executed by his gang. After the Emergency, the Shah Commission investigated the incident and held Sanjay Gandhi responsible. One of the charges that led to his conviction was the destruction of Kissa Kursi Ka.
Who turned Sanjay Gandhi into such a dangerous figure? The answer is simple: his mother, Indira Gandhi. She enabled his rise, ignored every warning, and let him act with impunity. The Maruti project, the Emergency, the sterilizations, none of these were a problem for Indira. She never listened to those who warned her about her son’s path.
Sanjay was so unstable that he reportedly slapped Indira Gandhi, the sitting Prime Minister, in public. Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Lewis M. Simons, who was then the Delhi correspondent of the Washington Post, reported that Sanjay had slapped Indira six times at a private dinner party. The Indian media, terrified of Sanjay, never published the story.
However, veteran journalist T.J.S. George offers a different perspective. He argues that Sanjay did not control Indira, rather, he was her mask. Sanjay was her alter ego, a tool she used to implement policies she didn’t want to be personally blamed for.
T.J.S. George wrote: Indira Gandhi was the only man in her cabinet. She sidelined strong personalities like Morarji Desai, Sanjiva Reddy, and Nijalingappa and surrounded herself with loyal sycophants. This centralisation of power became the template for future Congress leadership. Corruption, too, became institutionalised. Indira Gandhi famously said, “Corruption is a universal phenomenon.”
Former Cabinet Secretary B.G. Deshmukh, in his book A Cabinet Secretary Looks Back (2004), quoted B.K. Nehru’s shocking admission. Nehru recounted that after Sanjay’s funeral, he asked Rajiv Gandhi if the money Sanjay had collected for the party was safe. Rajiv replied that he had found only ₹20 lakhs in the Congress office. When asked how much Sanjay had collected, Rajiv, holding his head, replied, “Crores. Countless crores.” The top of the Congress pyramid had become the fountainhead of corruption.
A Fall from the Skies: The Untimely End of an Unchecked Ambition
There was an unwritten rule in Indira Gandhi’s government: she handled foreign affairs; Sanjay controlled domestic matters. He embezzled billions through schemes like bank nationalisation. To this day, no one knows where that money went.
Sanjay’s death was widely seen not just as a tragic accident, but as punishment for his arrogance. On June 23, 1980, while performing aerial stunts in a new aircraft, Sanjay crashed and died. His childhood obsession with flying had finally caught up with him.
Had he survived, there is little doubt that Sanjay would have succeeded Indira Gandhi as Prime Minister. And if that had happened, India’s democracy might never have survived.
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