Biography of ‘Jagjivan Ram’
Jagjivan Ram was born on 5th April 1908, at Chandwa near Arrah in Bihar, to a family of five siblings, elder brother Sant Lai, and three sisters. His father Sobhi Ram was with British Indian Army, posted at Peshawar, but later resigned.
Young Jagjivan started going a local school in January 1914, but shortly after his father died prematurely, leaving him and his mother Vasanti Devi to economic hardships, he joined Aggrawal Middle School in Arrah in 1920, where the medium of instruction was English and later joined Arrah Town School in 1922, it was here that he faced caste dis- crimination for the first time, yet remained unfazed.
An often cited incident occurred in the school, there was this tradition of having two water pots in the school, one for Hindus and another for Muslims, so when Jagjivan drank water from the Hindu pot, while being from an untouchable class, the matter was reported to the Principal, who placed a third pot for “untouchables” in the school, but this pot was broken by him twice, eventually the Principal decided against placing the third pot.
A turning point in his life came in 1925, when Pt. Madan Mohan Malviya visited his school, and impressed by his welcome address, invited him to join Banaras Hindu University.
Jagjivan Ram passed his matriculation in the first division and joined the Banaras Hindu University (BHU) in 1927 where he was awarded the Birla scholarship, and passed his Inter Science Examination; while at BHU he organised the scheduled castes to protest against social discrimination. As a Dalit student, he would not be served meals in his hostel, denied haircut by local barbers, a Dalit barber would arrive from Ghazipur from occasionally to trim his hair, and eventually he left BHU and pursued graduation from Calcutta University. He received a BSc degree from the University of Calcutta in 1931, here again he organised conferences to draw the attention towards issues of discrimination, and also participated in the anti-untouchability movement started by Mahatma Gandhi.
In 1946 he became the youngest minister in Jawaharlal Nehru’s provisional government and also the subsequent First Indian Cabinet, as a Labour Minister.
In Indira Gandhi’s government he worked as minister for labour, employment, and rehabilitation (1966-67), and Union minister for food and agriculture. He passed away on 6th July 1986.
