The ‘whip’ issued by S. Nijalingappa during the 1969 Presidential election was about asking all Congress MPs and MLAs -
Answer & explanation
Correct answer: option 1
The correct answer is Option (1) → to vote in favour of Sanjeeva Reddy.
Option (1) to vote in favour of Sanjeeva Reddy. — Correct. In 1969 the Congress President S. Nijalingappa issued a ‘whip’ asking all Congress MPs and MLAs to vote in favour of Sanjeeva Reddy, the official candidate of the party.
Option (2) to vote in favour of V.V. Giri. — Incorrect. V.V. Giri was the independent candidate whom the Prime Minister silently supported; he won the election.
Option (3) to vote the way they want. — Incorrect. This was what the Prime Minister’s call for a ‘conscience vote’ meant: MPs and MLAs free to vote the way they want, the opposite of the whip.
Option (4) to abstain from voting. — Incorrect. The whip asked them to vote, for the party’s candidate.
NCERT (2025-26): “Presidential election, 1969 … Congress had seen differences of this kind in the past. But this time both the parties wanted a showdown which took place during the Presidential elections. The then Congress President S. Nijalingappa issued a ‘whip’ asking all the Congress MPs and MLAs to vote in favour of Sanjeeva Reddy, the official candidate of the party. Supporters of Indira Gandhi requisitioned a special meeting of the AICC (that is why this faction came to be known as ‘requisitionists’) but this was refused.…” |