Madan Lal Khurana (15 October 1936 – 27 October 2018) was an Indian politician and former

Chief Minister of Delhi The chief minister of the National Capital Territory of Delhi is the head of government of the National Capital Territory of Delhi. According to the Constitution of India, the lieutenant governor is the National Capital Territory of Delhi's ''de ...

from 1993 to 1996. He also served as

Governor of Rajasthan A governor is an administrative leader and head of a polity or political region, ranking under the head of state and in some cases, such as governors-general, as the head of state's official representative. Depending on the type of political r ...

in 2004. He was the Union Minister of Parliamentary affairs and Tourism in the Atal Bihari Vajpayee government. He was a member of Rashtriya Swayansevak Sangh and

Bharatiya Janata Party The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP; ; ) is a political party in India, and one of the two major Indian political parties alongside the Indian National Congress. Since 2014, it has been the ruling political party in India under Narendra Modi ...

Early life

Khurana was born on 15 October 1936 in

Lyallpur Faisalabad (; Punjabi/ ur, , ; ), formerly known as Lyallpur ( Punjabi, Urdu: لائل پور), named after the founder of the city, but was renamed in 1977 in honour of late King Faisal of Saudi Arabia. It is the 3rd largest city of Pak ...

Punjab Province (British India) Punjab was a province of British India. Most of the Punjab region was annexed by the East India Company in 2 April 1849, and declared a province of British Rule, it was one of the last areas of the Indian subcontinent to fall under British co ...

(now called

Faisalabad Faisalabad (; Punjabi/ ur, , ; ), formerly known as Lyallpur ( Punjabi, Urdu: لائل پور), named after the founder of the city, but was renamed in 1977 in honour of late King Faisal of Saudi Arabia. It is the 3rd largest city of Pak ...

Punjab, Pakistan Punjab (; , ) is one of the four provinces of Pakistan. Located in central-eastern region of the country, Punjab is the second-largest province of Pakistan by land area and the largest province by population. It shares land borders with the ...

) to S. D. Khurana and Laxmi Devi. Khurana was barely 12 when the family was forced to migrate to Delhi by India's partition and began to piece its life together again at a refugee colony

Kirti Nagar {{Infobox settlement , name = Kirti Nagar , official_name = , native_name = , native_name_lang = , other_name = , nickname ...

in New Delhi. He took his bachelor's degree from

Kirori Mal College Kirori Mal College is a constituent college of the University of Delhi. Established in 1954, it is located in the North Campus of the university in New Delhi, India. It offers undergraduate and postgraduate programmes in the sciences, humanities ...

under

Delhi University Delhi University (DU), formally the University of Delhi, is a collegiate university, collegiate Central university (India), central university located in New Delhi, India. It was founded in 1922 by an Act of the Central Legislative Assembly and ...

Political career

As a student

Khurana had his training in politics at Allahabad University, where he was doing his post-graduation in economics. He was general secretary of the Allahabad Students Union in 1959 and became general secretary of the

Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) () is a right-wing all India student organisation affiliated to the Hindu nationalist organization Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS). History The ABVP, founded in 1948 with the initiative of the RSS ...

in 1960.

Jan Sangh

As a youth, Khurana became a teacher with

Vijay Kumar Malhotra Vijay Kumar Malhotra (born 3 December 1931) is an Indian politician and a sport administrator. He belongs to the Bharatiya Janata Party. He was born in the Lahore city of Punjab in British India which is now in Pakistan. He was the 4th out of ...

, at PGDAV (evening) College before deciding to enter politics. Madan Lal Khurana,

, Kedar Nath Sahani and Kanwar Lal Gupta founded the Delhi chapter of the

Jan Sangh The Bharatiya Jana Sangh ( BJS or JS, short name: Jan Sangh, full name: Akhil Bharatiya Jana Sangh; ) (ISO 15919: '' Akhila Bhāratīya Jana Saṅgha '' ) was an Indian right wing political party that existed from 1951 to 1977 and was the pol ...

, which in 1980 transformed into BJP. Khurana was the

's general secretary from 1965 to 1967. He dominated first Municipal Corporation politics and then the Metropolitan Council where he was the Chief Whip, Executive Councillor and Leader of the Opposition by turns.

Rise in BJP

BJP suffered badly in 1984 general elections, held after the death of

Indira Gandhi Indira Priyadarshini Gandhi (; Given name, ''née'' Nehru; 19 November 1917 – 31 October 1984) was an Indian politician and a central figure of the Indian National Congress. She was elected as third prime minister of India in 1966 ...

. Khurana is credited with reviving the party in India's capital, New Delhi. He worked tirelessly, which earned him the title of 'Dilli Ka Sher' (Lion of Delhi). He was the Chief Minister of

Delhi Delhi, officially the National Capital Territory (NCT) of Delhi, is a city and a union territory of India containing New Delhi, the capital of India. Straddling the Yamuna river, primarily its western or right bank, Delhi shares borders w ...

from 1993 until he resigned in 1996. The party declined to reinstate him and preferred staying with

Sahib Singh Verma Sahib Singh Verma (15 March 1943 – 30 June 2007) was an Indian politician and the former senior vice-president of the Bharatiya Janata Party. He served as Chief Minister of Delhi (1996–1998) and was member of 13th Lok Sabha, Parliament of ...

. He along with Kedar Nath Sahani and

kept the party afloat in New Delhi for more than four decades spanning from 1960 to 2000. The peak of his career saw him serve as the Union Minister of Parliamentary Affairs and Tourism in the Vajpayee government, before resigning in January 1999, owing to a fallout with the senior leadership of the party following a series of attacks on Christians that were blamed on Hindu groups. He also served as the Governor of

Rajasthan Rajasthan (; lit. 'Land of Kings') is a state in northern India. It covers or 10.4 per cent of India's total geographical area. It is the largest Indian state by area and the seventh largest by population. It is on India's northwestern si ...

from 14 January 2004 to 28 October 2004, when he resigned to return to politics in Delhi after about half a dozen MLAs from Delhi went up to him in Jaipur Raj Bhawan requesting that he return to active politics. On 20 August 2005, Khurana was removed from the BJP for indiscipline for publicly criticising BJP president

Lal Krishna Advani Lal Krishna Advani (born 8 November 1927) is an Indian politician who served as the 7th Deputy Prime Minister of India from 2002 to 2004. Advani is one of the co-founders and a senior leader of the Bharatiya Janata Party. He is a longtime memb ...

and expressing inability and discomfort at serving with him. On 12 September 2005, he was taken back to the party and given back his responsibilities after he apologised about his remarks about the party's leadership. On 19 March 2006, he was again expelled from the primary membership of the BJP for his anti-party statements. Khurana spoke against the party leadership when he announced that he would attend expelled Saffron Party leader

Uma Bharti Uma Bharti (born 3 May 1959) is an Indian politician and former Chief Minister of Madhya Pradesh. She became involved with the Bharatiya Janata Party at a young age, unsuccessfully contesting her first parliamentary elections in 1984. In 1989, s ...

's rally in Delhi. Khurana left the BJP, accusing it of not helping solve his cause as committed to giving weight to his mission of developing Delhi.

Criticism

In 1991, an arrest linked to militants in Kashmir led to a raid on

hawala Hawala or hewala ( ar, حِوالة , meaning ''transfer'' or sometimes ''trust''), also known as in Persian, and or in Somali, is a popular and informal value transfer system based on the performance and honour of a huge network of money b ...

brokers, revealing evidence of large-scale payments to national politicians. Those accused included

L. K. Advani Lal Krishna Advani (born 8 November 1927) is an Indian politician who served as the 7th Deputy Prime Minister of India from 2002 to 2004. Advani is one of the co-founders and a senior leader of the Bharatiya Janata Party. He is a longtime memb ...

, V. C. Shukla, P. Shiv Shankar,

Sharad Yadav Sharad Yadav (born 1 July 1947) is a politician from Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) party. He has been elected to Lok Sabha seven times and to Rajya Sabha thrice from JD(U). He was the first national president of Janata Dal (United) since its forma ...

Balram Jakhar Balram Jakhar (23 August 1923 – 3 February 2016) was an Indian politician, who served as the Speaker of the Lok Sabha and Governor of Madhya Pradesh. He was also the longest serving Speaker of the Lok Sabha. Early life and education Jakhar ...

, and Madan Lal Khurana. The prosecution that followed was partly prompted by a public interest petition (see

Vineet Narain Vineet Narain (born 1956) is an Indian journalist, anti-corruption activist and conservator of heritage. His exposure of the 1990s Jain Hawala scandal led him to use a public interest petition to apply pressure on the Central Bureau of Investiga ...

), and yet the court cases of the Hawala scandal eventually all collapsed without convictions. Many were acquitted in 1997 and 1998, partly because the hawala records (including diaries) were judged in court to be inadequate as the main evidence. The

Central Bureau of Investigation The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) is the premier investigating agency of India. It operates under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions. Originally set up to investigate bribery and governmen ...

's role was criticised. In concluding the Vineet Narain case, the

Supreme Court of India The Supreme Court of India ( IAST: ) is the supreme judicial authority of India and is the highest court of the Republic of India under the constitution. It is the most senior constitutional court, has the final decision in all legal matters ...

directed that the

Central Vigilance Commission Central Vigilance Commission (CVC) is an apex Indian governmental body created in 1964 to address governmental corruption. In 2003, the Parliament enacted a law conferring statutory status on the CVC. It has the status of an autonomous body, f ...

should be given a supervisory role over the CBI.

Personal life

Khurana was married to Raj Khurana. Together they had four children. One of his sons, Vimal, died in August 2018. Two months later, at 11 p.m. (

IST Ist or IST may refer to: Information Science and Technology * Bachelor's or Master's degree in Information Science and Technology * Graduate School / Faculty of Information Science and Technology, Hokkaido University, Japan * Graduate School ...

) on 27 October 2018, Khurana died at his residence in

Kirti Nagar {{Infobox settlement , name = Kirti Nagar , official_name = , native_name = , native_name_lang = , other_name = , nickname ...

New Delhi New Delhi (, , ''Naī Dillī'') is the capital of India and a part of the National Capital Territory of Delhi (NCT). New Delhi is the seat of all three branches of the government of India, hosting the Rashtrapati Bhavan, Parliament House ...

, aged 82. He had had a

brain hemorrhage Intracerebral hemorrhage (ICH), also known as cerebral bleed, intraparenchymal bleed, and hemorrhagic stroke, or haemorrhagic stroke, is a sudden bleeding into the tissues of the brain, into its ventricles, or into both. It is one kind of bleed ...

five years prior to his death and had been ailing since then.

Notes

References

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External links

Official biographical sketch in Parliament of India website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Khurana, Madan Lal 1936 births 2018 deaths Government of Delhi Kirori Mal College alumni University of Allahabad alumni Chief ministers from Bharatiya Janata Party Governors of Rajasthan Chief Ministers of Delhi India MPs 1989–1991 India MPs 1991–1996 India MPs 1998–1999 India MPs 1999–2004 Delhi University alumni Members of the Delhi Legislative Assembly Lok Sabha members from Delhi People from South Delhi district Punjabi people Bharatiya Janata Party politicians from Delhi