Murli Manohar Joshi (born 5 January 1934) is an Indian politician. He is one of the founding members of the

Bharatiya Janata Party The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP; , ) is a political party in India and one of the two major List of political parties in India, Indian political parties alongside the Indian National Congress. BJP emerged out from Syama Prasad Mukherjee's ...

(BJP) and served as its President from 1991 to 1993. In addition to his role in the BJP, he has been a lifelong member of the

Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS,, ) is an Indian right-wing politics, right-wing, Hindutva, Hindu nationalist volunteer paramilitary organisation. It is the progenitor and leader of a large body of organisations called the Sangh Parivar ( ...

(RSS), a

far-right Far-right politics, often termed right-wing extremism, encompasses a range of ideologies that are marked by ultraconservatism, authoritarianism, ultranationalism, and nativism. This political spectrum situates itself on the far end of the ...

Hindu nationalist Hindu nationalism has been collectively referred to as the expression of political thought, based on the native social and cultural traditions of the Indian subcontinent. "Hindu nationalism" is a simplistic translation of . It is better descri ...

paramilitary A paramilitary is a military that is not a part of a country's official or legitimate armed forces. The Oxford English Dictionary traces the use of the term "paramilitary" as far back as 1934. Overview Though a paramilitary is, by definiti ...

organisation. Joshi is the former Member of Parliament from

Kanpur Kanpur (Hindustani language, Hindustani: ), originally named Kanhapur and formerly anglicized as Cawnpore, is the second largest city of the Indian States and union territories of India, state of Uttar Pradesh after Lucknow. It was the primary ...

Lok Sabha The Lok Sabha, also known as the House of the People, is the lower house of Parliament of India which is Bicameralism, bicameral, where the upper house is Rajya Sabha. Member of Parliament, Lok Sabha, Members of the Lok Sabha are elected by a ...

constituency. He is a former professor of physics in

University of Allahabad The University of Allahabad is a Central university (India), Central University located in Prayagraj, Uttar Pradesh. It was established on 23 September 1887 by an act of Parliament and is recognised as an Institute of National Importance (INI). ...

. He is one of the senior most leaders of the BJP and one of the founding members. Joshi later became the Union Human Resources & Development Minister in the

National Democratic Alliance The National Democratic Alliance (NDA; ISO 15919, ISO: ''Rāṣṭrīya Lokatāntrik Gaṭhabandhan'') is an Indian big tent Political group, multi-party political alliance, led by the country's biggest political party, the Bharatiya Janata Pa ...

government. Joshi was awarded

Padma Vibhushan The Padma Vibhushan ( , lit. "Lotus Grandeur") is the second-highest civilian award of the Republic of India, after the Bharat Ratna. Instituted on 2 January 1954, the award is given for "exceptional and distinguished service". All persons w ...

, the second-highest civilian award, in 2017 by the

Government of India The Government of India (ISO 15919, ISO: Bhārata Sarakāra, legally the Union Government or Union of India or the Central Government) is the national authority of the Republic of India, located in South Asia, consisting of States and union t ...

Background and personal life

Joshi was born in

Delhi Delhi, officially the National Capital Territory (NCT) of Delhi, is a city and a union territory of India containing New Delhi, the capital of India. Straddling the Yamuna river, but spread chiefly to the west, or beyond its Bank (geography ...

on 5 January 1934. His family hails from

Almora Almora ( Kumaoni: ') is a municipal corporation and a cantonment town in the state of Uttarakhand, India. It is the administrative headquarters of Almora district. Almora is located on a ridge at the southern edge of the Kumaon Hills of the ...

in Kumaon region, which is now part of the

Uttarakhand Uttarakhand (, ), also known as Uttaranchal ( ; List of renamed places in India, the official name until 2007), is a States and union territories of India, state in North India, northern India. The state is bordered by Himachal Pradesh to the n ...

state. His father's name was Manmohan Joshi. In 1966, Joshi was married to Tarla Joshi, a lady of his own community and similar family background, in a match arranged by their families in the usual Indian way. The lifelong marriage has proven entirely harmonious and conventional. The couple are the parents of two daughters, Nivedita and Priyamvada.

Education

Joshi had his early education in Chandpur, district Bijnor and in

, from where his family hails. He completed his B.Sc. from

Meerut College Meerut College is a state-funded college in Meerut, Uttar Pradesh, India. The college is affiliated to Chaudhary Charan Singh University, Meerut. The college was established in 1892 and has a campus of . Academics The college offers undergradu ...

and M.Sc. from

Allahabad University The University of Allahabad is a Central University located in Prayagraj, Uttar Pradesh. It was established on 23 September 1887 by an act of Parliament and is recognised as an Institute of National Importance (INI). It is the 4th oldest mode ...

. In Allahabad, one of his teachers was Professor Rajendra Singh, who later became the Sarsanghchalak of the

. Joshi did his doctorate in physics at

. The subject of his doctoral thesis was

spectroscopy Spectroscopy is the field of study that measures and interprets electromagnetic spectra. In narrower contexts, spectroscopy is the precise study of color as generalized from visible light to all bands of the electromagnetic spectrum. Spectro ...

. He published a research paper in Physics in

Hindi Modern Standard Hindi (, ), commonly referred to as Hindi, is the Standard language, standardised variety of the Hindustani language written in the Devanagari script. It is an official language of India, official language of the Government ...

, which was a first of its kind. After completing his PhD, Joshi started teaching physics at

Politics and activism

Joshi came in contact with the RSS in Delhi at a young age and took part in the Cow Protection Movement in 1953–54, in the Kumbh Kisan Andolan of UP in 1955, demanding halving of land revenue assessment. During the Emergency period (1975–1977) in India, Joshi was in jail from 26 June 1975 until the

elections in 1977. He was elected Member of Parliament from

. When the

Janata Party The Janata Party (JP, ) is an unrecognised political party in India. Navneet Chaturvedi is the current president of the party since November 2021, replacing Jaiprakash Bandhu. The JP was established as an amalgam of Indian political partie ...

(which then included his party) came to power forming the first non-Congress government in Indian history, Joshi was elected General Secretary of the Janata Parliamentary Party. After the fall of the government, his party came out of Janata Party in 1980, and formed the

or the BJP. Joshi first looked after the Central Office as a General Secretary and later became Party Treasurer. As General Secretary of BJP, he was directly in charge of Bihar, Bengal and North-Eastern States. Later, when BJP formed a government in India under

Atal Bihari Vajpayee Atal Bihari Vajpayee (25 December 1924 – 16 August 2018) was an Indian poet, writer and statesman who served as the prime minister of India, first for a term of 13 days in 1996, then for a period of 13 months from 1998 ...

, Joshi served as the Human Resource Development Minister in the cabinet. In December 1991, Joshi held a ''

yatra ''Yatra'' (, ), in Indian religion, Indian-origin religions, Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism and Sikhism, generally means a pilgrimage to holy places such as confluences of River#Sacred rivers, sacred rivers, Sacred mountains#India, sacred mount ...

'', the ''Ekta'' ''Yatra'', intended to signal that BJP supported national unity and opposed separatist movements. It began on 11 December in

Kanyakumari Kanyakumari (Tamil; / kəɳjɑkʊmɑɾiː/; referring to Devi Kanya Kumari, officially known as Kanniyakumari, formerly known as Cape Comorin) is a town and a municipality in Kanyakumari district in the state of Tamil Nadu, India. It is the ...

Tamil Nadu Tamil Nadu (; , TN) is the southernmost States and union territories of India, state of India. The List of states and union territories of India by area, tenth largest Indian state by area and the List of states and union territories of Indi ...

and visited 14 states. The rally's final stop to hoist the

Indian flag The national flag of India, colloquially called Tiraṅgā (the tricolour), is a horizontal rectangular tricolour flag, the colours being of India saffron, white and India green; with the , a 24-spoke wheel, in navy blue at its centre. It wa ...

in Jammu and Kashmir on 26 January 1992 was considered unsuccessful, with minimal local participation. Joshi is known to have been influenced by the life and work of

Babasaheb Ambedkar Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar (Bhīmrāo Rāmjī Āmbēḍkar; 14 April 1891 – 6 December 1956) was an Indian jurist, economist, social reformer and political leader who chaired the committee that drafted the Constitution of India based on t ...

Mahatma Jyotiba Phule Jyotirao Phule (11 April 1827 – 28 November 1890), also known as Jyotiba Phule, was an Indian social activist, businessman, anti-caste social reformer and writer from Maharashtra. His work extended to many fields, including eradication of u ...

and

Deendayal Upadhyaya Deendayal Upadhyaya (25 September 1916 – 11 February 1968), known by the epithet Panditji, was an Indian politician, a proponent of integral humanism ideology and leader of the political party Bharatiya Jana Sangh (BJS), the forerunner of Bh ...

. Joshi was a three-term M.P. from

Allahabad Prayagraj (, ; ISO 15919, ISO: ), formerly and colloquially known as Allahabad, is a metropolis in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh.The other five cities were: Agra, Kanpur, Kanpur (Cawnpore), Lucknow, Meerut, and Varanasi, Varanasi (Benar ...

before he was defeated in the Lok Sabha elections of May 2004. He won election to the 15th Lok Sabha from

Varanasi Varanasi (, also Benares, Banaras ) or Kashi, is a city on the Ganges river in northern India that has a central place in the traditions of pilgrimage, death, and mourning in the Hindu world.* * * * The city has a syncretic tradition of I ...

as a BJP candidate. He also served as the home minister for 13 days government in 1996. Joshi was appointed as Chairman of the Manifesto Preparation Board of the BJP in 2009. He was honoured as "Proud Past Alumni" of Allahabad University by Allahabad University Alumni Association. He was a sitting MP from

and he vacated that seat for Narendra Modi in 2014 Lok Sabha Elections. He later contested from

and won from the constituency by a margin of 2.23 lac votes.

References

External links

Reflections...
Murli Manohar Joshi's blog (last updated 1 October 2009) {{DEFAULTSORT:Joshi, Murali Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh pracharaks Bharatiya Janata Party politicians from Uttar Pradesh Living people University of Allahabad alumni Rajya Sabha members from Uttar Pradesh 1934 births India MPs 1977–1979 Presidents of Bharatiya Janata Party India MPs 1996–1997 India MPs 1998–1999 India MPs 1999–2004 India MPs 2009–2014 Lok Sabha members from Uttar Pradesh India MPs 2014–2019 People from Nainital Ministers of education of India Recipients of the Padma Vibhushan in public affairs Politicians from Varanasi Politicians from Kanpur Politicians from Prayagraj People from Almora district Rajya Sabha members from the Bharatiya Janata Party Science ministers of India