June 25-26, 2010 marks the 35th anniversary of the Emergency, the darkest period in the history of democratic, Independent India.

If you are one of the millions of Indians born after those 19 dark months, this special series is especially for you.

A brief glimpse of the Emergency, below:

It was truly the best of times, it was truly the worst of times.

Months after India won a decisive military victory in the December 1971 war with Pakistan, economic troubles confronted the nation.

Matters quickly began to spiral out of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi's control.

First came the railway strike of May 1974 that paralysed the country for nearly three weeks. Then Gujarat and Bihar became symbols of national unrest as the unlikely personality of Jayaprakash Narayan led an increasingly shrill anti-government campaign.

Even as JP's call for Total Revolution found resonance among the youth in many parts of the country, on June 12, 1975 the Allahabad high court declared Indira Gandhi's 1971 Lok Sabha election victory invalid. Justice Jaganmohan Lal Sinha also barred her from contesting elections for six years.

Prodded by her advisers, which included her younger son Sanjay, Indira Gandhi decided she would not step down as prime minister.

On the night of June 25-26, 1975, the prime minister obtained President Fakhruddin Ali Ahmed's consent to impose a state of Emergency in the country.

The next morning JP, Opposition leaders like Morarji Desai and L K Advani, and thousands of the government's critics all over the country were arrested.

Civil liberties were severely curbed, newspaper censorship was harshly imposed. The Maintenance of Internal Security Act, under which any Indian could be detained indefinitely without the right to appeal, was used rampantly.

Democracy, Indira Gandhi noted wryly, had been brought 'to a grinding halt'.

The Emergency saw the sinister rise of Sanjay Gandhi who became the real power behind the throne.

Forcible sterilisation -- the dreaded nasbandi -- massive slum demolitions to 'beautify and de-congest' cities, outlawing industrial strikes, the arrests, the crushing of human rights were all seen as the handiwork of Sanjay Gandhi and his goons.

Nineteen dark months passed before Indira Gandhi, just as abruptly, withdrew the Emergency and called an election.

Defeat was swift as the Congress was routed by the Janata Party, a new political formation consisting of the Congress-0, the Jan Sangh, the Lok Dal, the Socialist Party and other smaller political parties.

Both Indira Gandhi and her son lost the election. The Congress party won just two Lok Sabha seats in North India where the Emergency's worst excesses had occurred.

To this day, millions of Indians, who lived in fear through those bewildering months, remain puzzled: How did Indian democracy collapse so meekly before authoritarianism? Why did so many Indians, when ordered to bend, crawl?

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