Indian Congress (Socialist) (IC(S)) also known as Congress (Secular) was a

political party A political party is an organization that coordinates candidates to compete in a particular country's elections. It is common for the members of a party to hold similar ideas about politics, and parties may promote specific political ideology ...

India India, officially the Republic of India ( Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the ...

between 1978 and 1986. The party was formed through a split in the

Indian National Congress The Indian National Congress (INC), colloquially the Congress Party but often simply the Congress, is a political party in India with widespread roots. Founded in 1885, it was the first modern nationalist movement to emerge in the British ...

. Initially the party was known as the

Indian National Congress (Urs) The Indian National Congress (U) was a breakaway faction of the Indira Gandhi-led Congress (I), formed in July 1979 by D. Devaraj Urs, the then Chief Minister of Karnataka. Urs' explanation of the split was the return of Indira's son Sanjay ...

and was led by D. Devraj Urs. It broke away from the parent party in 1978 following Indira Gandhi's drubbing in the 1977 General Elections. Urs took with him many legislators from

Karnataka Karnataka (; ISO: , , also known as Karunāḍu) is a state in the southwestern region of India. It was formed on 1 November 1956, with the passage of the States Reorganisation Act. Originally known as Mysore State , it was renamed ''Kar ...

Kerala Kerala ( ; ) is a state on the Malabar Coast of India. It was formed on 1 November 1956, following the passage of the States Reorganisation Act, by combining Malayalam-speaking regions of the erstwhile regions of Cochin, Malabar, South C ...

, Maharashtra and Goa including future Union Ministers and Chief Ministers

A.K. Antony Arackaparambil Kurien Antony (born 28 December 1940) is an Indian politician and attorney who was the 23rd Defence Minister of India. He was Member of Parliament in the Rajya Sabha, from Kerala from 1985 to 1995 and again from 2005 to 2022. He ...

Sharad Pawar Sharad Govindrao Pawar (Marathi pronunciation: �əɾəd̪ pəʋaːɾ born 12 December 1940) is an Indian politician. He has served as the Chief Minister of Maharashtra on four occasions. He has held the posts of Minister of Defence and Mini ...

, Dev Kant Baruah,

Priyaranjan Das Munshi Priya Ranjan Dasmunsi (''Prio Rônjon Dashmunshi''; 13 November 1945 – 20 November 2017) was an Indian National Congress politician, former Union Minister and a member of the 14th Lok Sabha of India. He represented the Raiganj (Lok Sabha cons ...

, Sarat Chandra Sinha and K. P. Unnikrishnan

Mohammad Yunus Saleem Mohammad Yunus Saleem (1912 – 15 January 2004) was an Indian politician, scholar, and lawyer, who was also active in the religious field. He was also a poet who campaigned to make Urdu the second official language. He was also a devout Musl ...

When

took over the party presidency in October 1981, the name of the party was changed to Indian Congress (Socialist) He became the youngest chief minister of Maharashtra by toppling the Vasantdada Patil-led Congress government in 1978. He led a group of 40 MLAs to split from the parent party and formed the government with

Janata Party The Janata Party ( JP, lit. ''People's Party'') was a political party that was founded as an amalgam of Indian political parties opposed to the Emergency that was imposed between 1975 and 1977 by Prime Minister Indira Gandhi of the Indian Nat ...

's support. In 1980, after Indira Gandhi swept the

Lok Sabha The Lok Sabha, constitutionally the House of the People, is the lower house of India's bicameral Parliament, with the upper house being the Rajya Sabha. Members of the Lok Sabha are elected by an adult universal suffrage and a first-pas ...

polls, Pawar's state government was dismissed. In the Maharashtra elections in 1980, his party lost. Again in 1985, Pawar's party the Indian National Congress (Socialist) won only 54 seats and he became the

Leader of Opposition The Leader of the Opposition is a title traditionally held by the leader of the largest political party not in government, typical in countries utilizing the parliamentary system form of government. The leader of the opposition is typically s ...

in Maharashtra. With the split and the decline of the

nationally, Pawar soon realised that he can't get back to power in Maharashtra on his own. Pawar merged his party back into the Congress in 1986. One section led by Sarat Chandra Sinha broke away from IC(S) in 1984 and formed a separate party known as

Indian Congress (Socialist) - Sarat Chandra Sinha The Indian Congress occurred from August 4 to October 31, 1898 in Omaha, Nebraska, in conjunction with the Trans-Mississippi International Exposition. Occurring within a decade of the end of the Indian Wars, the Indian Congress was the largest ...

. This faction merged with Sharad Pawar's

Nationalist Congress Party The Nationalist Congress Party ( NCP) is one of the nine national parties in India. The party generally supports Indian nationalism and Gandhian secularism. It is the largest opposition party in Maharashtra and is also a significant party ...

in 1999. However, in Kerala, the residual faction of Indian Congress (Socialist), Congress (Secular) led by Kadannappalli Ramachandran still exists and is a part of the

Left Democratic Front The Left Democratic Front (LDF) is an alliance of left-wing political parties in the state of Kerala, India. It is the current ruling political alliance of Kerala, since 2016. It is one of the two major political alliances in Kerala, the oth ...

. In 2007,

Democratic Indira Congress Democratic Indira Congress (Karunakaran) (DIC(K)) was a political party in Kerala, India. DIC(K) was founded at a meeting in Thrissur by the K. Karunakuran faction of the Indian National Congress on 1 May 2005. Initially it was called National ...

(Left) led by

M. A. John ( ; ; pl. ; ; 1512, from Middle French , literally "my lord") is an honorific title that was used to refer to or address the eldest living brother of the king in the French royal court. It has now become the customary French title of respe ...

merged with this party.

References

{{Indian political parties 1978 establishments in India 1986 disestablishments in India Defunct socialist parties in India Indian National Congress breakaway groups Political parties disestablished in 1986 Political parties established in 1978 Indian National Congress (Socialist)

See also

References