Former Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee passes awayFormer Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee passes away

Former Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee passed away following multi-organ failure in Kolkata, West Bengal. He was 89. He was Speaker of Lok Sabja (House of the People) in first five-year term (2004-2009) of United Progressive Alliance Government.

Somnath Chatterjee

He was born in 1929 in Tezpur, Assam. He was educated at Mitra Institution School, Presidency College and then University of Calcutta in Calcutta. He also attended Jesus College, Cambridge and graduating with BA in 1952 and an MA in 1957, both in Law.
He was awarded honorary fellowship by college in 2007. He was called to bar from Middle Temple in London and took up legal practice as advocate at Calcutta High Court before joining active politics. He joined Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) in 1968 and was member till his expulsion in 2008.
He was elected to Lok Sabja (Parliament’s Lower House) for ten times since 1971 (except once when he lost to Mamata Banerjee in the Jadavpur Lok Sabha constituency in 1984).  He was expelled from CPM in July 2008 for refusing to resign as Speaker after his party withdrew support from UPA government.

Month: Current Affairs - August, 2018