Word: charan
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...turmoil began with the resignation of Prime Minister Charan Singh, 76, only 15 minutes before a vote of confidence in the lower house of Parliament, the Lok Sabha, that would have sent his 24-day-old coalition government down to certain defeat. In line for the job, or so he thought, was Ram, also official leader of the opposition. But India's President Neelam Sanjiva Reddy bypassed Ram and heeded the advice of outgoing Charan Singh to dissolve the Lok Sabha and call new national elections. He appointed Charan Singh as head of a caretaker government until elections...
Reddy's decision was furiously challenged on the constitutional ground that as Prime Minister, Charan Singh had never faced a vote in Parliament. For that reason, Charan Singh's opponents assert, the President was not bound, in the British tradition, to accept his advice. A disappointed Ram declared, "The country will not excuse the President for his undemocratic dissolution of the Lok Sabha." Certainly there was the danger that the Untouchables would not. In ignoring Ram, the President had offended millions of harijans, who suffer the humiliation of daily discrimination and harassment...
...comeback was due in part to the vigorous campaign she waged to portray herself as a defenseless woman persecuted by a vengeful government bent on destroying her and her son Sanjay, even at the expense of ignoring India's monumental problems. As both Charan Singh and his predecessor, Morarji Desai, had been imprisoned by Mrs. Gandhi, there was perhaps some truth in her charge, though there is ample evidence of her government's misdeeds. She has conceded that there were excesses during her Emergency, but she has stubbornly refused to apologize for her stringent measures in a time...
...political tactician, Mrs. Gandhi outwitted, outfought and outcornered the opposition. With no current seat of her own in Parliament, she directed the Congress (I) from her home or from party offices. Having first backed Charan Singh in July in order to force the resignation of Desai, she then deserted Charan Singh to force his resignation less than a month later. Ram, who has been in every Cabinet since independence, stood by Mrs. Gandhi throughout the Emergency, but deserted her at the last moment to help the Janata Party win the 1977 election. Last week she took her revenge by denying...
...Indian version of political poker. When President N. Sanjiva Reddy last week summoned caretaker Prime Minister Morarji Desai, 83, and his chief challenger, Charan Singh, 76, to his official residence in New Delhi, the two rivals presented lists totaling an identical number. Each claimed to have 279 supporters in the Lok Sabha (lower house), nine more than necessary to form a majority government. Even as Reddy scrutinized the conflicting claims, members of Parliament were changing allegiances behind the scene. In the end, the President chose Singh, the leader of 10 million Jats (farmers) from northern India, as his country...