Inder Kumar Gujral

Inder Kumar Gujral (4 December 1919 – 30 November 2012) was an Indian diplomat, politician and freedom activist who served as the 12th prime minister of India from April 1997 to March 1998.

Born in Punjab, he was influenced by nationalistic ideas as a student, and joined the All India Students Federation and the Communist Party of India.

He was imprisoned for taking part in the Quit India movement.

Inder Kumar Gujral was born on 4 December 1919 in a Punjabi Hindu Khatri family to Avtar Narain and Pushpa Gujral in the village of Pari Darveza in the Sohawa Tehsil of the Jhelum District in undivided Punjab in British India, which is in present-day Punjab, Pakistan.

He studied at D.A.V. College, Hailey College of Commerce and Forman Christian College, Lahore, all affiliated with the University of the Punjab.

He was a member of All India Students Federation.

He also participated in the Indian independence movement, and was jailed in 1942 during the Quit India Movement.

As a student, he became a member of the Communist Party of India.

He also has two sisters, Uma Nanda and Sunita Judge.

On 26 May 1945, Inder Kumar Gujral married Sheila Gujral (24 January 1924 – 11 July 2011) and had two sons, Naresh Gujral (born 19 May 1948), who is a Rajya Sabha MP, and Vishal Gujral.

IK Gujral's younger brother Satish Gujral was a world-renowned painter and sculptor.

Gujral's hobbies included poetry; he spoke Urdu and was, after his death, eulogised as a lover of the language by Maulana Azad National Urdu University, an institution where he held the position of chancellor.

Gujral became vice-president of the New Delhi Municipal Committee in 1958, and joined the Congress party (INC) in 1964.

After independence, he joined the Indian National Congress party in 1964, and became a Member of Parliament in the Rajya Sabha.

He was the Minister of Information and Broadcasting during the emergency.

He was close to Indira Gandhi, and became a member of the Rajya Sabha in April 1964.

During the Emergency of June 1975, Gujral was Minister of Information and Broadcasting, where he was in charge of the media during a time of censorship in India and was in charge of Doordarshan.

In 1976, he was appointed the Ambassador of India to the Soviet Union.

He again was selected to the Rajya Sabha to serve until 1976.

He also served as Water Resources Minister.

Later, Gujral was appointed Ambassador of India to the Soviet Union by Indira Gandhi and stayed on during the tenures of Morarji Desai and Charan Singh.

He was rumoured to have been shunted out of the ministry due to conflicts with the prime minister's son, Sanjay Gandhi, over media censorship, and was replaced by Vidya Charan Shukla, who had no qualms following party lines on the matter; he was then moved to the Planning Ministry.

Gujral resigned from the Indian National Congress party in the 1980s.

Then he joined the Janata Dal.

In the 1989 Indian general election, Gujral was elected from Jalandhar in Punjab.

He served as Minister of External Affairs in Prime Minister V. P. Singh's eleventh cabinet of India.

In 1989, Singh sent him to Srinagar to negotiate with the perpetrators of the 1989 kidnapping of Rubaiya Sayeed.

He also brought about controversy during the Gulf War when he hugged Saddam Hussein as a show-of-good-faith to ensure Indian expatriates would be safe.

In the 1991 Indian general election, Gujral contested from Patna in Bihar.

However, the election was countermanded following complaints of 'irregularities'.

In 1992, Gujral was selected to the Rajya Sabha with the help of Lalu Prasad Yadav.

In 1996, he became the Minister of External Affairs in the Deve Gowda ministry, and developed the Gujral doctrine during this period.

Subsequent to the 1996 election, when the United Front government was formed under the premiership of H. D. Deve Gowda, Gujral was again named Minister of External Affairs.

He was appointed the 12th Prime Minister of India in 1997.

His tenure lasted for less than a year.

He retired from all political positions in 1998.

His wife Sheila Gujral, an acclaimed poet, died on 11 July 2011 after an illness.

The couple had two sons, Naresh, who is a Shiromani Akali Dal MP in the Rajya Sabha, and Vishal.

The couple also have two granddaughters and a grandson.

He died in 2012 at the age of 92, following hospitalization due to a lung infection.