Back স্বতন্ত্ৰ পাৰ্টি Assamese Swatantra Catalan Swatantra-Partei German સ્વતંત્ર પક્ષ Gujarati מפלגת סוואטנטרה HE स्वतंत्र पार्टी Hindi Partai Swatantra ID സ്വതന്ത്രാ പാർട്ടി Malayalam स्वतंत्र पक्ष Marathi ਸਵਤੰਤਰ ਪਾਰਟੀ Punjabi

Swatantra Party

Swatantra Party
AbbreviationSWA
FounderC. Rajagopalachari
Founded4 June 1959
Dissolved1974
Split fromIndian National Congress
Merged intoBharatiya Lok Dal
IdeologyConservatism (Indian)[1]
Classical liberalism[2]
Liberal conservatism[3]
Secularism[4]
Agrarianism[5]
Political positionCentre-right[6][7][note 1]
ColoursBlue
Election symbol

The Swatantra Party was an Indian classical liberal political party that existed from 1959 to 1974. It was founded by C. Rajagopalachari[11] in reaction to what he felt was the Jawaharlal Nehru-dominated Indian National Congress's increasingly socialist and statist outlook.[1]

The party had a number of distinguished leaders, most of them old Congressmen, like C. Rajagopalachari, Minoo Masani, N.G. Ranga, Darshan Singh Pheruman,[12][13] Udham Singh Nagoke[14] and K.M. Munshi. The provocation for the formation of the party was the left turn that the Congress took at Avadi[15] and the Nagpur Resolutions.

Swatantra stood for a market-based economy and the dismantling of the "Licence Raj" although it opposed laissez-faire policies. Swatantra was not a religion-based party, unlike the Hindu nationalism of the Bharatiya Jana Sangh. In 1960, Rajagopalachari and his colleagues drafted a 21-point manifesto detailing why Swatantra had to be formed even though they had been Congressmen and associates of Nehru during the struggle for independence.[16][better source needed] Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru was highly critical of Swatantra and dubbed it as belonging to "the middle ages of lords, castles and zamindars".[17]

  1. ^ a b Erdman, H.L. (2007). The Swatantra Party and Indian Conservatism. Cambridge South Asian Studies. Cambridge University Press. pp. 2, 62–63, 75. ISBN 978-0521049801. Retrieved 2019-07-02.
  2. ^ Das, Gurcharan (2002). The Elephant Paradigm. Penguin. p. 244.
  3. ^ Pratapchandra Rasam, Vasanti (1997). Swatantra Party: a political biography. Dattsons. p. 199.
  4. ^ Smith, Donald E. (1966). South Asian Politics and Religion. Princeton University Press. p. 110.
  5. ^ Rajadhyaksha, Niranjan (2019-05-28). "The contemporary relevance of Swatantra Party's liberal view". Mint. Retrieved 2024-01-13.
  6. ^ Raghbendra Jha, ed. (2014). Facets of India's Economy and Her Society Volume I. Springer. p. 263.
  7. ^ Rudra Chaudhuri, ed. (2014). Forged in Crisis: India and the United States Since 1947. Oxford University Press, Incorporated. p. 100.
  8. ^ Snippet view, ed. (1978). Triveni: Journal of Indian Renaissance - Volume 47. Triveni Publishers. p. 24.
  9. ^ Chaudhuri, Rudra (2014). Forged in Crisis: India and the United States Since 1947. Oxford University Press. p. 100.
  10. ^ Jha, Raghbendra (2018). Facets of India's Economy and Her Society. Vol. 1. Springer. p. 263.
  11. ^ Rajagopalachari, C. (2016-07-16). "C. Rajagopalachari | Why Swatantra?". Mint. Retrieved 2019-03-24.
  12. ^ Singh, Ranjit (2008). Sikh Achievers. New Delhi, India: Hemkunt Publishers. pp. 36–37. ISBN 978-8170103653.
  13. ^ "Darshan Signh Pheruman (1885–1969)". Archived from the original on 5 January 2015. Retrieved 20 January 2015.
  14. ^ "Fifty Years of Punjab Politics (1920-70)". Panjab Digital Library. Retrieved 2019-07-21.
  15. ^ Ramakrishnan, Venkitesh (2012-09-22). "Long way from Avadi". frontline.thehindu.com. Retrieved 2019-08-12.
  16. ^ The 21 Principles of the Swatantra Party. 1959.
  17. ^ Erdman, 1963–64.


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