SUBRAMANIAN SWAMY ,THE GREAT-
DISCLOSED SECRETS OF POLITICIANS
WHO EVER MAY BE ...
BORN SEPTEMBER 15,1939
Subramanian Swamy (born 15 September 1939) is an Indian politician and economist who serves as a member of the Rajya Sabha, the upper house of the Indian Parliament.[1][2] He was the President of the Janata Party[3] until he merged on with Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
[4][5] Swamy has served as a member of the Planning Commission of India and was a Cabinet Minister in the Chandra Shekhar government. Earlier in November 1978, Swamy was member of the Group of Eminent persons and was called to Geneva, Switzerland to prepare a report of the United Nations (United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD)) on Economic Co-operation between Developing countries (ECDC).
Swamy also simplified trade procedures and formulated a new export strategy which became the forerunner of trade reform adopted subsequently. In 1994, Swamy was appointed as Chairman of the Commission on Labour Standards and International Trade by former Prime Minister P. V. Narasimha Rao.
Early life and education[edit]
Subramanian Swamy was born at Mylapore, Chennai, India[7][8] to a family which hailed originally from Madurai in Tamil Nadu.[9] His father, Sitaraman Subramanian, was a bureaucrat and his mother, Padmavathy, was a homemaker. He has one younger brother, Ram Subramanian as well as two younger sisters.[10]
Sitaraman Subramanian was an officer in the Indian Statistical Service who served as the director of the Central Statistical Institute in Delhi, and was a statistical adviser to the Government of India.[11] The family, which hailed from Madurai in Tamil Nadu, moved to New Delhi when Swamy was only six months old. Due to his father's job and the family's Tamil roots, major national leaders like K. Kamaraj, C. Rajagopalachari and S. Satyamurti often visited Sitaraman.[12][13][14]
Swamy attended Hindu College, University of Delhi, from where he earned his Bachelors Honours degree in Mathematics. He then took his master's degree in Statistics from the Indian Statistical Institute, Kolkata. He then went to study at Harvard University, where he received a PhD in Economics in 1965. His thesis adviser was Nobel Laureate Simon Kuznets.[13][15] In 1963, while he was a doctoral student at Harvard, Swamy worked at the United Nations Secretariat in New York as an Assistant Economics Affairs Officer. He subsequently worked as a resident tutor at Lowell House at Harvard university.
While studying at Harvard, Swamy met Roxna, an Indian lady of Parsi ethnicity who was studying PhD in mathematics at Harvard.[16][17] They were married in in June 1966. Shortly afterwards, Roxna abandoned mathematics for law and became an advocate at the Supreme Court of India.[18] Swamy have two daughters. The elder daughter, Gitanjali Swamy,is an entrepreneur and private equity professional. She is also the wife of Sanjay Sarma, a professor at MIT, who is the son of E.A.S Sarma, a retired IAS officer and former secretary Economic Affairs to the government of India. The younger daughter, Suhasini Haider, is a print and television journalist married to Nadeem Haider, the son of former Indian foreign secretary Salman Haider.
Academic career[edit]
In July 1965, immediately after obtaining his PhD in economics from Harvard, Swamy joined the faculty of economics at the same institution as an assistant professor,[13][19] and in 1969, he was made an associate professor.[20] As associate professor, he was invited by the future Nobel Laureate Amartya Sen[11] for a professor’s[21] to occupy the chair on Chinese studies at the Delhi School of Economics.[12] He accepted the offer, and indeed he even travelled to India to take up the position, but his appointment was cancelled at the last minute due to his views on India's economic policy and also its nuclear policy.[11] At that time, India was still partially oriented towards Socialism and the "command economy" model instituted by Nehru, and Swamy was a believer in free markets.
Thereafter, Swamy moved to the Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi and he was a full Professor of Mathematical Economics there from 1969 to 1991.[19][22] He was removed from the position by its board of governors in the early 1970s but was legally reinstated in the late 1990s by the Supreme Court of India. He continued in the position until 1991 when he resigned to become a cabinet minister. He served on the Board of Governors of the IIT, Delhi (1977–80) and on the Council of IITs (1980–82). He also taught economics courses in summer session at Harvard[23] until 2011.
Swamy now serves as Chairman of the School of Communication and Management Studies in Kochi
Early politics[edit]
Swamy's career started with his involvement in the Sarvodaya movement, which was an apolitical movement but which formed the foundation of the creation of Janata Party later.[26] Swamy during this time described Sonia Gandhi, Jayalalithaa and Mayawati as "three great ladies" and compared them with Lakshmi, Saraswati and Durga respectively.[27] The real turn in his political career came after his sacking from IIT. Liberal economic policies put forward by him didn't go well with the then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi who discredited him as 'Santa Claus with unrealistic ideas'. He was later expelled from Indian Institute of Technology. This marked the beginning of his active political career. Staunch opponent of Indira Gandhi and right wing political party Jansangh sent him to Rajya Sabha – the upper house of Indian Parliament.[11]
He was elected Member of Parliament 5 times between 1974 and 1999. He has twice represented the city of Mumbai North East during 1977 and 1980, Uttar Pradesh and Tamil Nadu in the Parliament.[11]
During the period of the Emergency, he fled to the United States, seeking haven with an Indian businessman in Michigan who had become the spokesperson of the opposition in the United States. In 1976, when the Emergency was still in force and an arrest warrant had been issued in his name, Swamy came to Parliament to attend the session and managed to escape India after the session was adjourned. This act of defiance was well received in the eyes of opposition parties.[28][29]
Swamy was one of the founding members of the Janata Party and served as its president till 2013.
Minister of Commerce and Law of India[edit]
During 1990 and 1991, Swamy served as a member of the Planning Commission of India and as Cabinet Minister of Commerce and Law. During this period, Swamy claims to have provided the blueprint for the economic reforms in India under Prime Minister Chandra Shekhar[30][31] which was later carried out in 1991 by Manmohan Singh,[13] then Finance Minister under leadership of Prime Minister Narasimha Rao.[31] In his book, Swamy asserts that Manmohan Singh acknowledges his role as well.[
Complaint against Jayalalithaa[edit]
In 1996, Swamy had filed a criminal complaint against Jayalalitha which led to her prosecution, conviction and sentencing to four years imprisonment. Later, on May 11, 2015,
a special Bench of the Karnataka High Court set aside the trial court order convicting former Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Jayalalitha, who was acquitted of all charges in the disproportionate assets case.[34][35] An Appeal against the High court verdict was filed in Supreme Court.[36]
Phone tapping allegation[edit]
Swamy released a letter alleging that former intelligence chief had asked DoT to tap the phone of many politicians and businessmen in Karnataka,[37] the then Chief Minister, Ramakrishna Hegde resigned in 1988.[38] Hegde then filed a case against him in 1989 and 1990.[39][40][41]
Hashimpura massacre[edit]
Main article: Hashimpura massacre
In 1987, when Muslim youths were killed under police custody, Swamy spoke against it and sat on a fast for more than a week in Jantar Mantar demanding the institution of an inquiry.[42] After 25 years he started pursuing the case once again in court.[43]
Rebecca John, a counsel for the Hashimpura complainants, told Additional Sessions Judge Rakesh Siddhartha who is conducting the trial in the case, that "there is no other motive than politics behind Swamy's plea for further investigation and it would only further delay the trial"
Role in exposing 2G spectrum scam[edit]
Main article: 2G spectrum scam
In November 2008, Swamy amongst others wrote the first of five letters to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh seeking permission to prosecute A. Raja in regard to 2G spectrum scam.[45] After not receiving any response,[46]
On 15 April 2011, he filed a 206-page petition with PM Singh seeking permission to prosecute Sonia Gandhi on charges of corruption. He also raised doubts regarding her acquisition of Indian citizenship.[49] Swamy filed documents in the court to prosecute Minister of Home Affairs P. Chidambaram by including a 15 January 2008 letter written by Chidambaram to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.
Sanction to prosecute telecom minister A. Raja[edit]
On 31 January 2012, the Supreme Court of India accepted Swamy's petition against the Prime Minister's Office in the 2G case, saying that all public authorities should give a sanction within three months against any public official if a request is made for prosecution.
The Supreme Court said that Swamy had the locus standi to seek sanction from the Prime Minister for the prosecution of A Raja in the 2G scam. Sanction by a competent authority for the prosecution of a public servant has to be granted within a time frame, the apex court said. Justice AK Ganguly said that the sanction would be deemed to be granted if competent authority failed to take a decision within four months.
Swamy's arguments were that he wrote to the PMO on 29 November 2008, but it was only on 19 March 2010 the PMO replied that the plea made by Swamy was "premature" as investigation was being carried out by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI). Raja was arrested by the CBI in the case and got bail on 15 May 2012 after spending nearly 15 months in the Tihar Central Jail.[51]
National Herald case[edit]
Main article: National Herald Case
On 1 November 2012 Swamy alleged that both Sonia and Rahul Gandhi have committed fraud and land grabbing to a tune of ₹20 billion (US$300 million) by acquiring a public ltd company called Associated Journals Private Ltd (AJPL) through their owned private company,
Young Indian[67] which was formed on 23 November 2010.[68] Through this they had got publication rights of National Herald and Quami Awaz newspapers, with real estate properties in Delhi and Uttar Pradesh.[69] The acquired place was intended only for newspaper purposes but were used for running a passport office, amounting to lakhs of rupees, it alleges.[citation needed] Swamy further added that Rahul Gandhi hid the facts in his affidavit while filing nomination for the 2009 Lok Sabha elections.[70][71]
It further alleges that on 26 February 2011 AJPL approved the transfer of unsecured loan of ₹900 million (US$13 million) from the All India Congress Committee at zero interest.[72][73] Swamy argued that it is illegal for any political party to lend the loan as per violation of Section 269T of Income Tax Act 1961.[74]
The hearing of the case had been taken up thereafter on different occasions[78][79][80][81][82] with the court observing prima facie evidence against all the accused.[80][83][84] On 1 August 2014 the Enforcement Directorate initiated probe to find any money laundering in the case[85] while on the same day Swamy was served notice by the High Court.[86] On 28 August the metropolitan court fixed 9 December for the next hearing of the case,[87][88] while on 12 January 2015
On 18 September 2015 it was reported that the Enforcement Directorate had reopened the investigation.[91] Following it, on 19 December 2015 Patiala House Court granted unconditional bail immediately on the hearing to all the five accused but one.
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