Free India (Frommer's, 4th Edition) by Keith Bain

declared that lasted 2 years. Believing that she had reasserted control, Indira Gandhi held elections in 1977. The result was the first defeat for Congress, although no party was able to form a united government to replace it, and by 1980 Gandhi was back in power.
    The INC never regained its previous level of control, however. Resentment by Sikhs at their failure to secure autonomy in the Punjab culminated in 1984 with the Indian army’s siege and capture of the main Sikh temple at Amritsar with thousands of casualties, and Indira Gandhi was assassinated by her Sikh bodyguards. Her son, Rajiv Gandhi, succeeded her, and instituted new programs of economic liberalization, but he also embroiled India unsuccessfully in the ongoing civil war in Sri Lanka, leading to his assassination in 1991 by a Tamil activist. Although his widow, the Italian-born Sonia Gandhi, inherited leadership of Congress, the era of the Nehru family’s domination of Indian politics (which has been compared to the Kennedy family’s political impact in the U.S.) was thought by many to be over.
    In 1989, Congress was again defeated at the polls, this time led by the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). Although the BJP initially failed to hold together a coalition government, its strength grew. It accused Congress of allowing India to be dominated by outside interests, including globalized economic forces, but more specifically by Indian Muslims who it considered to be unduly tolerated under Congress’s secular state policies. In 1992, a BJP-led campaign led to the destruction of the mosque at Ayodhya, believed to be the birthplace of the Hindu god Ram.
    In the 1996 elections the BJP defeated a Congress government plagued by accusations of corruption and emerged as the leading group in the coalition governments that have ruled India since. Under the BJP Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee, tensions with Muslim Pakistan increased, with both sides testing and threatening the use of nuclear weapons, especially in conflicts over Kashmir. Fortunately, 2003 saw a welcome cooling. In 2004 the confident BJP government called for early elections, hoping to cash in on a booming economy and developments in the India-Pakistan peace process. Contrary to all expectations, however, the BJP did not win. Instead the Congress, which had been the opposition party for 8 years, took much of the vote, as did the Left (which unexpectedly won more than 60 seats in the 543-member house). Together with other parties, they formed a ruling coalition, the UPA (United Progressive Alliance). The next surprise came soon after, when the victorious Sonia Gandhi, leader of the Congress, declined to take on the job of prime minister, appointing instead Manmohan Singh, a former Indian finance minister, to the chair.
    By mid-2005, the Congress had been in power for just 1 year; the opposition BJP was in disarray, its political plans to disrupt the functioning of the Congress-led government a mess, and its own dirty linen being washed in public view almost daily. Simultaneously, the normally tenuous relations between India and Pakistan had reached a new high—despite obstacles like unresolved disputes and cross-border terrorism—a strategic factor in the development of the region as a whole. When the next general election rolled around in 2009, voters turned up in larger-than-ever numbers and reaffirmed support for Congress’s secular, reformist policies. With Sonia’s son, Rahul Gandhi (whom many believe is on course to become the next Gandhi to lead India), impressing crowds and analysts, the party trumped its earlier victory and was able to form a government without forming allegiances with parties likely to compromise its position. Ms Gandhi again appointed Manmohan Singh prime minister, and the media celebrated what felt like the start of a new era in the country’s development.
    Dateline
    ■ Circa 3000–1700 B.C. Harappan civilization of the Indus Valley marks earliest