V.V.Giri was born at Berhampore, Orissa on August 10, 1894. He was responsible for the formation of the all India Trade Union Congress, of which he was President twice. A long period of his public life was devoted to building up the All India Railwaymen's Federation. He was Labour and Industry Minister in the first popular ministry in Madras during 1937-39 and served as Union Labour Minister during 1952-54. Served as the Governor of Uttar Pradesh, Kerala and Mysore.
He served as Vice-President of India from May 13, 1967 to 1969. He was Acting President from 3.5.69 to 20.7.69 after the death of Dr.Zakir Hussain.
V.V.Giri was elected to the Office of the President and was sworn in on 24.8.69. He held office till 24.8.1974. He was awarded the 'Bharat Ratna' in 1975. V.V.Giri passed away in 1980.
M.Hidayatullah was born on 17th December, 1905 in Maharashtra. He was Chief Justice of India from 1968 to 1970. He was Acting President of India for a short term from 20th July to 21st August, 1969. Later, he served as the Vice-President of India from 1979 to 1984.
Born in 1897 at Hyderabad, Dr Zakir Husain was the third President of India from May 13, 1967 until his death. Hussain was born in Hyderabad, India, where his father had migrated from Uttar Pradesh. He went for higher education to Anglo-Muhammadan Oriental College (now Aligarh Muslim University). He was known even in those days for his love of knowledge, his wit and eloquence and his readiness to help his fellow students. Zakir Husain, then only 23 and a student of the M.A. , was among the small group of students and teachers who decided to establish a National Muslim University and named it Jamia Millia Islamia. Zakir Husain's unceasing quest for knowledge also took him to Germany in the 1920's. During his three year stay there, he acquired a deep love for European art and literature on music and he also got a Doctorate from the University of Berlin in Economics. In 1963, he was awarded the highest honour of the land, the Bharat Ratna for his great service to the nation. After serving as the Governor of Bihar from 1957 to 1962, and as the Vice President of India for a term of five years, from 1962 to 1967, Dr. Zakir Husain was elected President of India on May 13, 1967. In his deeply moving inaugural speech he said that the whole of India was his home and all its people were his family. He died in office.
Dr. Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan is best known as the man who introduced the thinking of western idealist philosophers into Indian thought. He was an Oxford don who became the first Vice President and the second President of India. He was born at Tiruttani, 64 km to the northeast of Madras in South India. His mother tongue was Telugu. His early years were spent in Tiruttani, Tiruvallur and Tirupati. His primary education was in Gowdie School, Tiruvallur. He graduated with a Master's Degree in Arts from Madras University. In 1921, he was appointed to the most important philosophy chair in India, King George V Chair of Mental and Moral Science in the University of Calcutta. Radhakrishnan represented the University of Calcutta at the Congress of the Universities of the British Empire in June 1926 and the International Congress of Philosophy at Harvard University in September 1926. In 1929, Radhakrishnan was invited to take the post vacated by Principal J. Estin Carpenter in Manchester College, Oxford. This gave him the opportunity to lecture to the students of the University of Oxford on Comparative Religion. He was knighted in 1931 and was known as Sir Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan. He worked as the Vice-Chancellor of Andhra University from 1931 to 1936. In 1936,
Radhakrishnan was named the Spalding Professor of Eastern Religions and Ethics at the University of Oxford and elected a Fellow of All Souls College, a post which he held until he was named the first Vice President of India in 1952. He showed how western philosophers, despite all claims to objectivity, were biased by theological influences from their wider culture. In one of his major works he also showed that Indian philosophy, once translated into standard academic jargon, is worthy of being called philosophy by western standards. His main contribution to Indian thought, therefore, is that he placed it "on the map", thereby earning Indian philosophy a respect that it had not had before. After 1946, his philosophical career was cut short when his country needed him as ambassador to UNESCO and later to Moscow. He was later to become the first Vice-President and finally the President (1962-1967) of India. When he became the President of India in 1962, some of his students and friends requested him to allow them to celebrate his birthday, September 5. He replied, "Instead of celebrating my birthday, it would be my proud privilege if September 5 is observed as Teacher's Day." Since then, Teacher's Day has been celebrated in India. He was awarded the Bharat Ratna in 1954. The University of Oxford instituted the Radhakrishnan Chevening Scholarships and the Radhakrishnan Memorial Award in his memory. He also received the Peace Prize of the German Book Trade in 1961.
Dr. Rajendra Prasad was the first President of India. Rajendra Prasad was a great freedom-fighter, and the architect of the Indian Constitution, having served as President of the Constituent Assembly that drafted the Constitution of the Republic from 1948 to 1950. He had also served as a Cabinet Minister briefly in the first Government of Independent India. He was a crucial leader of the Indian Independence Movement. Prasad was born in Jiradei, in the Siwan district of Bihar. His father, Mahadev Sahay, was a Persian and Sanskrit language scholar; his mother, Kamleshwari Devi, was a devout lady who would tell stories from the Ramayana to her son. At the age of 5, the young Rajendra Prasad was sent to a Maulavi for learning Persian. After that he was sent to Chapra Zilla School for further primary studies.
He was married at the age of 12 to Rajvanshi Devi. He then went on to study at R.K. Ghosh's Academy in Patna to be with his older brother Mahendra Prasad. Soon afterward, however, he rejoined the Chapra Zilla School, and it was from there that he passed the entrance examination of Calcutta University, at the age of 18. He stood first in the first division of that examination. He then joined the Presidency College, Calcutta. He was initially a student of science and his teachers included J.C.Bose and Prafulla Chandra Roy. Later he decided to switch his focus to the arts. Acharya Prafulla Chandra Roy, who was impressed by his intellect and dedication asked him on the occasion "Why have you deserted your class?." Prasad lived with his brother in the Eden Hindu Hostel. A plaque still commemorates his stay in that room. He had been initiated into the Swadeshi movement by his brother. He then joined the Dawn Society run by Satish Chandra Mukherjee, and Sister Nivedita. In 1911, he joined the A.I.C.C. However, his family estate was in bad condition. He was looked upon as the provider. But he sought permission from his brother in a letter to join the Indian freedom movement. He wrote, "Ambitions I have none, except to be of some service to the Motherland". The shock of his brother, however, held him to the family. In 1916, Rajendra Prasad joined the High Court of Bihar, and Orissa. Such was his intellect and his integrity, that often when his adversary failed to cite a precedent, the judges asked Rajendra Prasad to cite a precedent against himself. After meeting Mahatma Gandhi, he quit as a Senator of the University, much to the regret of the British Vice-Chancellor.He also responded to the call by the Mahatma to boycott Western education by asking his son Mrityunjaya Prasad, a brilliant student to drop out of the University and enroll himself in Bihar Vidyapeeth, an institution he had along with his colleagues founded on the traditional Indian model. He wrote articles for Searchlight and the Desh and collected funds for these papers. He toured a lot, explaining, lecturing and exhorting. When the earthquake of Bihar occurred on January 15, 1934, Rajendra Prasad was in jail. He was released two days later. He set himself for the task of raising funds. The Viceroy had also raised a fund. However, while Rajendra Prasad's fund collected over 38 Lakhs (Rs. 3,800,000), the Viceroy could only manage one-third of that amount. The way relief was organized left nothing to be desired. Nationalist India expressed its admiration by electing him to the President of the Bombay session of the Indian National Congress.
After India became independent he was elected the President of India. As President, he used his moderating influence so silently and unobtrusively that he neither reigned nor ruled. His sister Bhagwati Devi died on the night of 25 January 1960. She doted on her dearly-loved younger brother. It must have taken Rajendra Prasad all his will power to have taken the Republic Day salute as usual, on the following day. It was only on return from the parade that he set about the task of cremation. In 1962, after 12 years as President, he announced his decision to retire. He was subsequently awarded the Bharat Ratna, the nation's highest civilian award. Within months of his retirement, early in September 1962, his wife Rajvanshi Devi passed away. In a letter written a month before his death to one devoted to him, he said, "I have a feeling that the end is near, end of the energy to do, end of my very existence". He died on 28 February 1963 with 'Ram Ram Ram' on his lips. Because of the enormous public adulation he enjoyed, he was referred to as Desh Ratna or the Jewel of the country. His legacy is being ably carried forward by his great grandson Ashoka Jahnavi-Prasad, a psychiatrist and a scientist of international repute who introduced sodium valproate as a safer alternative to lithium salts in the treatment of bipolar disorders.
