Who presided over the first Session of the All India Kisan Sabha?

Concept

A historical organisation’s inaugural session is identified by the person formally chosen to preside over that founding meeting. This role should be distinguished from other leaders who supported the movement or held offices in related political organisations.

Application

The All India Kisan Sabha was formed at Lucknow in April 1936. Historical accounts record Swami Sahajanand Saraswati as the president of that first meeting and as the organisation’s first president.

Contrast

• Narendra Dev presided over the fourth AIKS conference at Gaya in 1939; that later conference role is distinct from the organisation’s founding-session presidency.

• Sahajanand Saraswati led the Bihar Provincial Kisan Sabha and presided over the all-India body’s founding meeting at Lucknow.

• Sampurnanand’s documented work centred on Congress politics and education in the United Provinces, and AIKS conference chronologies do not assign him a presiding session.

• “More than one of the above” would require multiple listed people to share the same presidency; the founding record identifies one president.

• “None of the above” would require the president to be absent from the list; the founding record includes the office-holder among the named choices.

Cross-check

This agrees with his earlier leadership of the Bihar Provincial Kisan Sabha and with accounts of the 1936 Lucknow session.

Result

Therefore, the presiding leader was Sahajanand Saraswati.