The country will celebrate on Saturday the 97th birthday of the former prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, who was born on December 25, 1924. Since 2014, Vajpayee’s birthday has been designated as “Good Governance Day” every year.

Read also | On Good Governance Day, UP CM will lay the foundation for 11 projects in Vajpayee’s hometown

The late former prime minister was born in Gwalior, present-day Madhya Pradesh, and is an eloquent speaker and prolific writer. He is famous for his poems, most of which are written in Hindi. Vajpayee was an active member of Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and Jana Sangh who was later affiliated with RSS, and held several important positions in his political career, including the very important foreign minister.

In 1980, Vajpayee co-founded the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) with his close partner and later Deputy Prime Minister Lal Krishna Advani (Lal Krishna Advani). In 1996, he became the country’s first prime minister from the People’s Party. However, his first term ended in only 16 days. This staunch supporter of the Bharatiya Janata Party will continue to hold the position for another two terms, from 1998 to 1999, followed by a full five-year term from 1999 to 2004. The two highlights of the second term were the Pokhara nuclear test in 1998 and the Kargil War the following year.

However, in 2004, the People’s Party suffered a disastrous defeat in the general election that year. In the following years, Vajpayee retired from politics and public life. In 2015, he was awarded Bharat Ratna, India’s highest civilian honor.

On August 16, 2018, the veteran politician was dying after being admitted to the hospital for a kidney infection in June.

Complete News Source : Hindustan Times