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History of Indian National Congress

History of Indian National Congress can be said to be synonymous
with the modern Indian history.

History of Indian National Congress Moderates

The history of the Indian National Congress falls into two

distinct eras, namely the pre-independence era, when the party
was at the forefront of the struggle for independence; and the
post-independence era, when the party has enjoyed a prominent
place in Indian politics, ruling the country for 48 of the 60
years since independence in 1947. In the pre-independence era,
the Indian National Congress was divided in two groups,
moderate and activist. The moderates were more educated and
wanted to attract people`s faith to rule over the country and
enjoy the power which British was enjoying and eventually they
achieved what they were looking for.
Indian National Congress was founded in 1885 with the
objective of obtaining a greater share in government for
educated Indians; the principles of Indian National Congress
were initially not opposed to British rule. The Congress
meetings were conducted once a year during December. A
Scotsman, Allan Octavian Hume brought about its first meeting
in Bombay, with the approval of Lord Dufferin, the
then-Viceroy. Womesh Chandra Bannerjee was the first President
of the Indian National Congress. The first meeting was planned
to be held in Pune, but due to a severe plague outbreak there,
the meeting of Indian National Congress was later shifted to
Bombay. The first Session of Indian National Congress was held
from 28-31 December 1885, and was attended by 72 delegates.
With passing years, the demands of Indian National Congress
became more fundamental in the face of constant opposition
from the government and the party became active in the
independence movement. By 1907 the party was separated into
two halves, namely the Garam Dal of Bal Gangadhar Tilak, or
Extremists (literally "hot faction"), and the Naram Dal of
Gopal Krishna Gokhale, or Moderates (literally "soft
faction"), identified by their attitude towards the British.
Under the influence of Bal Gangadhar Tilak, the Congress
became the first integrated mass organization in the country,
bringing together millions of people against the British. The
Indian National Congress was the only political party to
provide harmony to all the sections of the Indian society.

In its time as the nation`s leader in the freedom struggle,

Indian National Congress boasted the nation`s greatest
leaders. Before the Gandhi Era came leaders like Bal Gangadhar
Tilak, Lala Lajpat Rai, Bipin Chandra Pal, Gopal Krishna
Gokhale, Mohammed Ali Jinnah (later leader of the Muslim
League and instrumental in the creation of Pakistan), all
starting with the initial legendary icon of Indians. The
Congress was transformed into a mass movement by Surendranath
Banerjea and Sir Henry Cotton during the division of Bengal in
1905 and the resultant Swadesi Movement. Mahatma Gandhi came
back from South Africa in 1915 and with the help of the
pro-British group led by Ghokhale he through an extraordinary
rebellion became the President of The Congress without any
election and formed an alliance with the Khilafat Movement. In
protest a number of leaders went out of Congress. Khilafat
movement ended up in a disaster and the Congress was split. A
number of leaders Chittaranjan Das, Annie Besant, Motilal
Nehru, went out of the Congress to set up the Swaraj Party.
With the rise of Mahatma Gandhi`s popularity and his
Satyagraha, the art of revolution came with leaders of Indian
National Congress, namely Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, Pandit
Jawaharlal Nehru (the nation`s first Prime Minister), Dr.
Rajendra Prasad (the nation`s first President), Khan Mohammad
Abbas Khan, Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan, Chakravarti
Rajgopalachari, Jivatram Kripalani and Maulana Abul Kalam
Azad. With the already existing nationalistic feeling combined
with Gandhi`s popularity the Indian National Congress became a
forceful mass organization in the country, bringing together
millions of people by specifically working against caste
differences, untouchability, poverty, and religious and ethnic
boundaries. Indian National Congress had members from
virtually every religion, ethnic group, economic class and
linguistic group, although majority was Hindus.
In 1939, Subhas Chandra Bose, the elected president in both
1938 and 1939 was expelled from the Congress for his socialist
views and The Congress was reduced to a pro-Business group
financed by the business houses of Birla and Bajaj. At the
time of the Quit India movement, the Congress was undoubtedly
the strongest political and revolutionary organization in
India, but the Congress separated itself from the Quit India
movement within a few days. The Indian National Congress could
not claim to be the true representative of the Indian people
as other parties were there as well particularly the Hindu
Mahasabha, Azad Hind Sarkar and Forward Bloc.
The 1929 Lahore session of Indian National Congress under the
presidency of Jawaharlal Nehru holds special significance in
the history of Indian National Congress. In this session
"Poorna Swaraj" (complete independence) was declared as the
goal of INC. The 26th January 1930 was declared as "Poorna
Swaraj Diwas," Independence Day although the British remained
in India a number of years longer. It was to commemorate this
date particularly that The Indian Constitution was formally
adopted on 26 January 1950 (even though it was passed on 26
November 1949). However in 1929 Srinivas Iyenger was barred
from the Congress for demanding full independence, not just
home rule as demanded by Gandhi.
After the First World War the party became associated with
Mahatma Gandhi, who remained its unofficial, devout leader and
mass image even as younger men and women became party
president. The party was in many ways an umbrella
organization, sheltering within itself radical socialists,
traditionalists and even Hindu and Muslim conservatives, but
all the socialists (including the Krishak Praja Party,
Congress Socialist Party, Swarajya Party members) were
excluded along with Subhas Chandra Bose in 1939 by Mahatma
Gandhi.
During the INA trials of 1946, the Indian National Congress
helped to form the INA Defence Committee, which compellingly
defended the case of the soldiers of the Azad Hind government.
The committee confirmed the formation of the Congress` defence
team for the INA and included famous lawyers of the time,
including Bhulabhai Desai, Asaf Ali and Jawaharlal Nehru.
Members of the Congress initially supported the sailors who
led the Royal Indian Navy Mutiny. However they withdrew
support at the critical moment, when the mutiny failed.
During the Post-Independence Era, Indian National Congress
remained in power for thirty continuous years between
independence in 1947 and its first taste of electoral defeat
(at the national level) in 1977. Mahatma Gandhi and Sardar
Patel are said to have witnessed that Indian National Congress
was formed only for achieving independence and should have
been disbanded in 1947. However, at the time of independence,
the Indian National Congress (led by Jawaharlal Nehru) was a
major political organisation in the nation and was established
as the major political party. Indian National Congress have
thus provided leadership and guiding vision after the terrible

chaos and confusion following the Partition of India and

Independence, was re-established as an electoral party in
independent India. Across several general elections, the party
ruled unremitting until 1977, and has remained a major
political force.
After the murder of Gandhi in 1948, and the death of Sardar
Patel in 1950, Jawaharlal Nehru was the only remaining iconic
national leader, and soon the situation demanded Nehru to be
the key to the political potency and future of the Congress.
Nehru embraced secularism, socialist economic policies and a
non-aligned foreign policy, which became the characteristic of
the modern Congress Party. Nehru`s policies challenged the
peasantry class, the business class and improved the position
of religious minorities and lower caste Hindus. A generation
of freedom fighting leaders was soon replaced by a generation
of people who had grown up under the guidance of Nehru. Nehru
led the Indian National Congress to consecutively majorities
in the elections of 1952, 1957 and 1962.
After Nehru`s death in 1964, the party`s future initially came
into question. No leader was competitive enough to touch
Nehru`s iconic status, so the second-stage leadership mustered
around the compromise candidate, the gentle, soft-spoken and
Nehruvian Lal Bahadur Shastri. Shastri remained Prime Minister
till his own death in 1966, and a broad Congress Party
election choose Indira Gandhi, Nehru`s daughter, over the
right wing, conservative Morarji Desai.
The first serious challenge to Congress supremacy came in 1967
when a united opposition, under the banner of Samyukt Vidhayak
Dal, won control over several states in the Hindi strap. The
majority of the party leadership then challenged Indira
Gandhi, the daughter of Nehru, and Congress president. The
conflict led to a division, and Indira launched a separate
Indian National Congress. Initially this party was known as
Congress (R), but it soon came to be commonly known as the New
Congress. The official party became known as Indian National
Congress (Organisation) led by Kamaraj. It was informally
called the Old Congress. As Indira Priyadarshini gained
control over the state machinery, the Election Commission of
India recognized her faction as the "real" INC, although her
organization was the breakaway group.
The separation can in some ways be seen as a left wing or
right-wing division. Indira Gandhi wanted to use a populist
agenda in order to mobilize popular support for the party. She
initiated slogans such as Garibi Hatao (Remove Poverty), and
wanted to develop closer ties with the Soviet Union. The
regional party elites, who formed the INC(O), stood for a more

conservative schedule, and distrusted Soviet help. INC(O)

later merged into the Janata Party. Gradually, Indira Gandhi
grew more and more authoritarian. Facing growing opposition
she proclaimed a state of National Emergency in 1975,
condensed the powers of the courts, and unleashed a police
state.
After she lifted the emergency in 1977, more Indian National
Congress divisions were formed, the one remaining loyal to
Indira Gandhi being popularly known as Congress (I) with an
`I` for Indira. The Congress (I) was routed in the general
elections by the Janata Party, but the federation government
fell apart in two years. The Congress party returned to power
in the resulting 1980 elections. In 1984 Indira Gandhi was
assassinated by two of her Sikh bodyguards, in revenge for
Operation Blue Star. In the following days activists and
leaders of the Congress Party killed more than six thousand
Sikhs in the 1984 riots, mainly in Delhi. On the other hand
militants seeking a separate homeland slaughtered three
thousand to eight thousand Hindus in the Punjab from 1984 to
1991.
After Indira, her son Rajiv Gandhi took over as Congress
leader and led the party to victory with a large majority in
the 1984 Lok Sabha elections. It was into the government from
1984-9 and then was defeated in the 1989 general election.
Rajiv Gandhi was also assassinated by the LTTE during the
course of the election campaign in 1991. Following Rajiv
Gandhi`s assassination, P.V. Narasimha Rao succeeded him as
Congress leader and became prime minister. The 1990s was a
period of prolonged crisis for the Congress. With passing
years, the party asked the Rajiv Gandhi`s widow, Sonia, to
accept the position of Congress President. She refused at the
time, and the Congress stuck with Narasimha Rao. Rao
considerably changed the party`s traditionally socialist
policies and introduced major economic reforms and
liberalization, with the help of then Finance minister (and
future Prime Minister) Manmohan Singh. Nonetheless, his
involvement in the bribery of members of parliament was a
major issue, which led to the downfall of the Congress in
1996, and subsequently his fall out with other leaders in his
own party and eventual exit from politics. Former treasurer
Sitaram Kesri took over the reins of the party and oversaw the
Congress support to the United Front governments that ran from
1996 - 1998.
During his tenure, several key leaders broke away from the
party, and serious infighting broke out among those left. In
1998, Sonia Gandhi finally accepted the post of Congress
President, with a thought that may have saved the party from
extinction. After her election as party leader, a section of
the party, which objected to the choice, broke away and formed
the Nationalist Congress Party. The use of "Congress (I)"
continues to denote the party run by Indira Gandhi`s
successors. Although the Congress expedited the downfall of
the NDA government in 1999 by promising an alternative, Ms.
Gandhi`s decision was followed by fresh elections and the
Congress party`s worst-ever tally in the lower house. The
party spent the interval period creating alliances and
overseeing changes in the state and central organizations to
revive the party.
In the 2004 general elections, the Congress coalition won the
largest number of seats and got an assurance of support from
the Left Front upsetting the Atal Behari Vajpayee, led
National Democratic Alliance, which was variously predicted to
win complete victory or at least emerge as the largest
alliance. Shortly thereafter, Sonia Gandhi was nominated by
the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance to be the next
Prime Minister. Sonia Gandhi refused to take the position
based on her "inner voice" and she promoted the eminent
economist, former Union Finance Minister and senior Congress
leader Dr. Manmohan Singh for the post of Prime Minister, and
he was sworn-in as Prime Minister on 22 May 2004.
The list of Indian Prime Ministers from the Congress Party is
as follows -
Jawaharlal Nehru (1947 - 1964)
Gulzarilal Nanda (May - June 1964, January 1966)
Lal Bahadur Shastri (1964 - 1966)
Indira Gandhi (1966 - 1977, 1980 - 1984)
Rajiv Gandhi (1984 - 1989)
P.V. Narasimha Rao (1991 - 1996)
Manmohan Singh (2004 - present)

(Last Updated on : 17/04/2009)

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