Former India prime minister Morarji Desai is dead

[S.Ramani]

Topics:
* Former Prime Minister Morarji has passed away
* Morarji a century of life and half century of politics
* Govt declares seven-day state mourning

* * * * * *

* Former Prime Minister Morarji Has Passed Away

Bombay, Apr 10 (PTI) Former Prime Minister Mr Morarji Desai died
at the Jaslok Hospital in south Bombay this afternoon, hospital sources
said.
He had been admitted to the hospital on March 20 for treatment of
bronchitis.
Mr Desai's condition deteriorated last saturday and he was put on
a breathing apparatus.

* Morarji a century of life and half century of politics

Bombay, Apr 10 (PTI) Morarji Ranchhodji Desai, whose political
career began way back in 1930, had remained till his last breath an
ardent gandhian, a staunch prohibitionist, and a fierce advocate of
Hindi as the national language and was known for his puritanical views
as an orthodox Hindu.
Through his hundred eventful years, Desai was an integral part of
Congress in the struggle for independence and at the age of 81, headed
the first non-Congress government of the country.
The last destination of his political career - prime ministership
of India during the janata party regime between 1977 to 1979 - came his
way after he lost the bid to become the premier twice, in 1964 after
the death of Jawaharlal Nehru, and later in 1969, when he was expelled
from Congress.
However, the premiership did not last long as Desai had to resign
from the post due to internal squabbling, and later retired from active
politics.
In the prime of his youth, Morarji Desai came under the influence
of Mahatma Gandhi and his ideals. He entered public life with a rare
courage of conviction and possessed an abiding faith in the purity of
means and ends.
Truth to him was an article of faith and not an expediency. Desai
had once defined his credo ''I am a rightist in the sense I believe in
doing right''.
Born on February 29, 1896 at Bhadeli near Bulsar in Gujarat, Desai
was the eldest in the family of eight children. He belonged to the
Anavil Brahmin community who traditionally were farmers and known to be
outspoken and industrious.
Just three days before his marriage to Gajraben, when Morarji was
just 15 years old, his father committed suicide, leaving him to assume
responsibility of his young bride, grandmother, mother, three brothers
and four sisters.
After passing matric, he came to bombay for higher studies on a
scholarship from the Maharaja of Bhavnagar. He joined the science
faculty in wilson college living in a free boarding house.
After graduating with a first class in 1917, Morarji was recruited
to the Bombay provincial civil services the next year and was posted as
deputy collector in Ahmedabad.
The national emancipation Desai had cherished, did not conform to
the working under an alien government and he resigned in May 1930.
He openly expressed later that every Indian who served the British
government was in fact doing harm to the cause of his country as to
work for the british honestly was to popularise their administration
and perpetuate it.
Morarji joined the Congress in 1930 and was elected general
secretary of the local unit. It was during this period that the civil
disobedience movement of Mahatma Gandhi was getting tremendous response
from people.
Active participation in the freedom struggle saw him in and out of
jail several times between 1930 and 1934. He was imprisoned in the
1940s for almost a year in Sabarmati and Yerwada prisons.
In 1946, Desai was elected to the Bombay legislative assembly and
appointed home and revenue minister, a post he retained till general
elections held in independent India in 1952.
He became the chief minister of Bombay and continued in that
capacity till the end of 1956 when he joined the union government as
minister for commerce and industry.
In 1958, Desai assumed finance portfolio following the
resignation of T T Krishnamachari. However, in July 1969, he was
relieved of his finance portfolio by Mrs Indira Gandhi, which led to
his resignation.
After the 1967 general elections, he became the deputy premier.
However, serious differences developed between him and Mrs Indira
Gandhi over bank nationalisation issue, which was one of the ten points
adopted by the aicc session in June 1967 despite his opposition.
Mrs Gandhi first agreed to Desai's concept of +social control+ but
later made her views clear at the aicc session in june 1969 at
Bangalore that she had nationalisation of banks on the top of her
agenda.
The differences between Mrs Gandhi and Desai took a turn for the
worse when he voted for Sanjiva Reddy as the Congress candidate for
presidentship.
Following this open confrontation, Mrs Gandhi divested him of the
finance portfolio contending that his views on economic matters were
incompatrle with radical policies.
Answering the oft-repeated charge that he is obstinate, Desai had
said in his autobiography, +if I do not accept your view point, I am
considered obstinate and rigid. Would you also not consider yourself
rigid when you do not accept my views?+.
After the split in the Congress, Desai was instrumental in forming
Congress(O) under his leadership.
In 1971, Desai was reelected to the Lok Sabha from Surat
constituency. Later in 1975 he undertook a fast to protest against the
delay in holding assembly elections in Gujarat and forced Mrs Gandhi to
concede early elections to the state.
Desai had undertaken his first fast in August 1956 to protest
against violence in Ahmedabad during the agitation to form
Maha-Gujarat.
Morarji had also fasted for 10 days in 1969 to ''clear his
conscience'' and to revive feelings of harmony after Ahmedabad city was
rocked by communal riots.
He was among those opposition leaders who were arrested during the
emergency rule, which he vehemently opposed. however, he was released
on the dissolution of the fifth lok sabha on January 18, 1977.
The Janata Party, which was a conglomerate of Cong(O), Jan Sangh,
Bharatiya Lok Dal and Socialist Party - thanks to Jayaprakash Narayan's
effort, swept to power in the general elections that followed and
eventually donned the mantle of premiership.
However, the Janata government lasted for just two years. after
Congress returned to power in 1980, Desai retired from active
politics.
His official position took him to various countries in connection
with foreign aid, finance minister's meet and annual world bank and IMF
meetings.
Desai also held office of chairman of the administrative reforms
commission from 1956 till 1967 when he became the deputy prime
minister.
During his chairmanship of the administrative reforms commission,
Desai did full justice to the task of suggesting reforms with a view to
restructuring the administrative system of the government. His long and
varied experience as a civil servant, chief minister and union minister
stood him in good stead in this task.
While being the finance minister, in order to meet the needs of
defence and development, he raised large revenues and reduced wasteful
expenditure in an effort to promote austerity in government
administration and kept deficit financing very low by enforcing
financial discipline.
It was during his term as the home minister in the post-war Kher
government of Bombay that Desai first came to national focus.
He imposed total prohibition, banned kissing in films, closed
restaurants by midnight, campaigned against use of cosmetics and made
an unsuccessful attempt to clean up Bombay's brothels. This quest for
Morality in public life he pursued throughout his life.
During his premiership, Desai abolished all official titles.
However, later he accepted Nishan-E-Pakistan from general Zia-Ul-Haq
and Bharat Ratna.

* Govt Declares Seven-Day State Mourning

New Delhi, April 10 (PTI) The government has declared a
seven-day nation-wide state mourning beginning today as a mark of
respect to the memory of the former prime minister, Mr Morarji Desai.
An official announcement said that Mr Desai, who died earlier
during the day, would be given a state funeral at Ahmedabad at 1630
hours tomorrow.
All central government offices will remain closed today and
tomorrow as a mark of respect to the departed soul under the negotiable
instruments act.
During the state mourning period ending on April 16, national
flag will be flown at half mast on all buildings throughout the country
and there will be no no official entertainment.