Jawaharlal Nehru Add a review

Jawaharlal Nehru ( NAY-roo or NERR-oo, Hindi: [dʒəˌʋaːɦəɾˈlaːl ˈneːɦɾuː] ; 14 November 1889 – 27 May 1964) was an Indian statesman who was a central figure in India during the middle of the 20th century. Nehru was second only to Mahatma Gandhi in leading the Indian nationalist movement in the 1930s and 1940s, and upon independence from Britain in 1947 served as India's first prime minister until his death in 1964. A secular humanist and social democrat, Nehru championed parliamentary democracy, secularism, science and technology, influencing India's arc as a modern nation. In international affairs, he kept India out of the two blocs of the Cold War and was a founder of the Non-Aligned Movement. Nehru was also a prolific author in English, and his works including An Autobiography (1936) and The Discovery of India (1946) have been read and deliberated upon around the world.

The son of Motilal Nehru, a prominent lawyer and Indian nationalist, Jawaharlal Nehru was educated in England—at Harrow School and Trinity College, Cambridge, and trained in the law at the Inner Temple. He became a barrister, returned to India in 1912, enrolled at the Allahabad High Court and soon began to take an interest in national politics, which later became a full-time occupation. Nehru joined the Indian National Congress in 1919, rose to become the leader of a progressive faction during the 1920s, and eventually of the Congress in its totality, receiving the support of Mahatma Gandhi, who was to designate Nehru as his political heir. As Congress president in 1929, Nehru called for complete independence from the British Raj.

Nehru and the Congress dominated Indian politics during the 1930s, during which he served several years in prison. Nehru promoted the idea of the secular nation-state in the 1937 provincial elections, allowing the Congress to sweep the elections and to form governments in several provinces. In 1939, the Congress ministries resigned to protest Viceroy Lord Linlithgow's decision to join the war without consulting them. After the All India Congress Committee's Quit India Resolution of 1942, Nehru and other senior Congress leaders were imprisoned. Upon his release in 1945, Nehru emerged to a much altered political landscape. The Muslim League, under Muhammad Ali Jinnah, had come to dominate Muslim politics in the interim. In the 1946 provincial elections, the Congress won the elections but the League won most seats reserved for Muslims, which the British interpreted as a mandate for Pakistan. Nehru became the interim prime minister of India in September 1946, with the League joining his government with some hesitancy in October 1946.

Upon India's independence in 1947, Nehru gave a critically acclaimed speech, "Tryst with Destiny" and was sworn in as the Dominion of India's first prime minister; in 1950, when India became a republic within the Commonwealth of Nations, he continued as prime minister of the Republic of India. He embarked on an ambitious program of economic, social, and political reforms, promoting a pluralistic multi-party democracy. In the Constitution of India, adopted in 1949, he ensured legal equality between men and women, among all castes, and for minorities. Economically, Nehru championed heavy industry and mixed economy. Under his leadership, the Congress emerged as a catch-all party, dominating national and state-level politics and winning elections in 1951, 1957 and 1962. His premiership, spanning 16 years and 286 days—which is, to date, the longest in India—ended with his death in 1964 from a heart attack. Hailed as the "Architect of Modern India", his birthday is celebrated as Children's Day in India. His daughter, Indira Gandhi, served as prime minister of India from 1966 to 1977, and again from 1980 to 1984.