An Indian Political Life; Charan Singh and Congress Politics, 1937 to 1961

An Indian Political Life: Charan Singh and Congress Politics, 1937 to 1961 focuses on the role of Charan Singh in the politics of this period, while providing a much broader perspective concerning the major issues, controversies, and developments of the time. The book is the result of a careful study of Charan Singh's personal collection of political files coupled with a series of extensive interviews with politicians, public personalities, and the local people. It provides an account of the period, including Hindu-Muslim relations; the conflict between the Nehruvian goal of rapid industrialization and those favoring primary attention to agriculture; issues of law and order in the face of the rise of corruption and criminality in politics; the place of caste and status in a modernizing society; and the pervasive factional politics characteristic of the era. This book is much more than the biography of an important politician-it is also an analysis of issues, movements, and political conflicts that marked the late pre-Independence and early post-Independence era. This book is volume I of a multi-volume work on The Politics of Northern India: 1937 to 2007.