The Union Revolutionary Council ( my, နိုင်ငံတော်တော်လှန်ရေးကောင်စီ), officially the Revolutionary Council of the Union of Burma ( my, ပြည်ထောင်စုမြန်မာနိုင်ငံတော်လှန်ရေးကောင်စီ) or simply the Revolutionary Council (RC; my, တော်လှန်ရေးကောင်စီ), was the supreme governing body of

Burma Myanmar, ; UK pronunciations: US pronunciations incl. . Note: Wikipedia's IPA conventions require indicating /r/ even in British English although only some British English speakers pronounce r at the end of syllables. As John Wells explai ...

(now Myanmar) from 2 March 1962, following the overthrow of

U Nu Nu ( my, ဦးနု; ; 25 May 1907 – 14 February 1995), commonly known as U Nu also known by the honorific name Thakin Nu, was a leading Burmese statesman and nationalist politician. He was the first Prime Minister of Burma under the pr ...

civilian government Civil authority or civil government is the practical implementation of a state on behalf of its citizens, other than through military units (martial law), that enforces law and order and that is distinguished from religious authority (for exampl ...

, to 3 March 1974, with the promulgation of the 1974 Constitution of Burma and transfer of power to the

Pyithu Hluttaw The Pyithu Hluttaw ( my, ပြည်သူ့ လွှတ်တော်, ; House of Representatives) is the ''de jure'' lower house of the Pyidaungsu Hluttaw, the bicameral legislature of Myanmar (Burma). It consists of 440 members, of whic ...

(People's Assembly), the country's new

unicameral legislature Unicameralism (from ''uni''- "one" + Latin ''camera'' "chamber") is a type of legislature, which consists of one house or assembly, that legislates and votes as one. Unicameral legislatures exist when there is no widely perceived need for multic ...

. The Revolutionary Council's philosophical framework was laid in the

Burmese Way to Socialism The Burmese Way to Socialism ( my, မြန်မာ့နည်းမြန်မာ့ဟန် ဆိုရှယ်လစ်စနစ်), also known as the Burmese Road to Socialism, was the state ideology of the Socialist Republic of the ...

, which aspired to convert Burma into a

self-sustaining Self-sustainability and self-sufficiency are overlapping states of being in which a person or organization needs little or no help from, or interaction with, others. Self-sufficiency entails the self being enough (to fulfill needs), and a self-s ...

democratic

socialist state A socialist state, socialist republic, or socialist country, sometimes referred to as a workers' state or workers' republic, is a Sovereign state, sovereign State (polity), state constitutionally dedicated to the establishment of socialism. The ...

, on 30 April 1962. On 4 July 1962, the RC established the

Burma Socialist Programme Party The Burma Socialist Programme Party (BSPP), ; abbreviated , was Burma's ruling party from 1962 to 1988 and sole legal party from 1964 to 1988. Party chairman Ne Win overthrew the country's democratically elected government in a coup d'éta ...

(BSPP), the country's only legal political party which Donald M. Seekins claims was modelled along the lines of a Marxist-Leninist revolutionary party. From 1962 to 1971, BSPP transitioned from a cadre party (consisting of elite RC affiliated members) into a mass party. In the First Congress, the party had 344,226 members. By 1981, BSPP had 1.5 million members.

Leadership

The Union Revolutionary Council was led by

Ne Win Ne Win ( my, နေဝင်း ; 10 July 1910, or 14 or 24 May 1911 – 5 December 2002) was a Burmese politician and military commander who served as Prime Minister of Burma from 1958 to 1960 and 1962 to 1974, and also President of Burma ...

, its chairman and 16 senior officers. The founding members of the First Revolutionary Council, all of whom were military officers, are: #General

BC-3502 (Chief of General Staff) #Brigadier General

Aung Gyi Brigadier General Aung Gyi ( my, အောင်ကြီး ; 16 February 1919 – 25 October 2012) was a Burmese military officer and politician. He was a cofounder of the National League for Democracy and served as president of the party. E ...

BC-5458 (Vice-Chief of General Staff) (Army) #Commodore Than Pe (died 1962) (Vice-Chief of General Staff) (Navy) #Brigadier General Thomas 'Tommy' Cliff (Vice-Chief of General Staff) (Air Force) (resigned 1964) #Brigadier General

Tin Pe Tin Pe ( my, တင်ဖေ, ) was mayor of Yangon, Burma, from 1985 to 1986. He was also a founding member of the Union Revolutionary Council The Union Revolutionary Council ( my, နိုင်ငံတော်တော်လှန်ရေ ...

(resigned 1970) BC-3508 (Quartermaster General) #Colonel Than Sein BC-3574 (Colonel-General Staff) #Colonel Kyaw Soe (retired 1974) BC-3526 (Military Appointment General) #Colonel Chit Myaing (dismissed 1964) BC-3520 (Vice-Quartermaster General) #Colonel Khin Nyo (dismissed 1965) BC-3537 (Director General of Directorate of Military Training) #Colonel Hla Han (Director General of Directorate of Medical Services) #Brigadier General

San Yu San Yu ( my, စန်းယု, ; 3 March 1918 – 28 January 1996) was a Burmese army general and statesman who served as the fifth president of Myanmar from 9 November 1981 to 27 July 1988. Biography San Yu, an ethnic Chinese, was born i ...

BC-3569 (Commander of Northern Military Command) #Brigadier General Sein Win BC-3525 (Commander of Central Military Command) #Colonel Thaung Kyi BC-3523 (Commander of Southeast Military Command) #Colonel

Kyi Maung Colonel Kyi Maung ( my, ကြည်မောင်, ; 20 December 192019 August 2004) was a Burmese Army officer and politician. Originally a member of the military-backed Union Revolutionary Council that seized power in 1962, Kyi Maung resigne ...

(sacked 1963) BC-3516 (Commander of Southwest Military Command) #Colonel Maung Shwe (resigned 1972) BC-3575 (Commander of Eastern Military Command) #Colonel Saw Myint (sacked 1964) BC-3518 (Administrator of Border Regions) #Colonel Tan Yu Sai (resigned 1968) BC-5090 (Vice-Commissioner of General of People's Police)

Revolutionary Government

The government formed by the Revolutionary Council of the Union of Burma was named Revolutionary Government of the Union of Burma () or simply Revolutionary Government (). As wiping out the monarchist terms, a Ministry was called as a Department () and a Minister was called as a Person in-charge of Department () during the time of the Revolutionary Government. The terms Ministry and Minister were restored when the

Council of Ministers A council is a group of people who come together to consult, deliberate, or make decisions. A council may function as a legislature, especially at a town, city or county/ shire level, but most legislative bodies at the state/provincial or nati ...

was formed in 8 May 1974.

Council member terms

References

{{Burma topics Military history of Myanmar Government of Myanmar Military dictatorship in Myanmar Socialism in Myanmar Government agencies established in 1962 Government agencies disestablished in 1974 1962 establishments in Burma 1974 disestablishments in Burma