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Sardar Swaran Singh | |
|---|---|
 Swaran Singh Lok Sabha portrait | |
| Minister of Defence | |
| In office 10 October 1974 – 1 December 1975 | |
| Prime Minister | Indira Gandhi |
| Preceded by | Jagjivan Ram |
| Succeeded by | Indira Gandhi |
| In office 13 November 1966 – 27 June 1970 | |
| Prime Minister | Indira Gandhi |
| Preceded by | Yashwantrao Chavan |
| Succeeded by | Jagjivan Ram |
| Minister of External Affairs | |
| In office 27 June 1970 – 10 October 1974 | |
| Prime Minister | Indira Gandhi |
| Preceded by | Dinesh Singh |
| Succeeded by | Yashwantrao Chavan |
| In office 18 July 1964 – 14 November 1966 | |
| Prime Minister | Lal Bahadur Shastri Indira Gandhi |
| Preceded by | Lal Bahadur ShastriActing |
| Succeeded by | M. C. Chagla |
| Minister of Agriculture | |
| In office 1 September 1963 – 9 June 1964 | |
| Prime Minister | Jawaharlal Nehru |
| Preceded by | S. K. Patil |
| Succeeded by | Chidambaram Subramaniam |
| Minister of Railways | |
| In office 10 April 1962 – 21 September 1963 | |
| Prime Minister | Jawaharlal Nehru |
| Preceded by | Jagjivan Ram |
| Succeeded by | H. C. Dasappa |
| Member of Parliament, Lok Sabha | |
| In office 1957–1977 | |
| Constituency | Jullundur |
| Personal details | |
| Born | Swaran Singh Purewal (1907-08-19)19 August 1907 Shankar Village,Punjab Province,British India |
| Died | 30 October 1994(1994-10-30) (aged 87) New Delhi, India |
| Cause of death | Cardiac Arrest |
| Citizenship | India |
| Spouse | Charan Kaur |
| Children | Param Panag, Sat Boparai, Iqbal Sidhu, Jasvinder Kaur |
| Parent | SardarPartap Singh Shankar |
| Education | Randhir College, Kapurthala, Government College Lahore |
| Occupation | Politician |
Sardar Swaran Singh (19 August 1907 – 30 October 1994) was an Indian politician. He was India's second longest-serving union cabinet minister afterJagjivan Ram.[1]
Swaran Singh Purewal was born on 19 August 1907 inShankar (village) inJalandhar district of Punjab. He was born inJat (Sikh) family.He completed his intermediate (high school) atRandhir College inKapurthala. He then joinedGovernment College, Lahore and completed a degree in physics with honors.[citation needed]
He then worked as a lecturer in physics inLyallpur Khalsa College. After leaving this job he studied law in Government law college in Lahore and received his L.L.B in 1932.[citation needed]
He started a law practice near his birth village in the nearby town of Jallandhar, specialising in criminal law.[citation needed]
In 1930s he joined theAkali Dal political party and by the mid forties he was a prominent leader in the mid-1940s. He played an important role in the compromise between the Indian national congress party and the Akali Dal in the early 1940s.[citation needed]
Just before the 1946 elections, thePanthic Party was formed withBaldev Singh as the leader and Singh was elected its deputy leader. In 1946 he was elected a member of the Punjab legislative assembly. He then became parliamentary secretary to the Punjab Coalition government.[citation needed]
He was a member of the Punjab Partition Committee where he played an important role.[citation needed]
On 15 August 1947, the day ofIndian Independence he was sworn in as Home Minister in the cabinet of the state of Punjab. At the same time the capital of the Punjab was shifted fromShimla toJalandhar.[citation needed]
On 13 May 1952 he resigned his position here when Jawaharlal Nehru included him in the central cabinet.[2][3]
He entered the cabinet of India's first prime minister,Jawaharlal Nehru, in 1952, and was that government's last surviving member.
He spent 23 years of his life as a high ranking Cabinet Minister in the Government of India. He had a reputation for being an effective debater and negotiator. "His debates at the UN Security Council on Bangladesh's cause, when East Pakistan liberation war (1971) was in full swing, were impressive," attests Former Indian ambassador to the United Nations, Narendra P Jain, "He proved to be more than just a match for his then Pakistani counterpart Zulfikar Ali Bhutto. During one of the council debates when Bhutto said that Sardar's hands are full of blood in conflict, Swarn Singh got up and showed his clean, spotless hands."[4] He was familiar with and was a proficient speaker of several languages. He assisted Jawaharlal Nehru in his talks with the Chinese leader Zhou Enlai, on the Indo-China border question in 1960. He was in the Indian delegation during the six rounds of talks with Pakistan in 1962–63.[5]
He remained a part of successive governments until he resigned in November 1975.
He was elected to theLok Sabha in 1957, 1962, 1967 and 1972.
To this date he is the second longest-serving union cabinet minister in India.[citation needed] Babu Jajgivan Ram holds the record for maximum duration as cabinet minister, i.e., more than 29 years, but the record for longest consistent and uninterrupted membership of the cabinet in continuation is held by Mr. Swaran Singh.[citation needed]
| Ministry | Date |
|---|---|
| Works, Housing and Supplies | 1952–1957 |
| Steel Mines and Fuel | 1957–1962 |
| Agriculture | 1963–1964 |
| Railways | 1962–1963 |
| External Affairs | 1964–1966 |
| Defence | 1966–1970 |
| External Affairs | 1970–1974 |
| Defence | 1974–1976 |
He is best known for his role as India's external affairs minister.[citation needed]
He was also president of the National Congress in 1969, and 1978.[citation needed]
He visited the USSR in July 1966 along with then Prime MinisterIndira Gandhi.
On 9 August 1971, he signed "The Treaty of Peace, Friendship and Cooperation between the USSR and the Republic of India" which provided for closer contacts between the two countries in economic, political cultural and other fields. The treaty was also a defense pact under with both countries were obliged to come to each other's assistance in the event a military conflict with a third country occurs. This treaty was binding for 20 years and was co signed byAndrei Gromyko[6]
He led the Indian delegation to the UN general assembly in 1971 to explain India's position in the ongoing war with Pakistan.[7][8]
George H. W. Bush, who at the time was the US ambassador to the UN and led the US delegation at the UN Security Council, demanded an unconditional cease fire by India, to which Swaran Singh responded, "this one sided and partisan attitude of the distinguished representative of the United States has shocked and surprised us. The US is entitled to its own opinions and interpretations, so are we. But facts are facts and must be stated. Right from the beginning of this unfortunate situation that has arisen in the subcontinent, India had been asking for a political settlement acceptable to elected and acknowledged representatives of the people of Bangladesh."[9]
On 16 December 1971, East Pakistan troops there surrendered to joint forces of Bangladesh and India, who had seized the capital city of Dacca (now Dhaka).[10]
Sardar Swaran Singh was chairperson of the committee entrusted with the responsibility of studying theConstitution of India in 1976 during the national emergency.[11] Soon after the declaration of the national emergency,Indira Gandhi constituted a committee under the Chairmanship of Sardar Swaran Singh to study the question of amending the constitution in the light of past experiences. Based on its recommendations, the government incorporated several changes to the Constitution including the Preamble, through theForty-second Amendment of the Constitution of India (passed in 1976 and came into effect on 3 January 1977)[11]
He was awardedPadma Vibhushan award – the second highest civil award by the republic of India in 1992.[1]
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Sardar Swaran Singh met withNelson Mandela in prison three times in the mid-1980s. He was a member of the eminent persons group on South Africa sponsored by theCommonwealth Institute that consisted ofMalcolm Fraser who had been Prime Minister of Australia for eight years, General Obasanjo of Nigeria,Lord Barber who had been Edward Heath's Chancellor of the Exchequer and was also chairman of the Standard Chartered Bank, Dame Nita Barrow, Reverend Scott andJohn Malecela, a Tanzanian former government minister.[12] The group went to South Africa and spent five weeks there to collect information, interact with local people, and met withNelson Mandela and the ANC; their findings were published by the Commonwealth Institute entitled "Mission to South Africa: the Commonwealth Report".
Sardar Swaran Singh served as a member of board of directors from 1985 – 1989 for sessions 123 – 132.[13]
{{cite news}}:Missing or empty|title= (help)| Political offices | ||
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| Preceded by | Minister of Railways 1962–1963 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by | Minister for External Affairs of India 1964–1966 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by | Minister of Defence 1966–1970 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by | Minister for External Affairs of India 1970–1974 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by | Minister of Defence 1974–1975 | Succeeded by |
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