V V Giri
Terms of office: May 3, 1969 to July 20, 1969; August 24, 1969 to August 24, 1974
As a student, Varahagiri Venkata Giri was expelled from Ireland for his involvement in the Sinn Fein movement. While at the University College in Dublin he was in contact with both Michael Collins, the Irish revolutionary leader who was killed in 1922 (Liam Neeson played Collins in a memorable Hollywood film), and Eamon de Valera, who went on to become prime minister of Ireland for many years.
A lawyer, Giri was closely associated with the Indian labour movement and served as India's high commissioner to Sri Lanka. Vice-president when President Zakir Hussain died, he officiated as the President.
The 1969 Presidential election coincided with a tumultuous time in the nation's polity. The Congress party had been steadily losing steam since the military debacle in 1962 against China, and its tally in the 1967 general election was its lowest.
The Congress old guard, which had propped up the young Indira Gandhi after Lal Bahadur Shastri's untimely death, hoping her to be a pushover doing their bid, were in for a bit of a surprise. Indira Gandhi backed Giri, who was in the fray as an Independent candidate in the 1969 Presidential election, against the Congress party's official nominee Neelam Sanjeeva Reddy. Giri -- whose wife Saraswati once famously called Indira Gandhi 'My darling daughter' -- won.
The Presidential election led to a split in the Congress party. Indira Gandhi retained the dominant faction, the Congress-Ruling, with the old guard relegated to a minor faction, the Congress-Organisation. The mid-term poll in 1971, which she campaigned with the slogan 'Garibi Hatao', gave her a landslide.
Despite the tumult around him, President Giri retained his simplicity. As long as he was in Rashtrapati Bhavan, he sent vegetables from its gardens to orphanages every week.
He received the Bharat Ratna in 1975.
Giri wrote two books on labour issues and died in 1980. His brother was an MP from Madhya Pradesh and his sister a former deputy speaker of the Orissa assembly. His daughter-in-law Mohini Giri is active in the womens' right movement.
Photograph: Press Information Bureau
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