Madan Mohan Malaviya

Madan Mohan Malaviya (1861 to 1946) was a Congress leader, the founder of Banaras Hindu University and the man credited with founding the Hindu Mahasabha. He was born on 25 December 1861 at Allahabad and was Congress president four times, in 1909, 1918, 1932 and 1933. He founded Banaras Hindu University in 1916 and served as its Vice-Chancellor from 1919 until the late 1930s. He chaired the Hindustan Times from 1924 and launched its Hindi edition in 1936.

His part in this history is on the Hindu side of the contest over identity and representation in the Punjab of the Singh Sabha and the Arya Samaj. The all-India Hindu Sabha was formed at the Kumbh Mela at Haridwar in 1915, with Malaviya credited as its founder. Its roots lay in the Punjab Hindu Sabha of 1909, set up by Lal Chand and U. N. Mukerji. Under his leadership the Mahasabha pursued Hindu political unity and the conversion of Muslims to Hinduism.

Key moments

• November 1932: after the Communal Award of August 1932, Malaviya and Maulana Shaukat Ali organised a Unity Conference at Allahabad, opened on 3 November, to draft an agreement to replace it. Malaviya toured the Punjab to bring Sikh and Hindu leaders in. Of 121 delegates, 11 were Sikhs, among them Sundar Singh Majithia and Ujjal Singh.
• The Sikh delegates backed the draft, which offered Sikhs a Punjab Sikh minister, 20 per cent of legislative seats and representation in the Public Service Commission. The conference could not settle the Bengal and Assam questions, and no final agreement was reached.
• 1934: with M. S. Aney he left the Congress in protest at the Communal Award and formed the Congress Nationalist Party, which won 12 seats in the 1934 central legislative elections.
• March 1936: he helped about 200 Dalits led by P. N. Rajbhoj to enter the Kalaram temple at Nashik.

He died on 12 November 1946. India awarded him the Bharat Ratna after his death, on 24 December 2014.

Remembered for: founding Banaras Hindu University, building the Hindu Mahasabha, and his part in the failed 1932 attempt to replace the Communal Award with an agreement among Hindus, Muslims and Sikhs.