Last time India saw “One Nation, One Election” was in 1967. The country’s fourth general elections involved 520 Lok Sabha constituencies and 3,563 Assembly seats. Polling was largely held during 15-21 February. It was a single-phase election in most of the states, but UP had it in four phases. The country’s tryst with simultaneous Lok Sabha and Assembly polls started right from the first general elections in 1952, which used to be followed by the elections to the posts of the President and the Vice-President. Following the 1962 polls, India underwent wide-ranging social and political changes. There was demoralisation due to the India-China war. In May 1964, the country's first and longest-serving Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru passed away. He was succeeded by Lal Bahadur Shashtri, who died in Tashkent on January 11, 1966 just after signing a declaration to resolve the 1965 India-Pakistan war. Several parts of the country were then reeling under a two-year drought, with an alarming price rise fuelling anti-incumbency. Amid these crises, Nehru’s daughter Indira Gandhi took charge as the PM on January 24, 1966 by defeating Morarji Desai in the Congress Parliamentary Party (CPP) leader's election. This created a rift between Indira and the Congress veterans like Desai, which was reflected in the 1967 polls. The Opposition was resurgent, with parties like the Bharatiya Jan Sangh (BJS) under Pt Deendayal Upadhyay, Swatantra Party led by C Rajagopalachari and J B Kripalani, and Samyukta Socialist Party (SSP) under Ram Manohar Lohia mounting a challenge to the Congress’s supremacy, which had been winning over 50% seats in the Lok Sabha and the Assemblies till 1962. Lohia formed the SSP in 1964 to fight against the Congress. He was elected to the Lok Sabha in a bypoll from UP’s Farrukhabad in 1963, with his “Congress hatao” slogan gaining traction. Besides the Opposition parties' campaign against the Congress, there was a rising political assertion by the farming communities in the wake of the Green Revolution. The Opposition parties tried to tap into their discontent, using slogans like Lohia's “Pichhade Paavain Sau Mein Saath (OBCs must get 60%)” to galvanise these classes, which proved crucial in weakening the Congress in North India. And in states like Tamil Nadu, it was the coalition of the Swatantra Party and the DMK which ensured the Congress's defeat. In 1967, the total number of electors in the country was 25.03 crore, while the population was 43.87 crore as per 1961 Census. The citizens above 21 years were eligible voters. The polls saw a turnout of 61.33%, which was highest since 1952. The Congress got a majority in the Lok Sabha by winning 283 seats out of 520, but this was the party's lowest tally since 1952 even though its vote share was still 40.78%. The Swatantra Party emerged as the principle Opposition in the Lok Sabha by bagging 44 seats. The BJS won 35 seats as compared to the DMK's 25, SSP's 23, PSP's 13, CPI's 23 and CPM's 19 seats. The Swatantra Party also emerged as the principal Opposition party in some states. The results dealt a blow to the Congress, prompting the Opposition parties to forge an alliance, called Samyukta Vidhayak Dal (SVD), to form their coalition government in a number of states. Although the Congress emerged as the single largest party in 13 Assemblies, it did not get an absolute majority in states like Bihar, Punjab, Rajasthan, UP and West Bengal. In some of the states, the Congress faced major defections that led to the formation of the SVD governments there. In Bengal, Ajoy Kumar Mukherjee quit the Congress to form the Bangla Congress before the polls. He was sworn in as the SVD's CM on March 1, 1967. In Bihar, Mahamaya Prasad Sinha, the lone MLA of his party Jan Kranti Dal, became the SVD's leader and took oath as the CM on March 5, 1967. In Punjab, Gurnam Singh of the Akali Dal was sworn in as the SVD's CM on March 8, 1967. In Haryana, Rao Birender Singh quit the Congress to form Vishal Haryana Party and took oath as the SVD's CM on March 24, 1967. Other Opposition faces who took over as the CM included the CPM-led United Left Front's E M S Namboodiripad in Kerala on March 6, 1967; the DMK's C N Annadurai in Madras on March 6, 1967; and Swatantra Party leader Rajendra Narayan Singh Deo in Odisha on March 8, 1967. On April 1, 1967, Chaudhary Charan Singh also quit the Congress and was sworn in as the UP CM as the SVD leader on April 3. The Congress government fell similarly in a few months in MP as well, where its rebel Govind Narain Singh was sworn in as the first non-Congress CM on July 30, 1967. In Rajasthan, the Congress was short of a majority by four seats. Although Governor Hukum Singh administered the oath of the CM’s post to the Congress’s Mohanlal Sukhadia, he was accused of indulging in “mockery of democracy”. Some of these governments comprised over a dozen parties, including those from the extreme right to the extreme left. As the SVD governments started collapsing a few months after their formation, the mid-term polls were held in 1968-69 in many states including Haryana, Punjab, UP, Bihar and Bengal. Since then, politics in these states became more volatile. In 1969, President Dr Zakir Hussain passed away, with his successor's election escalating infighting within the ruling Congress. That election became a turning point in the Congress's history as the party was split into two factions – the Congress (O) headed by K Kamaraj-Morarji Desai and the Congress (R) led by Indira Gandhi. This, in turn, set off political instability across the country. In some of the states President's rule was imposed, while in some others alternative governments were formed. In 1971, PM Indira decided to hold the Lok Sabha polls 15 months ahead of the schedule, but a slew of states had already held mid-term Assembly polls – including Bihar (1969), Haryana (1968), Kerala (1970), Punjab (1969), UP (1969) and Bengal (1969) – thus breaking the simultaneous poll cycle, which would get increasingly disrupted in later decades. Along with the 1971 Lok Sabha polls, only states like Odisha, Tamil Nadu and Bengal went to the Assembly polls. Interestingly, in 1967, the Election Commission of India (ECI) was mulling a fixed schedule for the synchronised polls so that governments would not face problems over the commencement of the budget sessions. The ECI's report for the 1967 polls states, “The best time for holding simultaneous general elections all over the country is the first week of March rather than the third week of February, but, unless the financial year is changed, e.g., to the year commencing on July 1, we shall have to follow more or less the programme adopted as at this year's general elections and, both at the Centre and in the States, the first budget session of the newly constituted Houses will have to be hustled through at the start.” However, such proposals remained a distant dream as simultaneous elections have not been held in the country since.
