R. D. Pradhan
Encyclopedia
R.D. Pradhan is an ex-administrator and bureaucrat in the Indian Government. He was the Union Home Secretary in the Rajiv Gandhi
government and played a major role in the signing of the Assam Accord
and the Mizo Accord
. He has held Secretary-level positions at the international and national levels in the areas of commerce, defence and home. He was also a Governor of Arunachal Pradesh. He was in service of the government of India for 36 years.
R.D. Pradhan was an IAS officer of the Maharashtra cadre. He joined as a Bombay State officer. For the next five years he worked in Gujarat. He later was an Indian representative diplomat in international trade and commerce in Geneva for ten years. In December 2008 he was appointed to lead a two-man panel to investigate the 2008 Mumbai attacks
.
communal riots of 1982. When Rajiv became the Prime Minister in 1984, he invited Pradhan to join his government. Pradhan chose the post of Union Home Secretary which Rajiv accepted.
Pradhan worked under Home Ministers S.B. Chavan and Buta Singh, and Minister of State for Home Arun Nehru
.
. Politics in Punjab had become secessionist in nature and the Akali Dal party was calling for an independent country of Khalistan
. Following the previous Prime Minister Indira Gandhi
's ordering of Operation Bluestar to flush out the militants, and her subsequent assassination by her own Sikh
bodyguards sympathetic to the Khalistan cause, the situation in Punjab had become tense. Pradhan suggested re-initialisation of dialogue with the Akali Dal, and as a pre-cursor suggested replacement of Punjab Governor K.T. Satarawalla, with a person of political background.
Following this, Arjun Singh
was made the new Governor of Punjab in March 1985. Pradhan also suggested involving the former Maharashtra Chief Minister Sharad Pawar
in the Punjab negotiations. Being from Maharashtra himself, Pradhan was aware of the political structure on his home state, and knew of Pawar's abilities, and his added advantage of being a friend of Parkash Singh Badal, one of the Akali strongmen. Pawar's appointment led the way to his joining back the Congress (I) from which he had split. Pawar went on to become a Congress strongman in the Narasimha Rao
government.
Pradhan was given the task of assessing the election-readiness of Punjab, and he arranged meetings between jailed student leaders and their mentors to assess the mood of the Punjab youth. When elections were held in Punjab, the Akali Dal joined the mainstream and was returned as the ruling party.
. He extended support to the Mathew Commission, set up to decide the Hindi-speaking areas of Punjab to be transferred to Haryana in lieu of Chandigarh
which would be permanently transferred to Punjab as part of the accord. As per the commission's suggestion for a linguistic enumeration of the population of a village called Kandu Khera, the task demanded that the enumeration be fair and peaceful. Pradhan ordered the deployment of a contingent of Assam Rifles
in the village for the safety of the enumerators, and so that political forces do not determine the outcome of the result. When both the Chief Ministers of Punjab and Haryana showed dissatisfaction with the neutrality of the enumerators, Pradhan selected 30 young IAS
officers from non-Hindi speaking areas who successfully performed the enumeration. It was as per that enumeration that the commission concluded that it could not make any recommendation for a suitable contiguous Hindi-majority area of villages that can be transferred to Haryana.
Following this the Venkataramiah Commission was set up with the same purpose, and Pradhan represented the Central Government in the hearings of the commission. That commission too could not come up with a solution in time because of a last-minute change of plan by the Bhajan Lal
government. To counter Bhajan Lal's opposition to the commission, he was replaced as Chief Minister by Bansi Lal
who agreed to the commission's award.
Following this the Desai Commission was set up to complete the previous commission's work in 24 hours. Pradhan briefed the commission on the work done by the previous commissions, and provided him with records and figures available with the Home Ministry. However the commission could not complete its work as its term was extended at the behest of Punjab. Chandigarh is still a Union Territory shared as a joint capital by the states of Punjab and Haryana.
like AASU
, were agitating
against the influx of foreigners from Bangladesh
and Nepal
into the state. They were having talks with the Central Government from the time of Indira Gandhi
in 1980 for a solution to the problem. The talks were formally discontinued in 1983 without a solution. Pradhan formally resumed talks on the Assam problem at the instance of Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi in April, 1985. He invited the AASU representatives including Prafulla Kumar Mahanta
, President AASU and Bhrigu Kumar Phukan, General Secretary AASU to Delhi in May, 1985. Pradhan held five meetings with AASU in the first round of talks in May starting with a twenty-five point discussion list. Eventually the list was narrowed down to seven core issues. The policy for the detection and treatment of foreigners was discussed during these meetings.
Pradhan accompanied the Home Minister S.B. Chavan to Assam on August 9, 1985, and met over 95 delegations that day. The final round of talks began on August 12, when the first written draft of the negotiations was prepared jointly by Pradhan and the joint secretary of AASU, S.S. Sharma. There was no written record of the previous talks as Pradhan feared it might be leaked to the Press. The talks were held in confidentiality and even the Assam Chief Minister and th Governor were unaware of the progress made. When AASU requested to take the draft back to Assam for approval by the party members, it was instead suggested to fly a sixty-member AASU Executive body to Delhi. Pradhan had kept Rajiv Gandhi deliberately out of the talks with AASU until they had approved the draft. Pradhan used the pressure of time to clinch the accord as it was 2:30 am of August 15, and Rajiv Gandhi had decided to announce the signing of the accord in the Independence Day
speech the same morning.
Following the accord the AASU formed their political wing Asom Gana Parishad
which came to power in the elections held in Assam in December 1985, with P.K. Mahanta as Chief Minister.
had fought for secession of his land from the country. In 1976 he had signed an accord with the Indian government, but this was not implemented because of the successive change of governments. Negotiations were ongoing from the time of the 1980 Indira Gandhi government. Pradhan started direct talks with Laldenga on September 1985.
As in the case of Assam, Pradhan kept Rajiv Gandhi out of the negotiations. The talks started off roughly because Rajiv Gandhi had opposed some points of the agreement negotiated by Pradhan's predecessor with Laldenga. The talks progressed slowly, but in June 1986, Pradhan made an offer for a quick resolution as he was retiring from government service that month.
On June 30, the day of his retirement, Pradhan again suggested Laldenga to be flexible in order to reach a settlement. Laldenga accepted this and in an hour's time all pending issues were cleared, and the draft of the agreement was prepared. Although they had planned to get the accord signed by Pradhan's successor, Rajiv Gandhi wanted it to be signed by Pradhan himself in the few hours left before his retirement. They consulted a legal expert and got his retirement postponed to midnight. The accord was then jointly signed by him, Laldenga and Lal Thanhawla, the Chief Minister of Mizoram.
Rajiv Gandhi
Rajiv Ratna Gandhi was the sixth Prime Minister of India . He took office after his mother's assassination on 31 October 1984; he himself was assassinated on 21 May 1991. He became the youngest Prime Minister of India when he took office at the age of 40.Rajiv Gandhi was the elder son of Indira...
government and played a major role in the signing of the Assam Accord
Assam Accord
The Assam Accord was a Memorandum of Settlement signed between representatives of the Government of India and the leaders of the Assam Agitation in New Delhi on 15 August 1985...
and the Mizo Accord
Mizo accord
The Mizoram Accord was signed between the Mizo National Front and the Government of India on June 30 1986. The MNF was a secessionist movement to protest against the negligence and indifference of the Government of India to the people of Mizoram at the time of a severe famine, mautam, during the...
. He has held Secretary-level positions at the international and national levels in the areas of commerce, defence and home. He was also a Governor of Arunachal Pradesh. He was in service of the government of India for 36 years.
R.D. Pradhan was an IAS officer of the Maharashtra cadre. He joined as a Bombay State officer. For the next five years he worked in Gujarat. He later was an Indian representative diplomat in international trade and commerce in Geneva for ten years. In December 2008 he was appointed to lead a two-man panel to investigate the 2008 Mumbai attacks
2008 Mumbai attacks
The 2008 Mumbai attacks were more than 10 coordinated shooting and bombing attacks across Mumbai, India's largest city, by Islamist attackers who came from Pakistan...
.
Union Home Secretary
Rajiv Gandhi, who was then the General Secretary of the Congress (I) party, was impressed by the work done by Pradhan, who as Chief Secrtary of Maharashtra, had promptly handled and provided administrative services during the BhiwandiBhiwandi
Bhiwandi is a city, in the district of Thane, in the western state of Maharashtra, in India, located 20 km to the north-east of Mumbai and 15 km to the north-east of Thane city...
communal riots of 1982. When Rajiv became the Prime Minister in 1984, he invited Pradhan to join his government. Pradhan chose the post of Union Home Secretary which Rajiv accepted.
Pradhan worked under Home Ministers S.B. Chavan and Buta Singh, and Minister of State for Home Arun Nehru
Arun Nehru
Arun Nehru is an Indian politician and columnist. In the 1980s he was the chief strategist for his cousin Rajiv Gandhi and a minister in his government, but owing to ideological differences defected with V.P. Singh to the Janata Dal. Presently he is politically more close to BJP...
.
The Punjab problem
The first major task Pradhan took up as Home Secretary in February 1985, was to assess the political situation in PunjabPunjab (India)
Punjab ) is a state in the northwest of the Republic of India, forming part of the larger Punjab region. The state is bordered by the Indian states of Himachal Pradesh to the east, Haryana to the south and southeast and Rajasthan to the southwest as well as the Pakistani province of Punjab to the...
. Politics in Punjab had become secessionist in nature and the Akali Dal party was calling for an independent country of Khalistan
Khalistan
Khalistan refers to a global political secessionist movement to create a separate Sikh state, called Khālistān , carved out of parts mostly consisting of the Punjab region of India, depending on definition....
. Following the previous Prime Minister Indira Gandhi
Indira Gandhi
Indira Priyadarshini Gandhara was an Indian politician who served as the third Prime Minister of India for three consecutive terms and a fourth term . She was assassinated by Sikh extremists...
's ordering of Operation Bluestar to flush out the militants, and her subsequent assassination by her own Sikh
Sikh
A Sikh is a follower of Sikhism. It primarily originated in the 15th century in the Punjab region of South Asia. The term "Sikh" has its origin in Sanskrit term शिष्य , meaning "disciple, student" or शिक्ष , meaning "instruction"...
bodyguards sympathetic to the Khalistan cause, the situation in Punjab had become tense. Pradhan suggested re-initialisation of dialogue with the Akali Dal, and as a pre-cursor suggested replacement of Punjab Governor K.T. Satarawalla, with a person of political background.
Following this, Arjun Singh
Arjun Singh
Arjun Singh was an Indian politician from the Indian National Congress party. He was the Union Minister of Human Resource Development in the Manmohan Singh cabinet from 2004 to 2009....
was made the new Governor of Punjab in March 1985. Pradhan also suggested involving the former Maharashtra Chief Minister Sharad Pawar
Sharad Pawar
Sharadchandra Govindrao Pawar , popularly known as SAHEB , is the president of the Nationalist Congress Party which he founded in 1999, after separating from the Indian National Congress...
in the Punjab negotiations. Being from Maharashtra himself, Pradhan was aware of the political structure on his home state, and knew of Pawar's abilities, and his added advantage of being a friend of Parkash Singh Badal, one of the Akali strongmen. Pawar's appointment led the way to his joining back the Congress (I) from which he had split. Pawar went on to become a Congress strongman in the Narasimha Rao
Narasimha Rao
Narasimha Rao or Narasimharao is one of the Indian names.* Pamulaparthi Venkata Narasimha Rao served as the 10th Prime Minister of India.* Modireddy Venkat Narasimha Rao, is a former Indian cricketer....
government.
Pradhan was given the task of assessing the election-readiness of Punjab, and he arranged meetings between jailed student leaders and their mentors to assess the mood of the Punjab youth. When elections were held in Punjab, the Akali Dal joined the mainstream and was returned as the ruling party.
Punjab Accord
Pradhan was involved in the implementing of the Punjab accordPunjab accord
Punjab accord is an accord signed by Rajiv Gandhi and Harcharan Singh Longowal on 24 July 1985. The government accepted the demands of Akali Dal who in turn agreed to withdraw their agitation.But later was turned into a failure as government wasn't able to fulfill any of their promises and ...
. He extended support to the Mathew Commission, set up to decide the Hindi-speaking areas of Punjab to be transferred to Haryana in lieu of Chandigarh
Chandigarh
Chandigarh is a union territory of India that serves as the capital of two states, Haryana and Punjab. The name Chandigarh translates as "The Fort of Chandi". The name is from an ancient temple called Chandi Mandir, devoted to the Hindu goddess Chandi, in the city...
which would be permanently transferred to Punjab as part of the accord. As per the commission's suggestion for a linguistic enumeration of the population of a village called Kandu Khera, the task demanded that the enumeration be fair and peaceful. Pradhan ordered the deployment of a contingent of Assam Rifles
Assam Rifles
The Assam Rifles are one of the Paramilitary forces of India. The unit can trace its lineage back to a paramilitary police force that was formed under the British in 1835 called Cachar Levy. Since then the Assam Rifles have undergone a number of name changes before the name Assam Rifles was finally...
in the village for the safety of the enumerators, and so that political forces do not determine the outcome of the result. When both the Chief Ministers of Punjab and Haryana showed dissatisfaction with the neutrality of the enumerators, Pradhan selected 30 young IAS
Indian Administrative Service
The Indian Administrative Service is the administrative civil service of the Government of India. It is one of the three All India Services....
officers from non-Hindi speaking areas who successfully performed the enumeration. It was as per that enumeration that the commission concluded that it could not make any recommendation for a suitable contiguous Hindi-majority area of villages that can be transferred to Haryana.
Following this the Venkataramiah Commission was set up with the same purpose, and Pradhan represented the Central Government in the hearings of the commission. That commission too could not come up with a solution in time because of a last-minute change of plan by the Bhajan Lal
Bhajan Lal
Bhajan Lal was a politician and two-time chief minister from the northern Indian state of Haryana.-Early life:...
government. To counter Bhajan Lal's opposition to the commission, he was replaced as Chief Minister by Bansi Lal
Bansi Lal
Chaudhary Bansi Lal was an Indian freedom fighter, senior Congress leader, former Chief Minister of Haryana and considered by many to be the architect of modern Haryana. He was born in a Jat family of Golagarh village in Bhiwani district of Haryana. He served three separate terms as Chief...
who agreed to the commission's award.
Following this the Desai Commission was set up to complete the previous commission's work in 24 hours. Pradhan briefed the commission on the work done by the previous commissions, and provided him with records and figures available with the Home Ministry. However the commission could not complete its work as its term was extended at the behest of Punjab. Chandigarh is still a Union Territory shared as a joint capital by the states of Punjab and Haryana.
Assam Accord
Student parties in AssamAssam
Assam , also, rarely, Assam Valley and formerly the Assam Province , is a northeastern state of India and is one of the most culturally and geographically distinct regions of the country...
like AASU
All Assam Students Union
All Assam Students Union is a five-tier students' union in Assam, India.All Assam Students Union or AASU is a students' organization in Assam, India. It is best known for leading the six-year Assam Movement against alleged illegal immigrants from Bangladesh...
, were agitating
Assam Agitation
The Assam Agitation was a popular movement against undocumented migrants in Assam between 1979 and 1985. It is regarded as one of the most vibrant democratic mass movements of independent India...
against the influx of foreigners from Bangladesh
Bangladesh
Bangladesh , officially the People's Republic of Bangladesh is a sovereign state located in South Asia. It is bordered by India on all sides except for a small border with Burma to the far southeast and by the Bay of Bengal to the south...
and Nepal
Nepal
Nepal , officially the Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal, is a landlocked sovereign state located in South Asia. It is located in the Himalayas and bordered to the north by the People's Republic of China, and to the south, east, and west by the Republic of India...
into the state. They were having talks with the Central Government from the time of Indira Gandhi
Indira Gandhi
Indira Priyadarshini Gandhara was an Indian politician who served as the third Prime Minister of India for three consecutive terms and a fourth term . She was assassinated by Sikh extremists...
in 1980 for a solution to the problem. The talks were formally discontinued in 1983 without a solution. Pradhan formally resumed talks on the Assam problem at the instance of Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi in April, 1985. He invited the AASU representatives including Prafulla Kumar Mahanta
Prafulla Kumar Mahanta
Prafulla Kumar Mahanta was the leader of the Assam Movement, a former Chief Minister of Assam and belongs to the Asom Gana Parishad , a major political party in the Indian state of Assam...
, President AASU and Bhrigu Kumar Phukan, General Secretary AASU to Delhi in May, 1985. Pradhan held five meetings with AASU in the first round of talks in May starting with a twenty-five point discussion list. Eventually the list was narrowed down to seven core issues. The policy for the detection and treatment of foreigners was discussed during these meetings.
Pradhan accompanied the Home Minister S.B. Chavan to Assam on August 9, 1985, and met over 95 delegations that day. The final round of talks began on August 12, when the first written draft of the negotiations was prepared jointly by Pradhan and the joint secretary of AASU, S.S. Sharma. There was no written record of the previous talks as Pradhan feared it might be leaked to the Press. The talks were held in confidentiality and even the Assam Chief Minister and th Governor were unaware of the progress made. When AASU requested to take the draft back to Assam for approval by the party members, it was instead suggested to fly a sixty-member AASU Executive body to Delhi. Pradhan had kept Rajiv Gandhi deliberately out of the talks with AASU until they had approved the draft. Pradhan used the pressure of time to clinch the accord as it was 2:30 am of August 15, and Rajiv Gandhi had decided to announce the signing of the accord in the Independence Day
Independence Day (India)
The Independence Day of India is celebrated on the fifteenth of August to commemorate its independence from British rule and its birth as a sovereign nation in 1947. The day is a national holiday in India. All over the country, flag-hoisting ceremonies are conducted by the local administration in...
speech the same morning.
Following the accord the AASU formed their political wing Asom Gana Parishad
Asom Gana Parishad
Asom Gana Parishad is a state political party in Assam, India. The AGP was formed after the historic Assam Accord of 1985 when Prafulla Kumar Mahanta was elected as the youngest chief minister of the country...
which came to power in the elections held in Assam in December 1985, with P.K. Mahanta as Chief Minister.
Mizoram Accord
In August 1985, Rajiv Gandhi handed over responsibility of negotiations with Laldenga to Pradhan. Laldenga, founder of the Mizo National FrontMizo National Front
Mizo National Front is a regional political party in Mizoram, India. MNF emerged out of the Mizo National Famine Front, which was formed by Pu Laldenga to protest against the inaction of the Indian central government towards the famine situation in the Mizo areas of the Assam state in 1959. It...
had fought for secession of his land from the country. In 1976 he had signed an accord with the Indian government, but this was not implemented because of the successive change of governments. Negotiations were ongoing from the time of the 1980 Indira Gandhi government. Pradhan started direct talks with Laldenga on September 1985.
As in the case of Assam, Pradhan kept Rajiv Gandhi out of the negotiations. The talks started off roughly because Rajiv Gandhi had opposed some points of the agreement negotiated by Pradhan's predecessor with Laldenga. The talks progressed slowly, but in June 1986, Pradhan made an offer for a quick resolution as he was retiring from government service that month.
On June 30, the day of his retirement, Pradhan again suggested Laldenga to be flexible in order to reach a settlement. Laldenga accepted this and in an hour's time all pending issues were cleared, and the draft of the agreement was prepared. Although they had planned to get the accord signed by Pradhan's successor, Rajiv Gandhi wanted it to be signed by Pradhan himself in the few hours left before his retirement. They consulted a legal expert and got his retirement postponed to midnight. The accord was then jointly signed by him, Laldenga and Lal Thanhawla, the Chief Minister of Mizoram.
Governorship of Arunachal Pradesh
R.D. Pradhan was appointed the second Governor of Arunachal Pradesh in March 1987, after Arunachal was granted statehood in November 1986. The state was having border problems with China at the time, and Pradhan's achievements in reaching the accords of northeast states of Assam and Mizoram and his previous experience in the Defence Ministry were the factors Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi considered before offering him the position. When V.P. Singh came to power in January 1990, he demanded the resignation of Governors of all states. Pradhan was the first governor to hand over the resignation.Rajya Sabha and Legislative Council
R.D. Pradhan won a seat in the Maharashtra Legislative Council in June 1990 on the Congress ticket.Positions held
The positions listed are not in chronological order.- Governor, Arunachal Pradesh : March 1987 - March 1990
- Home Secretary, India : January 1985 - June 1986
- Home Secretary, Maharashtra : 1977
- Chief Secretary, Maharashtra
- Private Secretary to Y.B. Chavan, Chief Minister Maharahtra, Defence Minister India : (1960–1965)
- India's Resident Representative in Geneva to UNCTAD and GATT : 12 years
- International civil servant : 5 years
- Assistant Collector and Sub-Divisional Magistrate, Mount Abu
- Chairman of the High-level Enquiry Commission for 26/11Pradhan Inquiry CommissionOfficially known as the High-Level Enquiry Committee on 26/11, the Pradhan Inquiry Commission was appointed by the Maharashtra Government on December 30, 2008, to probe the response to the 2008 Mumbai attacks....
.
Awards
- R.D. Pradhan was awarded the Padma BhushanPadma BhushanThe Padma Bhushan is the third highest civilian award in the Republic of India, after the Bharat Ratna and the Padma Vibhushan, but comes before the Padma Shri. It is awarded by the Government of India.-History:...
on Republic DayRepublic Day (India)The Republic Day of India commemorates the date on which the Constitution of India came into force replacing the Government of India Act 1935 as the governing document of India on 26 January 1950....
, 1987.
Further reading
- "Working with Rajiv Gandhi" by R.D.Pradhan