Table of Contents
EARLY LIFE
- He was born in 25 september 1916 in the village Chandrabhan, now called Deendayal Dham, near the Farah town in Mathura District.
- His father, Bhagwati Prasad, was an astrologer and his mother Rampyari was religious. Both his parents died when he was eight years old and he was brought up by his maternal uncle.
- His education was under the guardianship of his maternal uncle and aunt. He went to high school in Rajasthan where he matriculated.
- He did Intermediate at the Birla College in Pilani. He did his B. A. at the Sanatan Dharma College, Kanpur in 1939. He joined St. John’s College, Agra to pursue a master’s degree in English literature but did not complete his master’s degree. He then joined Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh as it’s full-time worker, called Pracharak.
POLITICS
- While he was a student at Sanatan Dharma College, Kanpur in 1937, he came into contact with the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS).
- He started full-time work in the RSS from 1942. Upadhyaya became a lifelong pracharak of the RSS. He worked as the pracharak for the Lakhimpur district and, from 1955, as the joint prant pracharak (regional organiser) for Uttar Pradesh.
- He was regarded as an ideal swayamsevak of the RSS essentially because ‘his discourse reflected the pure thought-current of the Sangh’.
POLITICS
- He started the monthly Rashtra Dharma from Lucknow in the 1940s. The publication was meant for spreading the ideology of Hindutva nationalism. Later he started the weekly Panchjanya and the daily Swadesh.
- In 1951, when Syama Prasad Mookerjee founded the Bharatiya JanaSangh, Deendayal was seconded to the party by the RSS.
- He was appointed as General Secretary of its Uttar Pradesh branch, and later the all-India General Secretary. For 15 years, he remained the outfit’s general secretary.
IDEOLOGY
- Upadhyaya conceived the political philosophy Integral Humanism. This philosophy advocates the simultaneous and integrated program of the body, mind and intellect and soul of each human being.
- Deendayal Upadhyaya was convinced that India as an independent nation could not rely upon Western concepts like individualism, democracy, socialism, communism or capitalism.
- He was of the view that the Indian intellect was getting suffocated by Western theories.
- He welcomed modern technology but wanted it to be adapted to suit Indian requirements. He believed in Swaraj (“self-governance”).
MURDER?
- In December 1967, Upadhyaya was elected president of the Jana Sangh. In the evening of 10 February 1968, at Lucknow he boarded the Sealdah Express for Patna.
- The train reached Mughalsarai at about 2:10 AM but Upadhyaya was not found on the train.He was murdered under mysterious circumstances on 11 February 1968 while travelling.
- His body was found near Mughalsarai railway station in Uttar Pradesh10 minutes after the train arrived. His body was lying near a traction pole.
MURDER?
- The CBI investigation team claimed that Upadhyay had been pushed out of the coach by robbers just before the train entered the Mughalsarai station.
- A passenger named M.P. Singh travelling in the adjoining cabin of the same coach had seen a man (later identified as Bharat Lal) .
- Bharat Lal alone was convicted of the theft of the belongings of the deceased. Over 70 MPs demanded a commission of inquiry to uncover the truth.
- The Government of India agreed to this promptly and appointed Justice Y.V. Chandrachud of Bombay High Court as the sole member of the commission.
DEATH
- Finally, the judge observed: “I can say with a certain amount of confidence that nothing that has come before me can support the accusation that there was any politics in Shri Upadhyaya’s murder. Undoubtedly, he had political rivals but his death is the rash and extempore handiwork of mere thieves.”
- The CBI he said had conducted the investigation with care and objectivity.In 2017, Upadhyay’s niece and several politicians have demanded a fresh probe in his murder
DEATH
- In 1960, he suffered a heart attack. He was treated by top doctors in India, including his friend Dr Bidhan Chandra Roy, the then Chief Minister of West Bengal.
- His health started deteriorating and he died on 7 March 1961 at the age of 74, from a cerebral stroke. At that time he was still in office as the Home Minister of India.
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