A chapter on the excesses of the Emergency will be included in Madhya Pradesh school curricula, Chief Minister Mohan Yadav announced on Wednesday.

This came on the same day that newly-elected Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla read out a resolution in Parliament describing the imposition of the Emergency in 1975 – by the Congress government at the time – as a “black chapter” in India’s history.

Birla read out the resolution, which was moved a day after the 49th anniversary of the imposition of the Emergency, amid protests from the Opposition benches.

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Yadav, while speaking at the Loktantra Senani Regional Conference in Bhopal on Wednesday, claimed that the inclusion of a chapter on the Emergency in Madhya Pradesh’s school curricula had been a demand of those who had been imprisoned at the time.

The Bharatiya Janata Party leader said that the demand would certainly be fulfilled.

Yadav also announced a series of welfare measures for those who had protested the Emergency, referring to them as “loktantra senanis”, or soldiers of democracy. He said that they would be allowed to stay in government-run circuit houses and rest houses for up to three days with a 50% discount on the tariff.

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Those who protested the Emergency would also enjoy highway toll concessions, the chief minister announced. Additionally, in cases of serious health problems, air ambulances would provided to facilitate their travel to large hospitals, he added.

Yadav said that when the resolution condeming the Emergency was moved in the Lok Sabha, Opposition parties “ran away”. He noted that several Oppositon leaders who are now part of a coalition with the Congress were jailed during the Emergency. He remarked that this was an example of “friendship based on selfishness”.

On Wednesday, Congress MP Shashi Tharoor accused the speaker of adopting a “confrontational” stance against the Opposition at the start of the 18th Lok Sabha’s first Parliament session. He said the Opposition had hoped that the speaker would conduct the House in a manner that was fair to all parties.