- Govind Ballabh Pant is remembered as one of the country’s most prominent freedom fighters and an administrator who played a key role in shaping modern India.
- Born on 10 September 1887, in Almora, Uttarakhand, Pant began serving for the cause of Indian Independence.
- When he was only 18 he served as a volunteer foot soldier with the Indian National Congress, looking up to Gopalkrishna Gokhale and Madan Mohan Malaviya as his idols.
- In 1907, he decided to study law, after receiving his degree, he started to practise law in Almora in 1910 and eventually moved to Kashipur, where he started an organisation called the Prem Sabha.
- Its objectives included social reform, the protection of forests, and safeguarding the livelihood of those who depended on it, besides saving a school from closure for its inability to pay taxes to the British government.
- Govind Ballabh Pant joined the Congress in December 1921 and soon joined the non-cooperation movement.
- In 1930, he was imprisoned for organizing a Salt March inspired by Gandhi’s earlier actions.
- He played many roles in India, he was the Premier of United Provinces (1937 – 1939), First Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh (1946 -1954), and Union Home Minister (1955 – 1961).
- From his stern opposition to the exploitative zamindari system to the passage of the Hindu Code Bill, which among other things, gave Hindu women the right to divorce and made monogamy mandatory for Hindu men, during his tenure as the CM of Uttar Pradesh, Pant was always about reforming society from within.
- He also pleaded to the Government for lowering agricultural taxes on farmers.
- He encouraged many cottage industries in the country and raised his voice against the coolie-beggar law, which forced porters to transport the heavy luggage of British officials without any payment.
- Pant was always against a separate electorate for minorities, saying the step would further divide communities.
- In 1942 he was arrested again, this time for signing the Quit India resolution, and spent three years in Ahmednagar Fort along with other members of the Congress working committee until March 1945.
- He also played an integral part in the drafting of the Indian Constitution and served as India’s Home Minister, after the death of Sardar Patel, a period which saw states being carved out along linguistic lines.
- As a Home Minister, he championed the cause of Hindi as the national language or rashtrabhasha.
- In 1957, Pant was awarded India’s highest civilian award, the Bharat Ratna.
- After more than five decades in service of this nation, Pant passed away on 7th March 1961, as a consequence of a heart attack, during his tenure as Home Minister.
