KR Narayanan: K R Narayanan, a former president of India who brought a deeper meaning to the largely ceremonial position when he rose from the bottom of the country's ancient caste system to become the first "untouchable" to hold the office, has died. He was 85.
Narayanan, who had been suffering from pneumonia and kidney failure, died at an army hospital in New Delhi.
His elevation to the presidency in 1997 fulfilled the vision of Mohandas K Gandhi, the founder of independent India, prime minister Manmohan Singh said. Gandhi believed the election of an "untouchable" as president would mark a symbolic end of the degradation of Hindus on the lowest rung of the 3,000-year-old caste system.
Commonly used a century ago, the term "untouchables" has been replaced by the more politically correct Dalits, which literally translates as "broken people". It applies to nearly a quarter of India's billion-plus population.
At his inaugural, Narayanan condemned "caste-ism"' and said the election of "someone who has sprung from the grassroots of our society . . . is symbolic of the fact that the concerns of the common man have now moved to centre stage".
During his presidency, which ended in 2002, the soft-spoken Narayanan showed he was not afraid to take a stand. He broke from precedent twice to defy the government that appointed him, refusing to sack opposition-ruled state administrations. (The prime minister is the head of India's government.)
"Coming from a very poor family, coming up only with the dint of his own effort and labour, he proved . . . that neither religion nor caste can come in the way of a person who is able to exert himself intellectually," former prime minister IK Gujral said.
Kocheril Raman Narayanan was born in 1920 in a thatched hut in a village in the southern state of Kerala, the fourth of seven children of a traditional village healer. Barred from elementary school because his family could not afford to pay for it, he attended by standing outside the classroom window.
A fund for oppressed Indians set up by Gandhi helped Narayanan attend a local college, and a grant from a local industrialist allowed him to graduate from the London School of Economics.
After working as an English teacher and journalist, he returned to India in 1948 with a letter of introduction from a prominent economist to prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru.
As India's 10th president, Narayanan avoided criticising caste discrimination and emphasised the "slow but steady movement of the lower classes". Discrimination based on social caste was barred in 1950.
Narayanan is survived by his wife, Usha, and daughters Amrita and Chitra, who is India's ambassador to Turkey.
Kocheril Raman Narayanan: born October 27th, 1920; died November 9th, 2005