On the eve of his 100th birth anniversary, the Rashtrapati Bhavan on Tuesday announced former Bihar chief minister Karpoori Thakur will be conferred Bharat Ratna, India’s highest civilian honour, posthumously.

Following the announcement, PM Modi hailed him as a “beacon of social justice” and said that the award is testament to his efforts as a champion for the marginalised and a stalwart of equality.

Thakur is the 17 individual to have recieved the award posthumously and 49th overall. Before him, 48 people, including Jawaharlal Nehru, Indira Gandhi, Sachin Tendulkar, and former president Pranab Mukharjee.

Who was Karpoori Thakur?

Born in Pitaunjhia (now Karpuri Gram) village of Samastipur on January 24, 1924, Karpoori Thakur was a socialist leader, who served as the Bihar’s chief minister twice – from December 1970 to June 1971 and from December 1977 to April 1979.

Popularly known as ‘Jan Nayak’ or people’s hero, Thakur was also a votary of Hindi language, and as the education minister of Bihar, he removed English as the compulsory subject for the matriculation curriculum.

During his college days, he joined All India Students Federation (AISF) as a student activist. He left his college to take part in Mahatma Gandhi’s Quit India movement against the Britishers in 1942.

He spent several months in jail during India’s freedom movement. After independence, Thakur joined the Socialist party and was elected as an MLA for the first time in 1952 from Bihar’s Tajpur constituency.

He was jailed for leading P&T employees during the government employees strike in 1960. Ten years later, he sat on an indefinite hunger strike for the rights of labourers.

Before becoming the first non-Congress socialist chief minister of Bihar, Thakur also served as the deputy CM of the state.

In 1978, he implemented reservation for backward classes in government jobs and became one of the biggest champion of poor and marginalised people.

Thakur was said to be the mentor of former several prominent leaders like RJD supremo Lalu Yadav, Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar, and LJP leader late Ramvilas Paswan.