Chandra Shekhar

Biography

Chandra Shekhar was born in 1927 into a Rajput farming family in Ibrahimpatti, a village in Ballia district, Uttar Pradesh. After a first degree at Satish Chandra College he took a master's in political science at Allahabad University in 1950.

He entered politics in the socialist movement, rising from district secretary of the Praja Socialist Party in Ballia to its general secretary in Uttar Pradesh in the mid-1950s. He entered the Rajya Sabha in 1962 and joined the Congress in 1964, where he became known as one of the radical 'Young Turks'. He was jailed during the Emergency, joined the Janata Party on his release in 1977, served as its president until 1988 and was elected to the Lok Sabha from Ballia. In 1983 he walked some 4,260 km across India from Kanyakumari to New Delhi on his Bharat Yatra.

After the Janata Dal came to power in 1989, he broke with V. P. Singh and in November 1990 led a breakaway faction, the Samajwadi Janata Party, into government with outside support from Rajiv Gandhi's Congress. As prime minister he also held the home, defence and information portfolios, but the Congress withdrew support in March 1991 before a full budget could be passed, and he resigned, staying on as caretaker until June.

He kept his Ballia seat and led his small party for the rest of his life, and died in New Delhi in July 2007 after a long illness with multiple myeloma.