Nitish, Pawar, Deve Gowda on Upadhyay centenary panel

Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, former Prime Minister H.D. Deve Gowda and former Union Minister Sharad Pawar have been included in the 149-member committee being formed to commemorate the birth centenary of Jan Sangh ideologue Deendayal Upadhyay.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday approved the constitution of two committees for the commemoration of the birth centenary of Upadhyay, a Prime Minister's Office release said.

Modi will chair the 149-member National Committee, of which Kumar and Pawar are members, while Home Minister Rajnath Singh will chair a 23-member Executive Committee.

The members of the National Committee include former Prime Ministers Atal Bihari Vajpayee and H.D. Deve Gowda; Union Ministers Rajnath Singh, Sushma Swaraj, Arun Jaitley and Manohar Parrikar; senior BJP leader L.K. Advani and BJP President Amit Shah.

Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, former Union Minister Sharad Pawar, Rajya Sabha member Sharad Yadav, yoga guru Baba Ramdev, lyricist Prasoon Joshi, film director Chandraprakash Dwivedi, former hockey player Dhanraj Pillai, former badminton player Pullela Gopichand, and founder of Sulabh International Bindeshwar Pathak have also been included in the National Committee.

Union Minister of State Mahesh Sharma is the Convenor of the committee.

The other members of the committee are former Chief Justice of India R.C. Lahoti, retired Air Chief Marshal S. Krishnaswami, constitutional expert Subhash Kashyap, and environmentalist C.P. Bhatt.

Besides, the committee includes several Governors, Chief Ministers, scientists, journalists, academicians, social workers and spiritual leaders, the PMO release said.

--IANS

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