Kalyan Singh, born on January 5, 1932, was a stalwart of the Bharatiya Janta Party (BJP); he was elected as an MLA from Atrauli, Uttar Pradesh, for the first time in 1967. Kalyan Singh held several important posts in his political career and was appointed as Rajasthan governor in his last phase of public life. Kalyan Singh was a prominent Hindutva face during the party’s Ram Janmabhoomi campaign.
Before joining politics, Kalyan Singh was a Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) swayamsewak in Aligarh, where he was a part-time wrestler. After completing his education, he got a job as a teacher in Uttar Pradesh.
Another identity that Kalyan Singh carried through was that of a leader of the Lodhs, a community that is around 4-5 per cent in Uttar Pradesh but is influential even in Madhya Pradesh.
His rise came after his arrest during the emergency imposed by the Indira Gandhi Government. When he was released from jail after 21 months and the Janata Party coalition formed governments in several states in 1977, Kalyan Singh became the health minister of Uttar Pradesh.
When Mulayam Singh Yadav took over as the Uttar Pradesh CM in 1989, he took a tough stand and stood by the Muslim side.
Kalyan Singh was just the right man at the right moment for the BJP. He was a staunch supporter of the Ram Janmbhoomi Movement. The BJP launched the Ekatma Yatra with Kalyan Singh leading from the front. He, along with other BJP leaders, travelled to all corners of the country filling pots with water from rivers to be poured into other rivers, signifying unity.
Kalyan Singh won the Atrauli seat for the first time in 1967 on a Bhartiya Jana Sangh (BJS) ticket and continued his winning streak for nine-term till 2002, losing just once in 1980.
In the 1991 Assembly polls, BJP received the majority for the first time in Uttar Pradesh, winning 221 seats in the house of 425 members. On June 24, 1991, Kalyan Singh was sworn in as Chief Minister.
The Kalyan Singh Government came high on politicians with a criminal background, putting four such legislators behind bars. His government also brought a regulation stating copying in board examinations as a cognisable offence.
It was the fall of the disputed structure in Ayodhya on December 6, 1992, that became a defining point of Singh’s life as the Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh. On December 6, 1992, when a large number of karsevaks had assembled near the disputed structure in Ayodhya, Kalyan Singh instructed security personnel not to fire on them. Soon after the demolishment of the disputed structure, Kalyan Singh handed over his resignation to the governor the same day.
In the next assembly elections in November 1993, Kalyan Singh contested from two seats (Atrauli and Kasganj) and won both.
In the 1996 polls, the BJP won the maximum number of seats with 174 against the Samajwadi Party’s 110 and Bahujan Samajwadi Party’s 67. None of the parties crossed the majority. After a short span of the President’s rule, BSP and BJP joined hands to form the government under the formula of rotation of the CM’s post between two partners after every six months.
Kalyan Singh was just the right man at the right moment for the BJP. He was a staunch supporter of the Ram Janmbhoomi Movement. The BJP launched the Ekatma Yatra with Kalyan Singh leading from the front. He, along with other BJP leaders, travelled to all corners of the country filling pots with water from rivers to be poured into other rivers, signifying unity.
BSP leader Mayawati first took oath as the CM, and after the completion of six months of tenure, Kalyan was sworn in as the CM, for the second time, on September 21, 1997. BSP withdrew its support from the government.
However, the Kalyan government did not fall, as it managed to “engineer” defection in the BSP, Congress, and some other parties to keep itself afloat.
In September 2019, Kalyan Singh was brought to trial in the Babri demolition conspiracy case but was acquitted in 2020.
While remembering the Ram Bhakt, here is an extract from Kalyan Singh’s 27-page affidavit submitted to the Liberhan Commission on December 2, 2004. Written in simple, precise, and unambiguous language, it holds an extraordinary mirror of his commitment and character. In the affidavit, Kalyan Singh says that the demolition of the mosque was an act of God…whatever happened on that day, the deponent has no regret, no repentance, no sorrow, and no grief for that …(future) historians will record that Rama’s devotees and patriots demolished that structure, which symbolised slavery and stain. The disputed structure was a Ram temple and will always remain so.
In 2019, when BJP won the Lok Sabha elections for the second time in a row, PM Modi laid the foundation stone for the construction of the Ram Mandir in Ayodhya, fulfilling Kalyan Singh’s dream.
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