ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the general issues pertaining to the powers of emergency. It examines the definition of emergency, necessity of emergency powers, traditional models of emergency powers, possibility of the abuse of emergency powers and the evolution of the emergency powers in the Indo-Pak-Bangladesh Subcontinent. The Indian Councils Act, 1861 marked the beginning of vesting the Governor-General of British India with the unilateral power of judging the existence of an emergency and, as such, the power to promulgate an ordinance for the preservation of peace and good government. In early times, legal scholars and judges found it difficult to define the concept of emergency. Emergency powers have become an unavoidable feature of contemporary political reality. The traditional sources from which the relevant authority of a democratic state derives the power to proclaim an emergency can be grouped under three models, namely, constitutional, non-constitutional and extra-constitutional.
