Post Defence Ministership
The NDA Government lost power to the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance (UPA) in the 2004 general elections. Later, political observers alleged that Fernandes was locked in a bitter party rivalry with his one-time friend, Samata Party co-founder, Nitish Kumar. In the 2009 general elections, he contested from Muzaffarpur as an independent candidate after being denied a ticket by the Janata Dal (United) on health grounds, but lost the election. On 30 July 2009, Fernandes filed his nomination as an independent candidate for the mid-term poll being held for the Rajya Sabha seat vacated by Janata Dal (United) president Sharad Yadav. The Janata Dal (United) did not field any candidate against him, which led to his being elected unopposed. He was sworn in on 4 August 2009.
Read more about this topic: George Fernandes
Famous quotes containing the words post and/or defence:
“A demanding stranger arrived one morning in a small town and asked a boy on the sidewalk of the main street, “Boy, where’s the post office?”
“I don’t know.”
“Well, then, where might the drugstore be?”
“I don’t know.”
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“I don’t know.”
“Say, boy, you don’t know much, do you?”
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—William Harmon (b. 1938)
“Education must have two foundations—morality as a support for virtue, prudence as a defence for self against the vices of others. By letting the balance incline to the side of morality, you only make dupes or martyrs; by letting it incline to the other, you make calculating egoists.”
—Sébastien-Roch Nicolas De Chamfort (1741–1794)