Droupadi
Murmu is the First Tribal President of India
India scripted history
after Droupadi Murmu became the first tribal President of India. Her election
as a President was absolutely one- sided and was not contested at all. On
defeating the Opposition candidate Yashwant Sinha, she also became the second
woman President of India. The Opposition candidate Yashwant Sinha was with
Mamata Banerjee’s Trinamool Congress who was picked up as a candidate after
Farooq Abdullah, Sharad Pawar & Gopakrishna Gandhi (Mahatma Gandhi’s
grandson) refused to run for the post. In this article, we will be running
through her early life & career, struggles, political career and many more.
Early life and Career
Droupadi Murmu has
been a pioneer from a very young age. She was born in a Santhal family in 1958
and was the first girl in Uparbeda to go to college i.e.; the Ramadevi Women’s
College, now the Ramadevi Women’s University in Bhubaneswar. Uparbeda is one of
the seven revenue villages in Uparbeda Panchayat in Odisha’s backward district,
Mayurbhanj.
Murmu, who is
presently 64 as of 2022, is the second former member of BJP to become an Indian
President after Pres. Ram Nath Kovind. She is also the youngest President ever
that is a month younger than Neelam Sanjiva Reddy, who assumed office in 1977.
Let’s take a ride of her early life with the help of a timeline:
1958: Droupadi Murmu
was born.
1971: Completed her
primary education (up to Class VII) from Uparbeda UPME School, Mayurbhanj
1974: Completed high
school education from Capital Girls’ High School, Unit-II, Bhubaneswar
1979: Completed her
graduation from Rama Devi Women’s College
1979: Started working
as junior assistant in the department of irrigation and power under Odisha
government
1981: Tied knot with
Shyam Charan Murmu, a banker
1994: Started teaching
at the Sri Aurobindo Integral Education and Research Center, Rairangpur
1997: Joined the BJP
and became the councilor of Rairangpur NAC
2000: Elected to the
assembly on a BJP ticket from Rairangpur constituency
Until 2004: She served
as commerce and transport minister and later as fisheries and animal resources
development minister in Naveen Patnaik’s first term as CM of the state.
2004: She was
re-elected as Rairangpur MLA
2007: Received the
Best MLA of the Year award
Until 2009: Since
2006, she served as the Odisha BJP ST Morcha President
2013-2015: She became
the Mayurbhanj district President of the BJP
2015-2021: She served
as the Governor of Jharkhand.
2022: First Tribal
President of India
Votes Pulled by Presidents in India
Going with the flow,
let’s check out the votes pulled out by each of the Presidents to date.
|
Polling date |
Name of the Elected Winners |
Votes polled (%) |
Main rival |
|
May 2, 1952 |
Rajendra Prasad |
507,400 (83.8) |
KT Shah |
|
May 6, 1957 |
Rajendra Prasad |
459,698 (98.99) |
NN Das |
|
May 7, 1962 |
Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan |
553,067 (98.25) |
Hari Ram |
|
May 6, 1967 |
Zakir Hussain |
471,244 (56.2) |
K Subbarao |
|
August16,1969 |
V.V Giri |
401,515 (48.01) |
NSanjiva Reddy |
|
August17 1974 |
Fakhruddin Ali Ahmed |
785,587 (80.18) |
T Chaudhuri |
|
August 6, 1977 |
Neelam Sanjiva Reddy |
Unopposed |
|
|
July 12, 1982 |
Zail Singh |
754,113 (72.73) |
HR Khanna |
|
July 13, 1987 |
Ramaswamy Venkataraman |
740,148 (72.79) |
V Krishna Iyer |
|
July 13, 1992 |
Shankar Dayal Sharma |
675,804 (65.86) |
GG Swell |
|
July 14, 1997 |
K. R. Narayanan |
956,290 (94.9) |
TN Seshan |
|
July 15, 2002 |
A. P. J. Abdul Kalam |
922,884 (89.5) |
Lakshmi Sehgal |
|
July 22, 2007 |
prtibha patil |
638,116 (58.1) |
BS Shekhawat |
|
July 22, 2012 |
Pranab Mukherjee |
713,763 (68.12) |
PA Sangma |
|
July 20, 2017 |
Ram Nath Kovind |
702,044 (66) |
Meira Kumar |
|
July 21, 2022 |
Droupadi Murmu |
676,803 (64.03) |
Yashwant Sinha |
Source-Rashtrapati
Bhawan
Murmu’s Political Career
Droupadi Murmu won
the by a margin of 947
votes, bagging 64. 03% of the electoral college votes against Yashwant Sinha’s
share of 35. 97%. She got votes from a total of 2,824 electors, including 540
MPs, while Sinha won the support of 1,877 electors, including 208 MP.
- From the timeline depicted
above, it is clear that Murmu won an election to the Rairangpur Nagar
Panchayat in 1997, and served as councilor.
- She was elected to two terms in
the Odisha Assembly in 2000 and 2004, and served as a Minister from 2000
to 2004 in CM’s Naveen Patnaik’s BJD-BJP coalition government.
- She held the portfolio of
Commerce and Transport then, Fisheries and Animal Husbandry in the state
government.
- As Odisha’s Transport Minister,
she was credited with having set up transport offices in all 58 sub-
divisions of the state.
- Droupadi Murmu also served as
Vice-President of the BJP’s Scheduled Tribes Morcha.
Tribal issues in India- Role of the Adivasi leader
In India, major
problems faced by the tribal community (Adivasi) are poverty, exploitation,
economic & technological backwardness, Socio-cultural handicaps,
assimilation problems & illiteracy. Murmu being a Santhal leader and an
inspirational figure for her community (for all women too) has mostly
emphasized on such issues that are faced by Adivasis in India.
In 2018, speaking at
an international conference on financial inclusion, Murmu who was then a Governor
stated that even though the Jharkhand state government (then, headed by
the BJP) and the Center were working for the betterment of the community and
for the benefits of banking services and other schemes to tribals, the
condition of SCs and STs still “remain extremely poor”. She also talked about
the translation of literature on Adivasi languages and culture.
Parliamentarians bid farewell to outgoing President Ram Nath
Kovind in Central Hall
Parliamentarians bid a fond farewell to the outgoing
President Ram Nath Kovind in the Central Hall on Saturday evening. In his
address at the function, President Ram Nath Kovind called upon the political
parties to rise above a partisan approach and think about the works needed to
be done for the development and welfare of the people with the spirit of
‘nation first’.
Mr Kovind said, citizens and political parties have many
constitutional avenues open to them, including protests. He said, the Father of
the Nation also employed the weapon of Satyagraha for that purpose but he was
equally concerned about the other side. He said, the right to protest should be
exercised always in Gandhian ways.
President Kovind expressed his gratitude towards the
Parliamentarians saying that it would not have been possible for him to
discharge his responsibilities without their support. He said, during his
tenure, he tried to discharge his duties with full efficiency. He mentioned
that all the former Presidents of India were the source of inspiration to him.
Speaking on the occasion, Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla said
during his five-year tenure, President Kovind has elevated the stature and
dignity of this highest office.
Vice President M Venkaiah Naidu, Prime Minister Narendra
Modi, Union Ministers and Members of Parliament from both the Houses were
present on the occasion. On Friday, the Prime Minister hosted a farewell dinner
for the outgoing President in New Delhi.
Modi government is misusing power and mentally harassing Soniaji Gandhi and the opposition :- A. Praniti Shinde
●Democracy is being killed and Congress party will stand strongly against it. ● Change of power in Maharashtra due to ED pressure.
The Modi government at the Center has issued a notice to its leader Soniaji Gandhi to appear before the Enforcement Directorate (ED) for questioning on July 21, 2022 after misusing the central investigative agencies. Against this, former Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan, Maharashtra Pradesh Congress Working President MLA Praniti Shinde, former Minister Satej (Bunty) Patil, former Minister Vishwajit Kadam, and senior leaders led a protest on Thursday 21 July 2022 at Collectorate Pune to protest the Modi government. was done