Sikander Bakht (24 August 1918 – 23 February 2004) was an Indian politician belonging to 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) who served as the 15th governor of Kerala from 2002 until his death. He was elected as the Vice President of the BJP, served as its leader in the

Rajya Sabha Rajya Sabha (Council of States) is the upper house of the Parliament of India and functions as the institutional representation of India’s federal units — the states and union territories.https://rajyasabha.nic.in/ It is a key component o ...

, and as a cabinet minister in the NDA government headed by

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 ...

. In 2000, he 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 honour of the Government of India.

Early life

Sikander Bakht was born in Quresh Nagar 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 ...

, India in 1918. He attended the Anglo Arabic Senior Secondary School, Delhi and completed his

Bachelor of Science A Bachelor of Science (BS, BSc, B.S., B.Sc., SB, or ScB; from the Latin ') is a bachelor's degree that is awarded for programs that generally last three to five years. The first university to admit a student to the degree of Bachelor of Scienc ...

from the Anglo-Arabic College (now known as Zakir Husain College) in Delhi. During his school and college days he was a keen

hockey ''Hockey'' is a family of List of stick sports, stick sports where two opposing teams use hockey sticks to propel a ball or disk into a goal. There are many types of hockey, and the individual sports vary in rules, numbers of players, apparel, ...

player and represented

Delhi University The Delhi University (DU, ISO 15919, ISO: ), also and officially known as the University of Delhi, is a collegiate university, collegiate research university, research Central university (India), central university located in Delhi, India. It ...

and Delhi in various tournaments. He also played and captained the Independents Hockey Club. He once said he is a member of BJP and always maintained that India is a land of secularism and supported the ethos of India.

Political career

In 1952, Bakht was elected to the Municipal Corporation of Delhi as a

Congress A congress is a formal meeting of the representatives of different countries, constituent states, organizations, trade unions, political parties, or other groups. The term originated in Late Middle English to denote an encounter (meeting of ...

candidate. In 1968 he was elected as the Chairman of Delhi Electric Supply Undertaking. In 1969 the Congress party split and Bakht stayed with Congress (Organisation). Bakht was then elected to The Metropolitan Council of Delhi as a Congress (O) candidate. On 25 June 1975, Emergency was declared by

Prime Minister A prime minister or chief of cabinet is the head of the cabinet and the leader of the ministers in the executive branch of government, often in a parliamentary or semi-presidential system. A prime minister is not the head of state, but r ...

Indira Gandhi Indira Priyadarshini Gandhi (Given name, ''née'' Nehru; 19 November 1917 – 31 October 1984) was an Indian politician and stateswoman who served as the Prime Minister of India, prime minister of India from 1966 to 1977 and again from 1980 un ...

, Bakht along with other opposition leaders was imprisoned on 25 June 1975. He was lodged in the Rohtak Jail until his release in December 1976. Prime Minister Indira Gandhi ordered General Elections in March 1977. As soon as the opposition leaders were released, they merged all opposition parties to form The Janta Party. In March 1977, Bakht was elected to the

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 ...

(the lower house of Indian Parliament) as a

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 ...

candidate, from Chandni Chowk in New Delhi.

Morarji Desai Morarji Ranchhodji Desai (29 February 1896 – 10 April 1995) was an Indian politician and Indian independence activist, independence activist who served as the Prime Minister of India, prime minister of India between 1977 and 1979 leading th ...

was appointed prime minister and he appointed Bakht as a Cabinet Minister for Works, Housing, Supply and Rehabilitation. He served in this capacity till July 1979. In 1980 the Janta Party split and Bakht opted to be with the

(BJP). He was appointed General Secretary of BJP. In 1984 he was made the Vice President of BJP. In 1990 Bakht was elected to the

(the upper house of the Indian Parliament) from

Madhya Pradesh Madhya Pradesh (; ; ) is a state in central India. Its capital is Bhopal and the largest city is Indore, Indore. Other major cities includes Gwalior, Jabalpur, and Sagar, Madhya Pradesh, Sagar. Madhya Pradesh is the List of states and union te ...

. In 1992 he became the Leader of Opposition in the ''Rajya Sabha''. (The Leader of Opposition is equivalent to Cabinet Minister's post.) On 10 April 1996 he was reelected from Madhya Pradesh to the ''Rajya Sabha''. In May 1996, during the first

Ministry, Bakht served as Minister of External Affairs and Minister of Urban Affairs. After the collapse of the Vajpayee government, Bakht became the Leader of the Opposition in the

once again. In 1998 Vajpayee was again appointed prime minister and Bakht was appointed Industry Minister, a post he held until 2002. In addition, he was appointed the Leader of the House in Rajya Sabha. After serving an entire term as Industries Minister, Bakht retired from active politics and was appointed the Governor of Kerala in 2002. He was the first BJP leader ever to be appointed the governor of Kerala.

Awards

In 2000 Bakht was awarded the

. This is the second highest Indian civilian award. The four other persons from the BJP who have been awarded the ''Padma Vibhushan'' are

, Lal Krishna Advani, Sushma Swaraj and Arun Jaitley. Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Lal Krishna Advani have since been awarded the

Bharat Ratna The Bharat Ratna (; ) is the highest Indian honours system, civilian award of the Republic of India. Instituted on 2 January 1954, the award is conferred in recognition of "exceptional service/performance of the highest order", without distin ...

, the highest civilian award of India.

Death

Bakht finished his term in Rajya Sabha on 9 April 2002. 9 days later, he was sworn in as

Governor of Kerala The governor of Kerala is the constitutional head of state of the southern Indian state of Kerala. The governor is appointed by the President of India, and holds office at the President's pleasure. The governor is ''de jure'' head of the govern ...

, succeeding Sukhdev Singh Kang. At the age of , he was the oldest Governor of Kerala state. He was highly popular and served in this post until his death. Bakht died in the Medical College Hospital in

Kerala Kerala ( , ) is a States and union territories of India, 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 ...

's capital city

Thiruvananthapuram Thiruvananthapuram ( ), also known as Trivandrum, is the Capital city, capital city of the Indian state of Kerala. As of 2011, the Thiruvananthapuram Municipal Corporation had a population of 957,730 over an area of 214.86 sq. km, making it the ...

on 23 February 2004, from complications of intestinal surgery which was performed on 19 February. He was the first Governor of Kerala who died in office. He was replaced two days later by

Karnataka Karnataka ( ) is a States and union territories of India, state in the southwestern region of India. It was Unification of Karnataka, formed as Mysore State on 1 November 1956, with the passage of the States Reorganisation Act, 1956, States Re ...

governor T. N. Chaturvedi. There was concern, particularly among BJP members, that Bakht might have died because of

medical negligence Medical malpractice is a legal cause of action that occurs when a medical or health care professional, through a negligent act or omission, deviates from standards in their profession, thereby causing injury or death to a patient. The negligen ...

, but nothing was proven. Chief Minister A. K. Antony, at the time of Sikander Bakht's death, had to give into popular demand to order an inquiry to examine if there was any lapse on part of doctors or any other motive. http://archive.thepeninsulaqatar.com/component/content/article/348-indiaarchiverest/38734.html The President of India, A. P. J. Abdul Kalam, said "In his death we have lost a prominent public personality and a statesman." Prime Minister Vajpayee said "Mr. Bakht was a freedom-fighter. He struggled for democracy and the nationalist cause with courage and conviction. He rendered distinguished service as a member of my Cabinet for sometime."

References

External links