Lal Bahadur Shastri

Why is news? PM pays floral tributes to Lal Bahadur Shastri on his Jayanti at Vijay Ghat

He was born on 2nd October, 1904 in Mughalsarai, a small railway town seven miles from Varanasi in Uttar Pradesh.

Shastri's thoughts were influenced by reading about Swami Vivekananda, Mahatma Gandhi and Annie Besant.

Deeply impressed and influenced by Gandhi, he joined the Indian independence movement in the 1920s.

He served as the president of Servants of the People Society (Lok Sevak Mandal), founded by Lala Lajpat Rai and held prominent positions in Indian National Congress.

After independence, he was minister in the Union Cabinet from 1951 to 1956 when he resigned taking responsibility for the railway accident and later from 1957-1964.

He was India’s second Prime Minister (1964-66).

During Shastri’s brief Prime Ministership, the country faced two major challenges.

While India was still recovering from the economic implications of the war with China (1962), failed monsoons, drought and serious food crisis presented a grave challenge. The country also faced a war with Pakistan in 1965.

Shastri’s famous slogan ‘Jai Jawan Jai Kisan’, symbolised the country’s resolve to face both these challenges.

Shastri’s Prime Ministership came to an abrupt end on 10th January 1966, when he suddenly expired in Tashkent, then in USSR and currently the capital of Uzbekistan.

He was there to discuss and sign an agreement (Tashkent Agreement) with Muhammad Ayub Khan, the then President of Pakistan, to end the war.

He signed an agreement with then Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) on persons of Indian origin there, in 1964 — an endorsement of the importance of neighbourhood.

He was the first person to be posthumously awarded the Bharat Ratna (1966).