NEW DELHI: Former Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi was assassinated and P V Narasimha Rao became the first prime minister from the South during 1991, which also saw a high dose of Liberalization by the New Congress (I) minority government to rescue a sinking economy.
Human bomb killed former premier Rajiv Gandhi as he was about to address a late night election meeting at Sriperambudur, off Madras city in the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu on May 21.
The assassination not only altered the electoral scenario but affected the fate of country as well Rajiv’s policies of lieralization became the guiding light for his Party men, who took up India’s reins riding on a sympathy wave.
A special investigation team later established that the assassination was the hand work of the LTTE. The team managed to track down many of the key suspects like Maurugan Sivarasan and Subha but could not nab them alive. The probe ended in a high drama in Bangalore in the southern state of Kamataka where Sivarasan, Subha and some other Tamil Tigers committed suicide before being arrested.
The year was an election year. A general election in May June and Bye-pol in mid-November saw the Tenth Lok Sabha (the lower house of the parliament) constituted. However New Delhi constituency that houses the seat of parliament remains unrepresented.
Chandra Shekhar, who was heading a minority government with Congress support for about five months, opted for a fresh mandate in March when the issue of alleged surveillance around Rajiv Gandhi’s central Delhi residence soured the precarious relations between the two parties.
Elections were announced in April and with that stared the bloodiest ever campaign trail. Five Lok Sabha (the lower house of parliament) and 21 state assembly candidates besides 350 others were killed in the run up to the elections.
The country was already going through the tremors of the worst ever electoral violence when Gandhi was assassinated on the day interceding the first and second phase of polling. Elections were stalled for cover 20 days to let the country absorb the shock after voting had been held for half the seats. The sympathy vote generated by the brutal Killing helped the Congress I rise to power forth first time sans a Nehru or a Gandhi. It won the general election but only at the cost of losing its leader Rajiv Gandhi, It could still not manage a majority in the Lok Sabha.
PV Narasimha Raos accent to premiership saw the party go through bitter power struggle. Sharad Pawar, the main challenger, was finally won over and offered defence portfolio.
For Janata Dal, the fall which stared in November 1990 when it was ousted from the center, continued. The party and its left allies could only muster enough seats to be the third biggest group in the Lok Sabha (the lower house of the parliament). The year-end saw Ajit Singh revolt and the Party split in its Bastion Uttar Pradesh, the northern Indian state.
The Right Wing BJP (Bharatiya Janata Party) bettered its seats tally but could not realize its dream of ruling the “Hindu Rashtira”. It however, grabbed power in the strategic Uttar Pradesh,
The party was recognized as the biggest opposition group in Lok Sabha and its MP $ Mallikarjunaiah was elected deputy speaker. December saw party president M Joshi, who had taken over the party’s reins from L K Advani in January; launch an “Ekta Yatra” (unity pilgrimage).
Electors voted for a change of government in the states of Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Assam, U P, Haryana, Pondicherry and West Bengal.
“The Tenth Lok Sabha was constituted on June 20. Some major legislation it has passed since, are the places of worship bill, the extension of Terrorist and Disruptive activities act and extension of president rule in Punjab till February.
The Rao govt also issued notification amending National Front govt proposed 27% job reservations for “other socially backward classes” (OBC) by adding another 10% for economically backward classes. Mandal flared up passions again following the announcement,
The government also announced legislative assembly and council of ministers for Delhi, while retaining its status as union territory and promise deflections within eight months.
The center went in for large scale economic reforms to tide over the severe foreign exchange crisis. India received large doses (of emergency loans from the World Bank and the IMF (International Monitory Fund) as it devalued the rupee by over 22% and announced new, far more market oriented undead industrial policies. The county’s gold was pledged abroad for raising resources.
The yearend saw India better its bilateral ties with China. Nepalese premier G P Koirala and Chinese premier Li Peng visited the country in December.
India was elected president of the U N security council this year. It also became the first country to lift people to people sanctions against south Africa after prime minister Rao participated in the 37th commonwealth heads of govt summit in Harare in October it also made sporting history by becoming the first country to play cricket against south Africa after over 20 years.
It recognized the three baltic republics in September, the Indo Soviet peace and friendship treaty was extended by 20 years this August.
Foreign minister Madhav Singh Solanki visited Moscow and New Delhi hosted the 37th commonwealth parliamentary conference.
Militancy specially in the northern Indian states of Kashmir, Punjab and Assam, took on a more menacing form this year with many abductions, massacres and bomb attacks in public places. The carnage spilled over from its home states to the capital and other areas and even foreigners and diplomats were not spared.
The high tide in militant activitis followed the many security forces operations against them.
At win bomb attack at Ramilia grounds in Rudrapur near Maintain the state of Uttar Pradesh killed 55 people. In the biggest ever militancy related massacre, 125 rain passengers were done to death in Ludhiana city in the strife tom state of Punjab.
Ramanian diplomat Liviu Radu, two Swedish engineers, an Israeli tourist, officials of ONGC and OIC including K Doraiswamy, were among scores of people abducted and later released by militants from Punjab, Kashmir and Assam while Soviet Sergei Grishenko was killed by the UFLA.
“The Ayodhya issue remained in the focus with Uttar Pradesh’s BJP government acquiring the land housing the disputed shrine and finally being asked by the supreme court to maintain status quo there.
Communal carnage also raised its head time and time again. 20 people were killed in Gujarat in July, Harijans were killed in Tsundur village in Andhra Pradesh in September and the holy city of Varanasi was rocked in November.
Litigation against the U S based union carbide in the Bhopal gas tragedy case was reopened by the Supreme Court.
The sharing of Cauvery waters by the southern Indian states of Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Pondicherry developed into another controversy in the latter half of the year as the tribunals order asking Karnataka to release water to Tamil Nadu was a referred to the Supreme Court.
While the Cauvery issue agitated the political scene, a massive earthquake rocked the sleepy hills of Utarkashi in Non Uttar Pradesh at least 500 people were killed in the quake that affected scores of villagers and hamlets in Tehri Garhwal.
Sura a methylated Ayurveda alcoholic mixture, killed 184 people and maimed many more on Diwali night on November
28 and an Indian airlines craft collided against a hillock near Imphal. The Kamataka express derailed near Bangalore in blinding rains killing 61 passengers. “The country lost celebrated Malayalam film director Arvindan, Marathi and Hindi cine actress Durga Khote, noted satirist and columnist Sharad Joshi, veteran communist leader Shripad Amrit Dange, Congress I veteran UMA Shankar Dixit, Kerala leader Achyuta Menon and Shankar Guha Niyogi, trade colonist from Chhattisgarh who was murdered in late September. India’s second remote sensing satellite IRS-IB was from Bykanour Cosmodome in Soviet Union.
Article extracted from this publication >> January 10, 1992
