Karpoori Thakur was an Indian politician from the Bihar state. He was popularly known as Jan Nayak. He served as the Chief Minister of Bihar from December 1970 to June 1971, and from December 1977 to April 1979.
Biography
Karpoori Thakur was born in the Nai caste to Gokul Thakur and Ramdulari Devi at Pitaunjhia village in Samastipur District of Bihar. As a student activist, he left his graduate college to join the Quit India Movement. For his participation in the Indian independence movement, he spent 26 months in prison. After India gained independence, Thakur worked as a teacher in his village's school. He became a member of the Bihar Vidhan Sabha in 1952 from Tajpur constituency as a Socialist Party candidate. He was arrested for leading P & T employees during the general strike of the Central Government employees in 1960. In 1970, he undertook a fast unto death for 28 days to promote the cause of Telco labourers. Thakur was a votary of Hindi language, and as the education minister of Bihar, he removed English as the compulsory subject for the matriculation curriculum. It is alleged that the Bihari students suffered due to the resulting low standards of English-medium education in the state. Thakur served as a minister and Deputy Chief Minister of Bihar, before becoming the first non-Congress socialist Chief Minister of Bihar in 1970. He also enforced total prohibition of alcohol in Bihar. During his reign, many schools and colleges were established in his name in the backward areas of Bihar. Chet Ram Tomar of Bulandshahr was his close ally. A socialist leader, Thakur was close to Jaya Prakash Narayan. During the emergency in India, he and other prominent leaders of Janata Party led the "Total Revolution" movement aimed at non-violent transformation of the Indian society. In the 1977 Bihar Legislative Assembly election, the ruling Indian National Congress suffered a heavy defeat at the hands of Janata Party. Janata Party was a recent amalgam of disparate groups including Indian National Congress, Charan Singh's Bharatiya Lok Dal, Socialists and Hindu Nationalists of Jana Sangh. The sole purpose of these groups joining together was to defeat Prime MinisterIndira Gandhi, who had imposed a nationwide emergency and curtailed many freedoms. There were also social cleavages with Socialists and BLD representing backward castes and Congress and Jana Sangh the upper castes. After the Janata Party came to power, Thakur became Chief Minister of Bihar for the second time by winning the legislative party election against Bihar Janata Party President Satyendra Narayan Sinha, formerly of Congress , by a vote of 144 to 84. Infighting in the party broke over the question of Thakur's decision to implement the Mungeri Lal Commission report, that recommended the institution of reservations for Backward Castes in government jobs. Upper caste members of the Janata Party tried to water down the reservation policy by unseating Thakur as Chief Minister. To wean away Dalit MLAs, Ram Sundar Das, a Dalit himself, was nominated as the candidate. Though both Das and Thakur were both socialists, Das was considered more moderate and accommodating than the Chief Minister. Thakur resigned and Das became the Chief Minister of Bihar on 21 April 1979. The reservation law was weakened by allowing upper castes to obtain a greater percentage of government jobs.The internal tensions in the Janata Party caused it to split into multiple factions which led to Congress to return to power in 1980. However, he could not last his full term because he lost the leadership battle in 1979 from Ram Sundar Das whom his adversaries placed against him and was replaced as chief minister. Thakur was known as the champion of the poor. He introduced reservation for the backward classes in the Government jobs, in 1978. In 1977; Devendra Prasad Yadav resigned from the Bihar Vidhan Sabha and paved the way for Thakur to contest the Phulparas Vidhan Sabha constituency by-election. Thakur won by the margin of 65000 votes, defeating Ram Jaipal Singh Yadav of INC. Thakur served as the President of Samyukta Socialist Party. He is called a mentor to the prominent Bihari leaders such as Lalu Prasad Yadav, Ram Vilas Paswan, Devendra Prasad Yadav and Nitish Kumar.
In Memory
Karpoori Thakur's birthplace, Pitaunjhia, was renamed to Karpuri Gram after his death in 1988.
The government has taken immense commemorative measures that includes naming several stadiums after Jan Nayak Karpuri Thakur in the state, establishment of scores of colleges and statues in most of the districts, Karpuri Thakur Museum, Jan Nayak Karpuri Thakur hospitals in Samastipur and Darbhanga, publication of Karpuri Thakur's speeches in legislative and documentary formation on Karpuri Thakur.
