Chinmaya IAS Academy – Current Affairs Chinmaya IAS Academy – Current Affairs
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The 2019 Rajya Sabha calendar, launched by its Chairman and Vice-President M. Venkaiah Naidu, is a treasure trove of the Upper House’s history. For instance, it says that over 34 of its 66 years of existence, including the first 17 years, the Rajya Sabha did not have a Leader of the Opposition. It was only in December 1969 that the position was first occupied by Shyam Nandan Mishra of the Congress. The office was formally created by an Act in 1977. The longest serving Leader of the Opposition is former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, with a tenure of six years. He has the distinction of being the longest-serving Leader of the House, with a stint of 10 years. The calendar, Mr. Naidu said, is a chronicle of political changes in the Rajya Sabha since 1952. Featured in the calendar are 65 leaders, including 13 Chairmen, 12 Deputy Chairpersons (three women among them), 26 Leaders of the House and 14 Leaders of the Opposition, since the inception of the Rajya Sabha in 1952. Six Rajya Sabha Chairmen who have gone onto become the President. The last to make this transition was K.R. Narayanan, and Pratibha Patil is the first Deputy Chairperson of the house to occupy the Rashtrapati Bhavan. Lal Bahadur Shashtri, India’s second Prime Minister, was the first Leader of the House to lead the executive.
