1979 in India explained

Events in the year 1979 in the Republic of India.

Incumbents

• President of India – Neelam Sanjiva Reddy
• Prime Minister of India – Morarji Desai until 28 July, Charan Singh
• Vice President of India – B.D. Jatti until 30 August; Mohammad Hidayatullah
• Chief Justice of India – Yeshwant Vishnu Chandrachud

Governors

• • • Andhra Pradesh – K.C. Abraham Assam – L. P. Singh Bihar –
      • • • until 31 January: Jagannath Kaushal 31 January-20 September: K.B.N. Singh starting 20 September: Akhlaqur Rahman Kidwai
  • Gujarat – Sharda Mukherjee Haryana – Harcharan Singh Brar (until 9 December), Surjit Singh Sandhawalia (starting 10 December)
    • • • • • • • • Himachal Pradesh – Amin ud-din Ahmad Khan Jammu and Kashmir – L. K. Jha Karnataka – Govind Narain Kerala – Jothi Venkatachalam Madhya Pradesh – C. M. Poonacha Maharashtra – Sri Sadiq Ali Manipur – L.P. Singh Meghalaya – L.P. Singh Nagaland – L.P. Singh Odisha – Bhagwat Dayal Sharma
• Punjab – Jaisukh Lal Hathi
• Rajasthan – Raghukul Tilak
  • Sikkim – B. B. Lal Tamil Nadu – Prabhudas Patwari
    • Tripura – L. P. Singh Uttar Pradesh – Ganpatrao Devji Tapase West Bengal – Anthony Lancelot Dias (until 6 November), Tribhuvana Narayana Singh (starting 6 November)

Events

• National income - 1,235,622 million
• 1 January – President of India makes official the decision to set up the Mandal Commission
• 22 January – 12 Iranian students who claimed to be members of the Iranian Islamic Students Association laid siege to the Iranian consulate at Churchgate.^[1]
• 31 January – The police under direction of Jyoti Basu, Chief Minister of Communist Party of India (Marxist) -led government of West Bengal, surrounds and opens fire on unarmed refugee settlement of Morichjhapi island in Sunderbans, West Bengal. (Marichjhapi massacre)
• 13 May – a tropical cyclone hits Coastal Andhra and destroys 7 lakh homes and affects 40 lakh people.^[2]
• 1 June – Vizianagaram district is formed in Andhra Pradesh.
• 27 June – CISF conflict at Bokaro
• 2 July – Athi Varadhar came out after 40 years in Varadharaja Perumal Temple, Kanchipuram.^[3]
• 3 July – A cargo ship named MV Kairali owned by Kerala Shipping Corporation went missing on its journey carrying iron ore from Mormugao to Rostock.
• 28 July – Charan Singh of Bharatiya Lok Dal, coalition partner of Janata Party became Prime Minister of India with outside support of Congress (I).^[4]
• 11 August – Morvi dam burst, the worst flood disaster in independent India, happens in Gujarat, killing 1500-15000 people
• 12 October – C. H. Mohammed Koya sworn in as Chief minister of Kerala. He is the first Muslim League leader to become Chief Minister of an Indian state.^[5]
• 10 December – Mother Teresa was awarded Nobel Peace Prize at Oslo.^[6]

Births

January to June

• 1 January Vidya Balan, actress.
• 3 January Gul Panag, actress
• 7 January – Bipasha Basu, actress and model.
• 16 January – Climax Lawrence, footballer
• 2 February – Shamita Shetty, actress
• 26 February – Premgi Amaren, playback singer, composer, songwriter, actor and comedian.
• 28 February – Srikanth
• 24 March – Emraan Hashmi, actor.
• 8 April – Amit Trivedi, music director, singer, film scorer
• 28 April – Sharman Joshi, actor
• 23 May – Divya Palat, actress.
• 10 June – D. K. Ravi, late IAS officer. (d. 2015)
• 12 June – Tottempudi Gopichand, actor.
• 18 June – A. L. Vijay, film director.
• 20 June – Renedy Singh, footballer.

July to December

• 19 July Malavika, actress.
• 27 July Vamshi Paidipally, film director.
• 29 July Hard Kaur, rapper
• 2 August Devi Sri Prasad, music composer and singer.
• 10 August Shabir Ahluwalia, television actor
• 31 August – Yuvan Shankar Raja, film composer and singer.
• 1 September – Aamir Ali, actor
• 11 September – Tulip Joshi, model and actress.

• 14 September – Kamya Panjabi, actress.
• 18 September – Vinay Rai, actor.
• 27 September – B Chandrakala, Indian Administrative Service officer.
• 7 October – Narain, actor.
• 23 October – Prabhas, actor.
• 4 November – Lazarus Barla, field hockey player.
• 7 November – Raima Sen, actress
• 18 November – Neeti Mohan, singer
• 20 November Shalini, actress and child artist.
• 3 December Konkona Sen Sharma, actress
• 14 December – Samit Basu, novelist.
• 30 December Kausalya, actress.

Deaths

• 9 February – Banaphool, author, playwright and poet (b. 1899).
• 19 May – Hazari Prasad Dwivedi, novelist, literary historian, essayist, critic and scholar (b. 1907).
• 18 August – Vasantrao Phulsing Naik, Politician, Former Chief Minister of Maharashtra (b. 1913)
• 3 December – Dhyan Chand, field hockey player (b. 1905).
• 8 October – Jayaprakash Narayan, political activist (b. 1902)
• 20 October – D.K.Sapru, character actor. (b. 1916).

See also

• List of Bollywood films of 1979

Notes and References

1. Web site: 30 November 2008. Joeanna. Rebello. Bombay's Iran hostage crisis of 1979. 2022-01-12. The Times of India. en.
2. Web site: 15 June 1979. Amarnath K.. Menon. Coastal Andhra Pradesh gets battered by cyclone, second time in less than 18 months. 2022-01-12. India Today. en.
3. News: Narasimhan. T.a. 2019-06-27. Retrieval of Kanchi Athivaradar: a deity's tryst with history. en-IN. The Hindu. 2022-01-12. 0971-751X.
4. News: 2019-12-23. Chaudhary Charan Singh – prime minister for 23 days and champion of India's farmers. en-US. ThePrint. 2022-01-12.
5. Web site: 2019-11-29. Forty Years Ago, November 29, 1979: Kerala drama. 2022-01-12. The Indian Express. en.
6. Web site: The Nobel Peace Prize 1979. 2022-01-12. NobelPrize.org. en-US.