Farmer, policeman, poet…Pawan Chamling has worn many hats over 69 springs. But for Sikkim, and the rest of India, it’s his achievements as a politician that makes him a superstar—in the fickle world of Indian politics, Chamling has been a CM for 25 years without a break, the longest ever. And he looks good to win another term as Sikkim voted on April 11 to elect a new assembly, along with two Lok Sabha members.
It has indeed been a long journey for Chamling since he fell out with his mentor Nar Bahadur Bhandari in 1993, and floated the Sikkim Democratic Front (SDF). As the lone member in the 32-member assembly, Chamling had staged the now famous protest on the floor of House by lighting a candle, symbolically “searching for democracy” in the “autocratic regime” of Bhandari.
The protest endeared Chamling to the people of the newly-minted state of Sikkim—which had merged into the Indian Union in 1975—and a groundswell of support propelled the farmer-poet to the “throne”; since dethroning Bhandari in...
