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The Syndicate could yet avenge itself. When it meets this week, the Congress Party's 21-member working committee could vote to discipline Indira or even expel her, but such action would be subject to later approval by the All India Congress Committee, a far larger forum of 700 delegates. The working committee is considered unlikely to take the drastic step of expulsion, primarily because it would tear the party apart —and perhaps leave Indira as a non-Congress Prime Minister with leftist support. The alternative possibility of bringing down her government with a vote of no-confidence was all but ruled out by her show of strength among the Congress M.P.s. In any case, Indira is not overextending herself to placate the right-wingers. After the election she made a point of saying: "If some vested interests, without understanding the government's policy, oppose it, they invite their doom."
One Punch. The chief irony of the power struggle was that it revolved around an office that is virtually powerless. As India's President, Giri will spend the next five years fulfilling largely ceremonial functions. Giri himself is not considered much of a mover and shaker these days, though in his youth he was a leading revolutionary. While he was studying law in Dublin, in fact, the British deported, him for his enthusiastic involvement in the Irish revolution. But that was long ago, and during the recent campaign his foes hinted that he was becoming senile. "Those who say that I am old," replied Giri, "let them have the benefit of my fist."
For all the powerlessness of his office, however, Giri does have one mighty club: he can dissolve Parliament. Only three times since India won its independence in 1947 has this power been used, and then mainly as a routine prologue to scheduled elections. Should Indira run into serious political difficulty, however, such a dissolution would leave her as caretaker Prime Minister for six months, and thus allow plenty of time to prepare for the required elections.
Anything but Progress. Time, above all, is what Indira needs. For all her talk of socialism, she has offered few concrete plans, and her political victories of the past months have preserved her power at the price of further wrenching apart the Congress Party. Congress has ruled for 22 years, but the national elections of 1967 sharply reduced its once-overwhelming majority in Parliament. For millions of Indians, the stability ensured by Congress Party rule no longer outweighs the drift, indecisiveness, lack of discipline, and corruption that go with it. If the minority parties—right and left —continue to gain popularity, the national elections scheduled for 1972 may well bury the party permanently.