AMN / New Delhi
Former Deputy Prime Minister and Chairperson, Ethics Committee (Lok Sabha) L. K. Advani, Members of Parliament and former Members of Parliament paid floral tributes at the portrait of the former Speaker of Lok Sabha, Dr. Bal Ram Jakhar in the Central Hall of Parliament House on his birth anniversary, today.
Secretary-General of Lok Sabha Smt. Snehlata Shrivastava and senior officers of Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha Secretariats also paid floral tributes to Dr. Jakhar.
Born on 23 August 1923 at Panjkosi village in the Ferozepur district of the State of Punjab, Dr. Bal Ram Jakhar was elected the Speaker of the Seventh Lok Sabha on 22 January 1980. Dr. Jakhar has the distinction of beginning his career in the Parliament by occupying the office of the Speaker immediately after his election to the Seventh Lok Sabha for the first time. On 16 January 1985, he was re-elected once again unanimously, to be the Speaker of the Eighth Lok Sabha. When Dr. Jakhar relinquished the office of the Speaker in December 1989, he earned the rare distinction of being the only Speaker in independent India to have presided over two successive Lok Sabhas for their full terms.
A farmer-turned politician, Dr. Jakhar lived fully upto the challenges of the august office of Speaker, Lok Sabha and conducted the business of the House with utmost dignity, decorum and objectivity. Firm, but at the same time sensitive to the mood of the House, he laid stress on the cooperation of the members in the smooth and orderly conduct of the House and thereby in projecting a healthy image of the Parliament to the country and outside.
In the General Elections of 1991, Dr. Jakhar was once again elected to the Lok Sabha from the Sikar constituency and became the Union Minister of Agriculture in the new Government. In Parliament and in the Government, he successfully projected and protected the interests of the farming community.
Dr. Jakhar breathed his last on 3 February 2016.