Context

103rd birth anniversary of Pandit Deendayal Upadhyaya.

About

• Deendayal's personal life:
  • Deendayal Upadhyaya was born in a village near the Farah town in Mathura district called Chandrabhan, which later went on to be named after him as “Deendayal Dham”.
  • His father's name was Bhagwati Prasad, an astrologer, and his mother Rampyari was a religious woman.
  • Both his parents died when he was only eight years old and he was then brought up by his maternal uncle and aunt who took care of him and his education as well.
• Education of Deendayal Upadhyaya:
  • He completed his intermediate education at Birla College, Pilani, and his Bachelors in Arts at Sanatan Dharma College, Kanpur, in 1939. At this college, he came into contact with the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) through his classmate Baluji Mahashabde.
  • He further joined St John's College in Agra to pursue a master's degree in English literature, but didn't complete it.
• Upadhyaya as a writer:
  • Deendayal Upadhyaya first started the monthly “Rashtra Dharma” from Lucknow in the 1940s, meant for spreading the ideology of Hindutva nationalism.
  • Later on, he also started the weekly “Panchjanya” and then the daily “Swadesh”.
  • He edited the weekly and daily from Kanpur itself.

• He wrote a Hindi drama on Chandragupta Maurya, a biography of Shankaracharya, and translated a Marathi biography of Hedgewar.

• Deendayal and the Bharatiya Jana Sangh:
  • After meeting the RSS founder KB Hedgewar in 1942, he joined RSS as a full-time worker, called Pracharak.
  • In 1951, Shyama Prasad Mukherjee founded the Bharatiya Jana Sangh.
  • Deendayal was seconded to the party by the RSS, bestowed with the responsibility of moulding it into a genuine member of the 'Sangh Parivar'.
  • Then, he was appointed as General Secretary of the party's Uttar Pradesh branch, and later as the all-India General Secretary.
  • He remained the general secretary for 15 long years and also contested for Lok Sabha from Uttar Pradesh, but did not get elected as he failed to gain enough political traction.
• Upadhyaya's ideology for India:
  • Upadhyaya devised the political philosophy of Integral Humanism, which advocates the simultaneous and integrated program of the body, mind and intellect and soul of each human being.
  • This philosophy of his is a synthesis of the material and the spiritual; the individual and the collective.
  • For India, he visualised a decentralised polity and self-reliant economy with the village being the core basis which thought of India as an independent nation which cannot rely upon western concepts like individualism, democracy, socialism, communism or capitalism.
  • Deendayal was of the view that India is in urgent need of a 'fresh breeze' to get rid of the post-independence westernisation.
  • He felt Indian intellect had been suffocated, and Indian polity was no more rooted in the traditions of our ancient culture.
  • Deendayal, just like all strong leaders, believed in the concept of Swaraj (Self Governance).
• Deendayal's death: A mystery
  • A pool of doubt surrounds the mysterious death of this political leader.
  • Travelling in a train to Patna, a year after he was elected in 1967 as the president of the Jana Sangh, he was allegedly murdered.
  • 10 minutes after the train's arrival at Mughal sarai station, his body was found near it clutching a five-rupee note in his hand.
  • Hence, the problematic case has been looked into by several judges and has seen demands made by several MPs, politicians and family members to be reopened.
    • Upadhyaya's eternal legacy:
  • Ever since BJP came to power under PM Modi, several public institutions, government schemes, and recently a railway station, were renamed after him.
  • A Delhi road/marg has been renamed as Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Marg.
  • An institute was established as Deen Dayal Research Institute which deals with queries on Upadhyaya and his works.
  • Mughalsarai junction in UP where Deendayal's body was found has been renamed as Deen Dayal Upadhyaya junction.

Several Schemes in the name of Deendayal Upadhyaya:

• Deendayal Antyodaya Yojana (DAY).
• Deendayal Upadhyaya Grameen Kaushalya Yojana (DDU-GKY) .
• Pandit Deendayal Upadhyaya Shramev Jayate Karyakram.
• Deendayal Upadhyaya Swaniyojan Yojana (DUSY).
• Deendayal Upadhyaya Gram Jyoti Yojana.