Karan Singh

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For other uses, see Karan Singh (disambiguation).

Karan Singh
Udhampur
In office
1967–1968
Preceded byConstituency established
Succeeded byG. S. Brigadier
Personal details
Born (1931-03-09) 9 March 1931 (age 93)
Cannes, France
Political partyIndian National Congress (1947 – 1979, 2000 – Present)
Other political
affiliations		Indian National Congress (U) (1979 – 1984)

Independent (1984)

National Conference (1996 – 1999)
SpouseYasho Rajya Lakshmi
RelationsDogra dynasty
Chitrangada Singh (daughter-in-law)
PhD)
AwardsPadma Vibhushan
Signature
Websitekaransingh.com

Karan Singh (born 9 March 1931) is an Indian politician and philosopher.

Sadr-i-Riyasat (President) of the state of Jammu and Kashmir .[2] He is the chairperson trustee of the Dharmarth Trust of Jammu and Kashmir which maintains 175 temples in north India and works in other areas such as historical preservation.[3][4]

Singh was a member of India's Upper House of Parliament, the

Sadr-i-Riyasat)[2][5] and Governor of the former state of Jammu and Kashmir. He was a life trustee and president of India International Center. He was elected chancellor of Banaras Hindu University for three terms[6] until 2018 when he was succeeded by Giridhar Malaviya.[7] He has been a prospective presidential candidate over the years.[8][9][10][11]

Early and personal life

Maharaja of Jammu and Kashmir.[13] His mother, Maharani Tara Devi, who was the fourth wife of his father, was the daughter of a landowning Katoch Rajput family and came from (Vijaypur near Bilaspur) in Kangra district of Himachal Pradesh.[dubious – discuss][citation needed
]

Singh was educated at

University of Delhi.[14]

In 1950, the 19-year-old Karan Singh was married to 13-year-old Yasho Rajya Lakshmi, granddaughter of Mohan Shumsher Rana, Maharajah of Nepal, belonging to the Rana dynasty of Nepal. Her father, General Maharajkumar Sharada Shumsher Jung Bahadur Rana, was a son of Mohan Shumsher.[15] The match, arranged by their families in the usual Indian way, was entirely harmonious and lasted all their lives. The couple had three children:

  • Chitrangada Scindia, the daughter of Madhavrao Scindia of Gwalior, in 1987.[16]
  • Ajatshatru Singh, second son; took to politics, was elected to the state assembly from the Nagrota constituency and became a minister in the state government. His wife is the daughter of an army officer.
  • Jyotsna Singh, only daughter, married to Dhirendra Singh Chauhan, from a Chauhan family belonging to Mainpuri in Uttar Pradesh.[17]

Political career

In 1949, at age of eighteen, Singh was appointed as the Prince Regent of Jammu and Kashmir state after his father stepped down as the ruler, following the state's accession to India.[18] From that point, he served successively as regent, the Sadr-i-Riyasat, and the first governor of the state of Jammu and Kashmir from 1965 to 1967.

On August 8, 1953 as the President (

Sadr-i-Riyasat) of Jammu and Kashmir, Karan Singh backed a coup d'etat against the elected Prime Minister Sheikh Abdullah,[citation needed] allegedly for harboring independent ambitions for Kashmir, which led to the imprisonment of Abdullah for eleven years following the Kashmir Conspiracy Case
.

In 1967, he resigned as

Governor of Jammu and Kashmir, and became the youngest-ever member of the Union Cabinet, holding the portfolios of Tourism and Civil Aviation between 1967 and 1973.[19][20]
Two years later, he voluntarily surrendered his privy purse, which he had been entitled to since the death of his father in 1961. He placed the entire sum into a charitable trust named after his parents.

In the 26th amendment

Jawaharlal Nehru Award for International Understanding to German Chancellor Angela Merkel at the Presidential Palace in New Delhi, India in 2009.

In 1971, he was sent as an envoy to the Eastern Bloc nations to explain India's position with regard to East Pakistan, then engaged in civil war with West Pakistan.[23]

He attempted to resign following an aircraft crash in 1973, but the resignation was not accepted. The same year, he became the Minister for Health and Family planning, serving in this post until 1977.

Following the Emergency, Karan Singh was elected to the Lok Sabha from Udhampur in 1977 on a Congress ticket [the party had not split into Congress(I) and Congress(U) factions till then], and became Minister of Education and Culture in 1979 in Charan Singh's cabinet, representing Congress(U), which had split from Indira's Congress. Notably, Charan Singh became Prime Minister after the fall of Janata Party government headed by Morarji Desai. And Charan Singh himself resigned without facing Parliament even for a day as he was not sure of having a confidence motion passed in his favour. Karan Singh contested the 1980 Lok Sabha election on a Congress(U) ticket and won. In 1989–1990, he served as Indian Ambassador to the US, and this experience became the subject of a book he wrote, "Brief Sojourn".[24]

From 1967 to 1984, Karan Singh was a member of the Lok Sabha. In 1984, he contested the Lok Sabha polls as an independent candidate from Jammu but lost the election. He was a member of the Rajya Sabha from 30 November 1996 to 12 August 1999, representing National Conference, a Muslim dominated party active in Jammu and Kashmir. Later, he was a Rajya Sabha member from 28 January 2000 to 27 January 2018 representing INC. He is known for switching his loyalties from one political party to another quite frequently. He has served as Chancellor of Banaras Hindu University, Jammu and Kashmir University, Jawaharlal Nehru University, and NIIT University.[25]

Later life

He has been engaged by Sansad TV (a merged Global TV Channel of Lok Sabha TV and Rajya Sabha TV) as a Guest Anchor along with some other senior celebrated experts from diverse fields such as Bibek Debroy, Amitabh Kant, Shashi Tharoor, Hemant Batra, Maroof Raza and Sanjeev Sanyal to present some flagship programmes.[26][27][28]

Academic career

Karan Singh served as the chancellor of Banaras Hindu University for three terms up until 2018. In 2008, he awarded an honorary doctorate to the then prime minister Manmohan Singh,[29] and in 2016, he was asked by university administration to award an honorary doctorate to prime minister Narendra Modi, that the prime minister declined.[30]

Honours and awards

The Chancellor, Banaras Hindu University, Dr. Karan Singh presenting Honorary Doctorate Degree to the Prime Minister, Dr. Manmohan Singh, at the '90th Convocation Ceremony' in Varanasi on 15 March 2008
Prime Minister Narendra Modi being welcomed by Dr. Karan Singh, on his arrival at the Banaras Hindu University, in Varanasi on February 22, 2016.

IndiaIndia:

Views

On population

"In 1974, I led the Indian delegation to the World Population Conference in Bucharest, where my statement that 'development is the best contraceptive' became widely known and oft quoted. I must admit that 20 years later I am inclined to reverse this, and my position now is that 'contraception is the best development'.”[31]

Bibliography

  • Towards A New India (1974)
  • Population, Poverty and the Future of India (1975)
  • One Man's World (1986)
  • Essays on Hinduism. Ratna Sagar. 1987.
    ISBN 81-7070-173-2
    .
  • Humanity at the Crossroads, with Daisaku Ikeda. Oxford University Press, 1988.
  • Autobiography (2 vols.)(1989)
  • Brief Sojourn (1991)
  • Hymn to Shiva and Other Poems (1991)
  • The Transition to a Global Society (1991)
  • Mountain of Shiva (1994)
  • Autobiography. Oxford University Press, 1994.
    ISBN 0-19-563636-8
    .
  • Hinduism. Sterling Publishers Pvt. Ltd, 2005.
    ISBN 1-84557-425-7
  • Mundaka Upanishad: The Bridge to Immortality.
  • Ten Gurus of the Sikhs Their Life Story, Tr. into English Pramila Naniwadekar & Moreshwar Naniwadekar.
  • Nehru's Kashmir. Wisdom Tree.
    ISBN 978-81-8328-160-7
    .
  • A Treasury of Indian Wisdom. Penguin Ananda, 2010.
    ISBN 978-0-670-08450-0
    .
  • ISBN 9353570239[32][33]

See also

References

  1. ^ "Dr. Karan Singh". karansingh.com. Retrieved 19 June 2017.
  2. ^
    Outlook India
    magazine    . 19 July 2017. Retrieved 19 June 2017.
  3. ^ "PM releases Manuscript with commentaries by 21 scholars on shlokas of Srimad Bhagavadgita". Press Information Bureau, Government of India. 9 March 2021. Retrieved 29 January 2022.
  4. ^ "Working Group Report on Improving Heritage Management in India" (PDF). NITI Aayog. 2020. p. 43.
  5. ISBN 9788184301526
    . Before leaving Srinagar he also had long talks with Yuvraj Karan Singh, who was then being pressed to become the Sadr-i-Riyasat - Head of State of the State.
  6. ^ "Karan Singh elected BHU chancellor for 3rd time". The Times of India. 24 June 2010. Retrieved 22 February 2020.
  7. ^ "Madan Mohan Malaviya's grandson next BHU chancellor". Business Standard India. Press Trust of India. 27 November 2018. Retrieved 22 February 2020.
  8. ^ "I'm available for the top job: Karan Singh". Hindustan Times. 14 June 2007. Retrieved 13 November 2021.
  9. ^ "Ankit Love wants nomination of Dr Karan Singh & Bhim Singh for President and Vice President of India". Cross Town News. 23 June 2021. Retrieved 16 October 2021.
  10. ^ "Bhim Singh pitches Dr Karan Singh as next President", Daily Excelsior, 5 June 2017, archived from the original on 19 December 2021, retrieved 18 June 2017
  11. ^ "Propose Dr. Karan Singh as next President: Prof. Bhim". JK Monitor. Archived from the original on 5 September 2017. Retrieved 18 June 2017.
  12. ^ "Karan Singh recalls his French Connection". NetIndian. 20 March 2010. Retrieved 22 May 2021.
  13. ^ "Rajya Sabha MP Karan Singh slams attempts to brand Hari Singh as communal". 28 January 2017.
  14. ^ "Dr. Karan Singh Profile". Doon School. Archived from the original on 18 September 2009.
  15. ^ "Jammu & Kashmir Dharmarth Trust - Maharani Yasho Rajya Lakshmi". Archived from the original on 24 September 2010.
  16. ^ The Gwalior Royal Wedding Event covered in India Today
  17. ^ "Unlike Father, son". The Week.
  18. ^ Dr. Karan Singh Raj Bhawan, Jammu and Kashmir official website.
  19. ^ "COUNCIL OF MINISTERS: GANDHI 2". kolumbus.fi. Archived from the original on 27 September 2020. Retrieved 10 March 2018.
  20. ^ "COUNCIL OF MINISTERS: GANDHI 3". kolumbus.fi. Archived from the original on 18 August 2021. Retrieved 10 March 2018.
  21. ^ "The Constitution (26 Amendment) Act, 1971", indiacode.nic.in, Government of India, 1971, retrieved 9 November 2011
  22. ISBN 978-0-88289-753-0
    Quote: "A monarchy is only as good as the reigning monarch: thus it is with the princely states. Once they seemed immutable, invincible. In 1971 they were "derecognized," their privileges, privy purses and titles all abolished at a stroke" (page 91)
  23. ^ "Dr. Karan Singh".
  24. ^ Karan echoes Omar, but ‘J&K part of India’, Arun Sharma, Jammu, Sat 23 October 2010, The Indian Express Limited
  25. ^ "NIIT University: Best University in India for B Tech, Integrated MBA, Ph. D Courses". niituniversity.in.
  26. Tribune India
    .
  27. ^ "PM Narendra Modi to launch Sansad TV on September 15: Report". Business Standard India. Press Trust of India. 10 September 2021 – via Press Trust of India.
  28. ^ "PM Modi to launch Sansad TV on September 15, say sources". The Times of India. 10 September 2021.
  29. ^ "Manmohan Singh awarded honorary doctorate degree by BHU | India News - Times of India". The Times of India. 15 March 2008. Retrieved 22 February 2020.
  30. ^ "Take pride in India's heritage, culture: PM Modi at BHU convocation ceremony". Business Standard India. 23 February 2016. Retrieved 22 February 2020.
  31. ^ "Quotations". populationmatters.org. Archived from the original on 3 July 2015. Retrieved 3 July 2014.
  32. OCLC 1100771553
    .
  33. ^ "An Examined Life". HarperCollins Publishers India. Retrieved 14 June 2020.

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Karan Singh.
Political offices
Preceded by
Post created following abdication of Hari Singh
 Prince Regent of Jammu and Kashmir
1949–1952 		Succeeded by
Head of State of Jammu and Kashmir (Sadr-i-Riyasat)
Preceded by
Prince Regent of Jammu and Kashmir
 Head of State of Jammu and Kashmir (Sadr-i-Riyasat)
1952–1964 		Succeeded by
Succeeded by that of
Governor of Jammu and Kashmir
Preceded by
Head of State of Jammu and Kashmir (Sadr-i-Riyasat)
Governor of Jammu and Kashmir

1964–1967 		Succeeded by
Preceded by
Ministry established
 Minister of Tourism and Civil Aviation
13 March 1967 – 9 November 1973 		Succeeded by
R. Bahadur
Preceded by Minister of Health and Family Planning
9 November 1973 – 24 March 1977 		Succeeded by
Preceded by
 Minister of Education and Culture
1979–1980 		Succeeded by
Preceded by
P.K. Kaul
Indian Ambassador to the United States

1989–1990 		Succeeded by
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