Lal Bahadur Shastri, born in 1904, succeeded
Jawaharlal Nehru as Prime Minister of India in 1964. Though eclipsed by other stalwarts of the Congress party, Shastri emerged as the consensus candidate in the midst of party warfare. Shasthri remained the prime minister of India from 1964 to 1966. Lal Bahadur Shasthri was a distinguished freedom fighter as well as honest politician.
The famous slogan 'Jai Jawan, Jai Kisan' (honor the soldier, honor the farmer) was proposed by him. Patriotic leaders such as Mahatma Gandhi and Bal Gangadhar Tilak were his companions.
It was during his period that the Indo-Pakistan war broke out. To ensure peace and harmony between two nations, Shastri signed the treaty of friendship with Ayub Khan, the then prime minister of Pakistan, on January 4, 1966.
In January 1966, he was invited by the Russian Premier, Aleksei Kosygin, to Tashkent for a summit with General Muhammad Ayub Khan, the President of Pakistan and commander of the nation's armed forces. There, Shastri suffered a fatal heart attack, and passed away.
