Morarji Desai; India’s Former Prime Minister

Former Indian Prime Minister Morarji Desai, widely known both for his statesmanship and his curious health regimen, has died. He was 99.

Desai, who had been hospitalized for weeks and recently underwent brain surgery, died Monday at Jaslok Hospital in Bombay, two news agencies reported.

Desai, India’s prime minister from 1977 to 1979, was the country’s first leader not to be a member of the Congress Party. He had been a loyal follower of Congress--the engine that had powered India to sovereignty--until he joined party dissenters against Indira Gandhi’s rule in 1969.

After India won nationhood in 1947, Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru gave Desai several important Cabinet posts.

When Nehru died in 1964, Desai was a strong contender for the party’s leadership. But he was edged out by power brokers who chose the unknown Lal Bahadur Shastri and, when Shastri died in office, picked Mrs. Gandhi, Nehru’s daughter.

Desai served as deputy prime minister and finance minister for three years under Mrs. Gandhi until the Congress Party split. He joined with other anti-Gandhi forces to form the Janata (People’s) Party.

In 1975, Mrs. Gandhi imposed emergency rule that lasted 21 months, imprisoning Desai and other political enemies without trial. When the emergency was lifted and elections were held in 1977, the Janata Party was swept into power at the head of a motley coalition united only in their enmity for Mrs. Gandhi.

Political defections inspired by Congress and factional squabbles within the Janata Party toppled his government 2 1/2 years later.

Along with his political accomplishments, he was noted for the personal habits to which he attributed his longevity: He became celibate at age 32 after the birth of his fourth child, and he kept a regular diet of fruit, milk and his own urine.