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Chaudhary Charan Singh served as the 5th Prime Minister of India between 28 July 1979 and 14 January 1980. Historians and people alike frequently refer to him as the 'champion of India's peasants.'
The Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) is a national level political party in India that was formed to represent Bahujans, referring to Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, and Other Backward Classes (OBC), along with religious minorities. According to Kanshi Ram, when he founded the party in 1984, the Bahujans comprised 85 percent of India's population, but were divided into 6,000 different castes. The party claims to be inspired by the philosophy of Gautama Buddha, B. R. Ambedkar, Mahatma Jyotiba Phule, Narayana Guru, Periyar E. V. Ramasamy and Chhatrapati Shahuji Maharaj. Kanshi Ram named his protégée, Mayawati, as his successor in 2001. The BSP has its main base in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh where it was the second-largest party in the 2019 Indian general election with 19.3% of votes and in the 2017 Uttar Pradesh elections with over 22% of votes. Its election symbol is an elephant.
Ram Vilas Paswan was an Indian politician from Bihar and the Cabinet Minister of Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution in the first and second Modi ministries. Paswan was also the president of the Lok Janshakti Party, nine-time Lok Sabha member and Rajya Sabha MP. He started his political career as member of Samyukta Socialist Party and was elected to the Bihar Legislative Assembly in 1969. Later, Paswan joined Lok Dal upon its formation in 1974, and became its general secretary. He opposed the emergency, and was arrested during this period. He first entered the Lok Sabha in 1977, as a Janata Party member from Hajipur constituency, and was elected again in 1980, 1989, 1991, 1996, 1998, 1999, 2004 and 2014.
Ambedkar Samaj Party is a political party in India, that fights for the rights of Dalits. The party is opposed to Hindu nationalism, which it sees as representing an upper caste minority. ASP claims that Bahujan Samaj Party has betrayed dalits through its alliance with Bharatiya Janata Party. The leader of ASP is Tej Singh.
Dalit Mazdoor Kisan Party is an Indian political party founded in 1984 by the remains of the Lok Dal. The DMKP was mainly based in Uttar Pradesh. It was led by former Prime Minister Charan Singh. Later it changed its name to the Lok Dal.
Kanshi Ram, also known as Bahujan Nayak or Manyavar or Saheb, was an Indian politician and social reformer who worked for the upliftment and political mobilisation of the Bahujans, the backward or lower caste people including untouchable groups at the bottom of the caste system in India. Towards this end, Kanshi Ram founded Dalit Shoshit Samaj Sangharsh Samiti (DS-4), the All India Backward and Minority Communities Employees' Federation (BAMCEF) in 1971 and the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) in 1984. He ceded leadership of the BSP to his protégé Mayawati who has served four terms as Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh.
The Republican Party of India is a political party in India. It has its roots in the Scheduled Castes Federation led by B. R. Ambedkar. The 'Training School for Entrance to Politics' was established by Ambedkar in 1956 which was to serve as an entry point to the Republican Party of India (RPI). The first batch of the school consisted of 15 students. Its first batch turned out to be last batch as the school was closed after Ambedkar's death in 1956.
The Ranvir Sena is a militia functioning as an upper caste landlord group, mainly based in the state of Bihar, India. The group was formed by upper-caste Bhumihar landlords in 1994, with the aim to counter the influence of various left-wing militants, Naxalite groups and the Communist Party of India (Marxist–Leninist) Liberation in central Bihar. The Ranvir Sena has been connected to a number of massacres including the massacre at Laxmanpur Bathe. It has, on several occasions, been accused of human rights abuses. The Bihar state government banned the Ranvir Sena in July 1995, but the group continue to remain active. The group has frequently publicly claimed responsibility for its crimes with impunity.
Udit Raj is an Indian politician and member of Indian National Congress. He was a Member of Parliament between 2014 to 2019 in the Lok Sabha, representing the North West Delhi as a member of Bharatiya Janata Party. Raj is also the National Chairman of the All India Confederation of SC/ST Organizations.
Digvijaya Singh is an Indian politician and a Member of Parliament in the Rajya Sabha. He is also currently a General Secretary of the Indian National Congress party's All India Congress Committee. Previously, he had served as the 14th Chief Minister of Madhya Pradesh, a central Indian state, for two terms from 1993 to 2003. Prior to that he was a minister in Chief Minister Arjun Singh's cabinet between 1980–84. In 2019 Lok Sabha elections he was defeated by Pragya Singh Thakur for Bhopal Lok Sabha seat.
Politics in reorganised present-day Punjab is dominated by mainly two parties. One is Shiromani Akali Dal(Badal) and the other is Indian National Congress. Since 1967, Chief Minister of Punjab has been predominantly from Jatt Sikh community despite its 21 percent state population. Only exception was Giani Zail Singh, the Chief Minister of Punjab from 17 March 1972 to 30 April 1977 belonging to Ramgarhia community that has population of 6 percent and is a part of significant OBC community having population of 31.3 percent in the state. However Scheduled Castes (Dalit) community never had Chief Minister from community nor proper representation in Government, despite having 32 percent population in the state. Other prominent party is Bahujan Samaj Party especially in Doaba region founded by Kanshi Ram of Rupnagar district. In 1992 BSP won 9 seats Vidhan Sabha elections. Also BSP won 3 lok sabha seats from Punjab in 1996 general elections and only Garhshanker seat in 1997 Vidhan Sabha elections. Communist parties too have some influence in the Malwa area. In the 2014 general elections, the first-time contesting Aam Aadmi Party got 4 out of 13 seats in Punjab by winning 34 of the total 117 assembly segments, coming second in 7, third in 73 and fourth in the rest 3 segments. The support for the Aam Aadmi Party increased later in Punjab. The current Government was elected in the 2017 Punjab Assembly elections and the Congress won 77 out of 117 Assembly seats with Captain Amarinder Singh as the current Chief Minister. The AAP, fighting its first assembly election in the state, won 20 seats. The incumbent BJP-SAD alliance came third with 18 seats.
Sharad Yadav is a politician from the Loktantrik Janata Dal party. He has been elected to Lok Sabha seven times and to Rajya Sabha thrice from JD(U). He was the national president of Janata Dal (United) since its formation in 2003 till year 2016. He was disqualified from Rajya Sabha and removed from party leadership positions for engaging in anti-party activities.
Balwant Singh Ramoowalia is an Indian politician from Samajwadi Party. His father Karnail Singh Paras was a well-known Kavishar. Balwant Singh started his political career with student politics as a general secretary of Student Federation of India in 1963. He went on to join All India Sikh Students' Federation and was its president from 1968-72. Later he joined Akali Dal and became Member of Parliament twice from Faridkot and Sangrur. He left Akali Dal to get elected to Rajya Sabha in 1996 and served as the Union Minister for Social Welfare. He formed his own political party Lok Bhalai Party that he merged into Akali Dal in November 2011. He contested for Punjab assembly in 2012 elections from Mohalli and lost.
Lok Bhalai Party (LBP) is a defunct Indian regional political party active mainly in Punjab. It was founded by former Union Minister Balwant Singh Ramoowalia in 1999. It merged into Akali Dal (Badal) on November 2011. Later it was relaunched in July 2018.
Kushwaha is a community of the Indo-Gangetic Plain which has traditionally been involved in agriculture. The term has been used to represent at least four subcastes, being those of the Kachhis, Kachwahas, Koeris and Muraos. They claim descent from the mythological Suryavansh (Solar) dynasty via Kusha, who was one of the twin sons of Rama and Sita. Previously, they had worshipped Shiva and Shakta.
The Politics of Bihar, an eastern state of India, is dominated by regional political parties. As of 2021, the main political parties are Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD), Janata Dal (United) (JDU), Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and Indian National Congress (INC). There are also some smaller regional parties, including Rashtriya Lok Samata Party, Hindustani Awam Morcha, Jan Adhikar Party and Rashtriya Jan Jan Party and Lok Janshakti Party, which play a vital role in Bihar politics. As of 2021, Bihar is currently ruled by a coalition of the JDU and the BJP.
The Koeri are an Indian caste, found largely in Bihar, whose traditional occupation was agriculture. An official report of 1941 described them as being the "most advanced" cultivators in Bihar and said, "Simple in habits, thrifty to a degree and a master in the art of market-gardening, the Koeri is amongst the best of the tillers of the soil to be found anywhere in India."
The Paswan, also known as Dusadh, are a Dalit community from eastern India. They are found mainly in the states of Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and Jharkhand. The urdu word Paswan means bodyguard or "one who defends". The origin of the word as per the belief of the community lays in their participation in the battle against Siraj-ud-daulah, the Nawab of Bengal at the behest of British East India Company, after which they were rewarded with the post of Chowkidars and lathi wielding tax collector for the Zamindars. They follow certain rituals such as walking on fire to assert their valour.
Chhedi Paswan is a member of 16th Lok Sabha (2014-2019) and a former member of Bihar Legislative Assembly. He represents the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) since 2014. At various points, he has been with Janata Party, then its Charan Singh faction, then the reunited Janata Dal, Bahujan Samaj Party, Nationalist Congress Party, Lalu Prasad's RJD and Nitish Kumar's JD(U).
A Legislative Assembly election was held in the Indian state of Punjab on 4 February 2017 to elect the 117 members of the Punjab Legislative Assembly. The counting of votes was done on 11 March 2017. The ruling pre-election coalition was the alliance comprising the political parties Shiromani Akali Dal and Bharatiya Janata Party and led by Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal. The voter turnout for the Punjab Assembly election was 77.2% The Indian National Congress led by former Chief Minister Captain Amarinder Singh defeated the ruling alliance and the newcomer Aam Aadmi Party.
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- ↑ The Tribune. Workers quit Lok Bhalai Party