Lal Bahadur Shastri, was the second Prime Minister of India . He was the Prime Minister of India for almost eighteen months from 9 June 1964 till his death on 11 January 1966. His tenure on this important post was unique. Shastri ji obtained the title of Shastri from Kashi Vidyapeeth. After India 's independence , Shastriji was appointed as the Parliamentary Secretary of Uttar Pradesh . Police in Govind Ballabh Pant 's cabinetAnd was entrusted with the Ministry of Transport. During the tenure of the Transport Minister, he had appointed women conductors for the first time. After becoming the police minister, he started using water cannons instead of sticks to control the crowd . In 1951, he was appointed General Secretary of the All India Congress Committee under the leadership of Jawaharlal Nehru . He worked very hard to win the Congress party with a huge majority in the elections of 1952, 1957 and 1962.

Shastriji was made the Prime Minister of the country in 1964 due to his clean image after Jawaharlal Nehru died on May 27, 1964 during his tenure as Prime Minister . He assumed the office of the Prime Minister of India on 9 June 1964. The Indo-Pak war of 1965 started during his reign . India had lost the war with China three years before this . Shastriji provided better leadership to the nation than Nehru in this unexpected war and gave a crushing defeat to Pakistan . Pakistan had never imagined this even in its dreams. of Pakistan in Tashkent He died under mysterious circumstances on the night of January 11, 1966, after signing an agreement to end the war with Prime Minister Ayub Khan . He was awarded Bharat Ratna posthumously for his simplicity , patriotism and honesty.

Shastri Jayanti and Lal Bahadur Shastri Memorial Day

October 2, the birthday of Lal Bahadur Shastri, is celebrated as Shastri Jayanti and January 11, the day of his death, is celebrated as Lal Bahadur Shastri Memorial Day.

Brief biography

Lal Bahadur Shastri was born in 1904 in Mughalsarai ( Uttar Pradesh ) in a Kayastha family to Munshi Sharda Prasad Srivastava. [2] His father was a primary school teacher, so everyone used to call him Munshiji. Later he took up the job of a clerk in the Revenue Department. Lal Bahadur's mother's name was Ramdulari. Due to being the youngest in the family, the family used to fondly call Lal Bahadur as little boy. Unfortunately the father passed away when the little boy was eighteen months old. His mother Ramdulari went to her father Hazarilal's house in Mirzapur . After some time even his maternal grandfather was no more. Her warts in raising a fatherless childRaghunath Prasad supported his mother a lot. While living in Nanihal, he received primary education. After that education was done in Harishchandra High School and Kashi Vidyapeeth . After receiving the title of Shastri from Kashi Vidyapeeth, he removed the caste-related word Srivastava from birth forever and put 'Shastri' in front of his name. After this the word Shastri became synonymous with Lal Bahadur's name.

In 1928 , he was married to Lalita, daughter of Ganesh Prasad , resident of Mirzapur . Lalita and Shastriji had six children, two daughters - Kusum and Suman and four sons - Harikrishna, Anil, Sunil and Ashok. Two of his four sons - Anil Shastri and Sunil Shastri are still alive, the remaining two have passed away. Anil Shastri is a senior leader of the Congress party while Sunil Shastri is a leader of the Bharatiya Janata Party .

Political life

After completing his graduation in Sanskrit language, he joined the Bharat Sevak Sangh and started his political life from here by taking a vow to serve the country . Shastriji was a true Gandhian who spent his entire life with simplicity and devoted it to the service of the poor. He had an active participation in all the important programs and movements of the Indian freedom struggle and as a result he had to stay in jails many times. The movements of the freedom struggle in which he played an important role include the Non-Cooperation Movement of 1921 , the Dandi March of 1930 and the Quit India Movement of 1942 .are noteworthy.

Seeing England badly embroiled in the Second World War , as soon as Netaji gave the slogan of "Delhi Chalo" to the Azad Hind Fauj , Gandhiji , sensing the delicacy of the opportunity, ordered the British to "Quit India" from Bombay on the night of August 8, 1942. And issued the order "Do or Die" to the Indians and Yervada went to the Aga Khan Palace in Pune under government security. On August 9, 1942, Shastri reached Allahabad and tactfully adopted the Gandhian slogan of the movement "Don't die, kill!" turned into and unexpectedly ignited a revolutionGave it a fierce form in the whole country. Shastriji was arrested on August 19, 1942, after running this movement while remaining underground for eleven whole days.

Apart from Purushottamdas Tandon and Pandit Govind Ballabh Pant, Jawaharlal Nehru was also included in Shastriji's political directors . First, after coming to Allahabad in 1929 , he started working with Tandanji as the secretary of the Allahabad unit of Bharat Sevak Sangh. His closeness with Nehruji increased while living in Allahabad. After this, Shastriji's stature continued to grow and while climbing the stairs of success one after the other, he reached the prime position of Home Minister in Nehruji's cabinet. And not only this, after the death of Nehru, he also became the Prime Minister of India .

Prime Minister

Due to his clean image, he was made the Prime Minister of the country in 1964. In his first press conference, he said that his top priority was to stop the rise in food prices, and he was successful in doing so. His activities were not theoretical but completely practical and according to the needs of the people. If seen objectively, Shastriji's reign was very difficult. The capitalists wanted to dominate the country and the enemy countries were trying to attack us. In 1965 suddenly Pakistan launched an air attack on India at 7.30 pm. According to tradition , the President called an emergency meeting in which the heads of the three defense organs and members of the cabinet were included. prime minister by chanceArrived a little late in that meeting. The discussion started as soon as he arrived. The three chiefs explained the whole situation to him and asked: "Sir! What is the order?" Shastriji immediately replied in one sentence: "You protect the country and tell me what we have to do?" Shastriji provided better leadership to the nation than Nehru in this war and gave the slogan of Jai Jawan-Jai Kisan . This boosted the morale of the people of India and the whole country became united. Pakistan had never imagined this even in its dreams.

During the Indo-Pak War, on 6 September, India's 15th Infantry Division, led by World War II veteran Major General Prasad, repulsed a massive Pakistani offensive on the western bank of the Ichchhogil Canal. The Ichchhogil Canal was the de facto border of India and Pakistan. In this attack, Major General Prasad's convoy itself was also severely attacked and he had to leave his vehicle and retreat. The Indian Army successfully crossed the canal near Barki village by retaliating with double power. This brought the Indian Army within range of attacking Lahore 's airport. Frightened by this unexpected attack, America appealed for a temporary ceasefire to evacuate its citizens from Lahore.

Eventually Shastriji was forced with the connivance of Russia and America. He was called to Russia under a well thought out conspiracy which he accepted. His wife Lalita Shastri, who always accompanied him, was persuaded not to accompany Shastriji to Tashkent , the capital of Russia , and she also agreed. Mrs. Lalita Shastri regretted this mistake of hers till her death. When the negotiations went on, Shastriji had only one insistence that he accepted all other conditions, but returning the won land to Pakistan was not acceptable at all. After a lot of struggle, by making international pressure on Shastriji, the document of Tashkent agreement was signed. He had signed saying that he is definitely signing but this land will be returned by some other prime minister, not him. President of PakistanHe died on the night of 11 January 1966, hours after signing a ceasefire agreement with Ayub Khan . It remains a mystery [3] till today whether Shastriji really died due to heart attack? Many people consider poison to be the cause of his death.

Even today the whole of India remembers Shastriji with reverence for his simplicity, patriotism and honesty. He was posthumously awarded the Bharat Ratna in the year 1966 .

Mysterious death

Facing the invasion of Pakistan, the Indian Army attacked Lahore. Seeing this unexpected attack, America demanded a ceasefire for some time to evacuate the American citizens living in Lahore. After the walk between Russia and America, the Indian Prime Minister was called to the Tashkent Agreement in Russia. [5] Shastri ji accepted all the conditions of Tashkent Agreement but returning the areas won by Pakistan was not acceptable at all. Under international pressure, Shastriji had to sign the Tashkent agreement, but Lal Bahadur Shastri himself refused to return this land during his prime ministership. Indian Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri died suspiciously hours after signing a ceasefire with Pakistan's Prime Minister Ayub Khan. The then Prime Minister of the country died on the night of 11 January 1966.

He died the same night after signing the Tashkent Agreement . The cause of death was said to be a heart attack. Shastriji was cremated with full state honors on the banks of the Yamuna in front of Shantivan (Nehruji's tomb) and the place was named Vijay Ghat . Gulzari Lal Nanda was caretaker Prime Minister until the Congress Parliamentary Party elected Indira Gandhi as Shastri's legal successor.

Various speculations were made regarding the death of Shastriji. Many people, including his family members, believe that Shastriji did not die of a heart attack but of poisoning. The first inquiry was conducted by Raj Narayan, which reportedly ended inconclusive. The interesting thing is that today there is no record of him in the Indian Parliamentary Library. It was also alleged that even the post mortem of Shastriji was not done. When this question was raised in 2009, it was answered by the Government of India that Shastriji's private doctor R.N.Chugh and some doctors from Russia had jointly investigated his death, but the government has no record of it. Later, when information was sought from the Prime Minister's Office, he also expressed his helplessness. 

A magazine named Outlook exposed the complete pole of the possible conspiracy in Shastriji's death. In 2009, when Anuj Dhar, author of the book CIA's Eye on South Asia, asked for information under the Right to Information , the Prime Minister's Office said that “Shastriji's death Making public the documents of our country can spoil the international relations of our country and as soon as this secret is revealed, apart from creating upheaval in the country, parliamentary privileges can also be hurt. These are all the reasons why this question was not answered. Can go.”

First published in 1978 in a Hindi book Lalita ke Aansoo the sad story of Shastriji's death was naturally told through his wife Lalita Shastri. At that time (in 1978) Lalitaji was alive. Not only this, in another English book published some time ago, author journalist Kuldeep Nayyar , who had accompanied Shastriji to Tashkent at that time, has thrown light on this cycle of events in detail. Last year in July 2012, Shastriji's third son Sunil Shastri had also demanded the Government of India to remove the veil from this mystery. On reading the chapter related to India in the book named Mitrokhon Archive, detailed information about Tashkent Agreement and political activities of that time is available.