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Telugu Desam Party

The Telugu Desam Party (TDP; lit. 'Party of the Telugu Land') is an Indian Telugu regional political party with influence in the states of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana. It was founded by the former chief minister of Andhra Pradesh N. T. Rama Rao (N.T.R.) on 29 March 1982 and has focused on supporting Telugu speakers. The party has won a five-time majority in the Andhra Pradesh Legislative Assembly and has emerged as the most successful political outfit in the state's history. It is currently the ruling party in the Andhra Pradesh Legislative Assembly.

From 1 September 1995, the TDP was led by N. T. Rama Rao's son-in-law and the former chief minister of Andhra Pradesh Nara Chandra Babu Naidu as national president of the party. The headquarters of the party is called N. T. R. Bhavan, which is located at Mangalagiri, Andhra Pradesh.

Ideology and symbolism
The Telugu Desam Party follows a pro-Telugu ideology. It was founded as an alternative to the Congress hegemony, by emphasizing Telugu regional pride and serving as the party for farmers, backward castes and middle-class people. Since the 1990s, it has followed an economically liberal policy that has been seen as pro-business and pro-development.

The TDP uses yellow as the background colour for its flag, with a hut, wheel and plough symbol in the foreground. The party's electoral symbol is bicycle.

Health insurance scheme
Since 2014, every active member has been eligible for a life insurance policy of ₹2 lakh to be paid to their family in cases of death or permanent total disability, such as the loss of two limbs of eyes, due to accidents, with additional payouts of ₹5,000 per child (up to two) for educational costs. Active members are also reimbursed for up to ₹50,000 to cover hospital treatment from such accidents.

N. T. Rama Rao era (1983–1995)

As a film actor, Nandamuri Taraka Rama Rao (NTR) is a well-known name not only to the Telugu people but across the country. On 18 November 1977, near Diviseema in Krishna district of Andhra Pradesh, the sea became turbulent and the Pralaya cyclone that crossed the coast caused great destruction to the villages. Thousands of people lost their lives in Horugali and Rakasi waves. The rotting bodies were mass cremated. Officially 14,204 people and unofficially about 50,000 lost their lives in the devastation caused by this typhoon. About 20 thousand acres of crops were damaged. Apart from this, property damage is also estimated to be in crores. People still get excited when they remember that Diviseema was flooded. Film actor NTR, who was shocked by the situation at that time, took the support of the entire film industry by saying that he should stand by the people of Divisea. NTR came to streets and begged everyone to help the Diviseema people. The money donated by people was used to rehabilitate the people of Diviseema.

TDP party was founded thinking that we should stand by the people of the state who are struggling with many such problems and put a political party to stand by the people. The party was formed on 29 March 1982 and contested the 1983 elections. The people of Andhra Pradesh, who were fed up with the Congress government which had been ruling for 36 years, gave a great victory to the TDP party in the 1983 elections. On 9 January 1983, NTR was sworn in as the 7th chief minister of Andhra Pradesh.

On 16 August 1984, when NTR went to America for the operation, Nadendla Bhaskara Rao, one of the MLAs of the TDP party, took the oath of office with the Governor along with his MLAs as the Chief Minister. On 16 September 1984, NTR along with his MLAs went to Delhi and held a march and dharna against the then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi. Then NTR was once again sworn in as the chief minister.

Telangana Faction (2014–present)
After the formation of Telangana, TDP, in alliance with Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), fought the 2014 Legislative Assembly election. TDP won 15 seats in the newly formed Telangana Legislative Assembly. TDP also won a Lok Sabha seat from Malkajgiri Lok Sabha constituency in the simultaneously held 2014 Indian General Election.

In the 2016 Hyderabad civic polls, TDP won one Councillor seat out of 150 seats. In the 2018 Telangana Legislative Assembly election, TDP won two seats in the 119-member state Assembly, both the seats in Khammam district. It had contested the 2018 assembly elections in an alliance with Indian National Congress and other parties under the Praja Kutami.

After the bifurcation, the party created two separate state units for both Telugu states. L. Ramana was appointed as the first president of the Telangana unit of TDP in 2015 and served till 19 July 2021. In July 2021, Telangana TDP appointed Bakkani Narasimhulu as the president.

In November 2022, Kasani Gnaneshwar Mudiraj, a former MLC and BC leader, was appointed as the president of Telangana TDP by N. Chandrababu Naidu. Kasani, who served as the MLC from undivided Andhra Pradesh, has served as the national president of Mudiraj Mahasabha and had a good hold in the BC community. Under his leadership, the party sees revival in the state and has started actively participating in various public gatherings and rallies in Telangana.

However, Mudiraj resigned as Telangana TDP president and joined BRS on 30 October 2023, after TDP supremo N. Chandrababu Naidu announced that the party would not contest the Telangana polls. The party's Telangana unit has been left leaderless since then. The party also announced it would also not contest seats in the 2024 Indian General Election in Telangana, but would remain part of the NDA.

Activities
On 21 December 2022, the party organized a large public gathering in Khammam district of Telangana to re-energize the party cadre. It was attended by TDP chief N Chandrababu Naidu and TTDP president Kasani Gnaneshwar Mudiraj. A huge crowd attended the gathering held at the Sardar Patel Stadium in Khammam. While addressing the gathering, Chandrababu Naidu appealed to those who quit the party to join other political parties to return to regain the party's past glory. After 2018, it was the first time that TDP organized a show of strength in Telangana.

On 27 April 2024, Gedela Srinubabu was appointed as TDP state general secretary and former MLA Kondapalli Appala Naidu as TDP's parliamentary wing coordinator. Both campaigned for job opportunities for youngsters by supporting the National Democratic Alliance candidates in the 2024 Indian general election.

Lok Sabha electoral performance
The Telugu Desam Party has had a significant presence in the Lok Sabha elections since its formation in 1982. In its first election in 1984, the party made a debut by winning 30 out of 42 seats in Andhra Pradesh. Over the years, TDP's performance in the Lok Sabha elections has fluctuated. In the 1989 elections, the party's influence slightly waned but it remained a key player in the state's politics.

N. T. Rama Rao served as the chairperson of the National Front, a coalition of non-Congress parties in the late 1980s. The TDP saw a resurgence in the 1996 and 1999 elections, forming alliances with national parties. N. Chandrababu Naidu played a crucial role as the convenor of the United Front, a coalition of non-BJP and non-Congress parties in the mid-1990s.

During the late 1990s, TDP leader G. M. C. Balayogi served as the Speaker of the Lok Sabha from 1998 to 2002. The party played a crucial role in supporting the Janata Dal coalition government and was instrumental in the formation of the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government with Atal Bihari Vajpayee as Prime Minister. The party's alliance with the BJP was pivotal in securing the necessary majority for the NDA.

The TDP's fortunes declined in the 2004 and 2009 elections, but it improved it's seat count in 2014, winning 16 seats in alliance as part of the NDA. However, in the 2019 elections, TDP faced a major setback, winning only 3 seats amidst strong competition from other parties in the state. After the bifurcation of Andhra Pradesh in 2014, the Lok Sabha seats were divided between the newly formed state of Telangana and Andhra Pradesh, leaving behind 25 seats in Andhra Pradesh and 17 seats in Telangana. In the recent 2024 election, the party, part of the NDA, managed to win 16 seats, playing a key role in the formation of the Third Modi ministry.

title: Telugu Desam Party


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Democratic Party (Andorra)

The Democratic Party (Partit Demòcrata, PD) was a Christian-democratic political party in Andorra. Its final election was the 2001 Andorran parliamentary election.

History
The party was established in the run-up to the 2001 elections when the National Democratic Group split in two, with the Social Democratic Party also being formed. The new party received 22.7% of the vote and won five seats.

Thereafter, the party did not contest any further elections. Their former candidates Enric Tarrado Vives and Julià Call i Raig joined the Andorran Democratic Centre–Century 21 coalition while Patrick Garcia Ricart led the Democratic Renewal list.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Democratic Party (Andorra)


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List of Idaho state prisons

This is a list of state prisons in Idaho. There are no federal prisons in Idaho and this list does not include county jails located in the state of Idaho.

The state contracted with the Corrections Corporation of America to operate the Idaho Correctional Institution - Orofino until the state took back operations in January 2014. CCA also operates the largest prison in the state, the Idaho Correctional Center, although Idaho Governor Butch Otter announced in January 2014 that its contract would not be renewed.

Idaho also exports state prisoners to CCA's Kit Carson Correctional Center in Colorado.

Community Work Centers

 * East Boise Community Work Center
 * Idaho Falls Community Work Center
 * Nampa Community Work Center
 * South Idaho Correctional Institution Community Work Center

Prisons

 * Correctional Alternative Placement Program (432 inmate capacity)
 * Idaho State Correctional Center
 * Idaho Maximum Security Institution (402 inmate capacity)
 * Idaho State Correctional Institution
 * South Boise Women's Correctional Center (284 inmate capacity)
 * South Idaho Correctional Institution (656 inmate capacity)
 * North Idaho Correctional Institution (414 inmate capacity)
 * Idaho Correctional Institution - Orofino (541 inmate capacity)
 * Pocatello Women's Correctional Cent (289 inmate capacity)
 * St. Anthony Work Camp (240 inmate capacity)

title: List of Idaho state prisons


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Liberals of Andorra

The Liberals of Andorra (Liberals d'Andorra, LA) is a conservative-liberal political party in Andorra. It is a member of the Liberal International and the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe.

History
The party was established as the Liberal Union (Unió Liberal) in 1992 by Marc Forné Molné. In the 1993 elections it received 22% of the vote and won five seats, making it the second largest party in the General Council. Although the party was in opposition after Òscar Ribas Reig formed a progressive coalition government, Ribas was forced out of office after losing a vote of no confidence and Forné became Prime Minister on 7 December 1994.

After two votes of no confidence, Forné called early elections in 1997. In the run-up to the elections the Union formed alliances with several local parties, including the Liberal Union–Liberal Group of Encamp, the Liberal Opinion Group (GOL), Unity and Renewal (UiR) and the Lauredian Union (UL), with the local parties contesting only at the parish level. The Union won 16 seats of which GOL took four, UL two and the UiR two, with Forné remaining Prime Minister.

Shortly before the 2001 elections the party was renamed the Liberal Party of Andorra (Partit Liberal d'Andorra) It won 46.1% of the popular vote and 15 seats, with Forné again remaining Prime Minister. In the 2005 elections the party lost another seat, but was still able to form a government, this time led by Albert Pintat. Pintat resigned the leadership, which passed to Joan Gabriel, before the 2009 elections.

In the elections the party was part of the Reformist Coalition alongside the Lauredian Union, Century 21, and two other political parties. The Coalition won 11 seats, whilst the Social Democrats won 14 seats and gained control of the government.

In the run up to the 2011 parliamentary election, the Liberal Party and the other members of the Reformist Coalition gave support to the Democrats for Andorra (DA). The new party chose Antoni Martí as leader and won the election on 3 April 2011 a landslide with 20 of the General Council's 28 seats.

Half way through the first term in office of Democrats for Andorra, a group of party activists started to actively work in order to run again separately in the 2015 elections. They presented their new name, Liberals of Andorra, and they announced their intention to stand candidates in the next parliamentary election.

In the 2015 parliamentary election held on 1 March 2015, the Liberal Party received 27.7% of the vote and 8 seats in the General Council.

Notable members

 * Marc Forné Molné
 * Juli Minoves
 * Jordi Gallardo
 * Ferran Costa Marimon
 * Judith Pallarés i Cortés
 * Emili Prats Grau

title: Liberals of Andorra


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Lauredian Union

The Lauredian Union (Unió Laurediana, UL) is a localist conservative political party in Sant Julià de Lòria, Andorra.

History
The party first contested national elections in 1997, when it was one of several local parties to form an alliance with the Liberal Union in the parliamentary elections that year. The UL failed to win a seat, but in the 2001 elections won two seats. The party did not contest the 2005 elections,

For the 2009 elections the party was part of the Reformist Coalition, which won 11 of the 28 seats. In the 2011 elections the party won two seats, supporting Democrats for Andorra. In the 2015 elections, the party returned to the Liberal camp but soon formed a 'third way' coalition alongside the Third Way party and several Independents for the 2019 elections. The coalition received 1,853 votes and won four seats. The party did not contest the 2023 elections.

title: Lauredian Union


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Social Democratic Party (Andorra)

The Social Democratic Party (Partit Socialdemòcrata, PS) is a social-democratic political party in Andorra.

History
The party was established in the run-up to the March 2001 parliamentary elections when the National Democratic Group split in two, with the Democratic Party also being formed. The new party received 28.7% of the vote and won six seats.

In the buildup to the April 2005 parliamentary elections the party formed an alliance named L'Alternativa with the Parochial Union of Independents Group (GUPI) and Democratic Renewal to contest parish-level seats. The party won six seats at the national level, whilst the alliance won six seats at the parish level. With a total of twelve seats, the party remained in opposition.

The April 2009 parliamentary elections saw the party renew its alliance with GUPI and some independents. The alliance won 14 of the 28 seats and PS leader Jaume Bartumeu became Prime Minister, with the Andorra for Change party supporting the government.

In 2010 the APC withdrew its support for the PS-led government, and in 2011 the General Council rejected the government's budget, forcing early elections. The April 2011 parliamentary elections saw the PS receive 34.8% of the vote, reducing its representation to six seats.

In the March 2015 parliamentary elections, the party ran in alliance with the Greens of Andorra, Citizens' Initiative and independent candidates. The alliance's vote share fell to 24%, winning only three seats.

Members
Some notable past and present members are:
 * Jaume Bartumeu, Prime Minister from 2009 to 2011
 * Carles Blasi Vidal
 * Josep Dallerès Codina
 * Jordi Font Mariné
 * Pere López Agràs, Prime Minister 2011
 * Maria Pilar Riba Font, sat on General Council from 2005 to 2011

title: Social Democratic Party (Andorra)


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Antigua and Barbuda Labour Party

The Antigua and Barbuda Labour Party (ABLP) is a political party in Antigua and Barbuda. The current leader of the party is Gaston Browne, who serves as the Prime Minister of Antigua and Barbuda. The party had previously been led by Lester Bird, who was chairman of the party since 1971, and was Prime Minister and political leader in 1994.

History
The party was founded in 1946, during the first national elections, as the Antigua Labour Party (ALP). Its founders included Vere Bird, father of Lester. The ABLP later came to be seen as a political arm of the Bird family. With the exception of five years in the 1970s, the ABLP ruled Antigua and Barbuda for over four decades leading up to 2004. It was in the opposition from 2004 to 2014, and then returned to power in the 2014 general election.

2004 defeat
Two major events precipitated the ABLP's first defeat in 28 years in the 2004 elections. First, an Electoral Commission was introduced after the 1999 election. According to international observers, the 1999 election was rife with irregularities. The report from an observer group from across the Commonwealth concluded that "voting rolls appeared to be inflated" and recommended "the establishment of an independent electoral commission to improve the voter registration process." Second, in 2002 there was a scandal over medical benefits, in which the government failed to contribute EC$120 million to cover recipients' medical expenses.

The opposition United Progressive Party campaigned on an anti-corruption platform they called "Government in the Sunshine." The ABLP lost its majority in the general election held on 24 March 2004. It received 41.8% of the popular vote, but won only four out of 17 seats. ABLP Prime Minister and political leader Bird was also defeated in his constituency.

Leadership crisis and transition
In early 2009, the Antigua and Barbuda Labour Party faced an internal leadership crisis. There was speculation that even if the ABLP won the 2009 election, Bird's leadership would be challenged. He announced that, if the ABLP failed to win the forthcoming 2009 general election, he would step down. Nevertheless, despite not winning, he remained the ABLP's leader until 2012, when he was defeated by Gaston Browne in a leadership challenge.

2014 elections and return to government
The Antigua and Barbuda Labour Party won 14 of the 17 seats in the Legislature in the 2014 general elections, forming a majority government with Browne as Prime Minister. They won 15 seats in the 2018 general elections and thereby retained power.

Ideology
Despite having been founded as a partisan expression of the labor movement in Antigua and Barbuda and having labor and social democratic origins, the party is generally considered as an economically liberal and fiscally conservative party, defender of a market-oriented economy and tax reductions, in particular rejecting the imposition of income tax. However, the party's policy of maintaining the public sector as the largest employer in Antigua and Barbuda during its successive governments (representing up to 40% of the workforce) has also led to the party being considered a guarantor of a "paternalistic conservatism" or "right-wing socialism." After the death of Elizabeth II of Antigua and Barbuda, the party went on to officially support the conversion of Antigua and Barbuda into a republic.

title: Antigua and Barbuda Labour Party


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United Progressive Party (Antigua and Barbuda)

The United Progressive Party is a political party in Antigua and Barbuda. It was previously led by Baldwin Spencer, it was the governing party from 2004 to 2014. It has been in opposition since the 2014 election. Jamale Pringle was elected leader of the party on 21 April 2024, after the resignation of Harold Lovell on 20 January 2023.

Foundation
The United Progressive Party was formed in 1992 through a merger of three parties, namely the Antigua Caribbean Liberation Movement, the Progressive Labour Movement and the United National Democratic Party. Each party was in opposition to the Antigua Labour Party government. Baldwin Spencer was chosen to lead the new party.


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Rick James

James Ambrose Johnson Jr. (February 1, 1948 – August 6, 2004), better known by his stage name Rick James, was an American singer, musician, producer, and songwriter. Born and raised in Buffalo, New York, James began his musical career in his teenage years. He was in various bands before entering the U.S. Navy Reserve to avoid being drafted into the army. In 1964, James moved to Toronto, Canada, where he formed the rock band The Mynah Birds, who eventually signed a recording deal with Motown Records in 1966. James's career with the group halted after military authorities discovered his whereabouts and eventually convicted him of desertion related charges. He served several months in jail. After being released, James moved to California, where he started a variety of rock and funk groups in the late 1960s and early 1970s.

After forming the locally popular Stone City Band in his hometown of Buffalo in 1977, James finally found success as a recording artist after signing with Motown's Gordy Records, releasing the album Come Get It! in 1978 which produced the hits "You & I" and "Mary Jane". In 1981, James released his most successful album, Street Songs, which included career-defining hits such as "Give It to Me Baby" and "Super Freak", the latter song becoming his biggest crossover single, mixing elements of funk, disco, rock, and new wave. James was also known for his soulful ballads such as "Fire & Desire" and "Ebony Eyes". He also had a successful career as a songwriter and producer for other artists including Teena Marie, the Mary Jane Girls, the Temptations, Eddie Murphy, and Smokey Robinson.

James's mainstream success had peaked by the release of his album Glow in 1985 and his appearance on the popular TV show, The A-Team. His subsequent album releases failed to sell as well as their predecessors. Rapper MC Hammer sampled James's "Super Freak" for his 1990 hit, "U Can't Touch This" which won Best R&B Song at the 1991 Grammy Awards. James received his only Grammy for composing the song. By the early 1990s, James's career was hampered by his drug addiction and he was embroiled in legal issues. In 1993, he was convicted of two separate instances of kidnapping and assaulting two different women while under the influence of crack cocaine, resulting in a three-year sentence at Folsom State Prison. He was released on parole in 1996. His health problems halted his career again after he had a mild stroke during a concert in 1998, and he announced a semi-retirement.

In 2004, James's career returned to mainstream pop culture after he appeared in an episode of Chappelle's Show. The segment involved a Charlie Murphy True Hollywood Stories-style sketch that satirized James's wild lifestyle in the 1980s. This resulted in renewed interest in his music and that year he returned to perform on the road. He died later that year from heart failure at age 56.

Early life
Johnson was born on February 1, 1948, in Buffalo, New York, to Mabel (née Sims) and James Ambrose Johnson Sr. He was one of eight children. He was an altar boy and choir member at St. Bridget's Catholic Church. James's father, an autoworker, left the family when James was 10. His mother was a dancer for Katherine Dunham, and later worked as a cleaner in the day, and as a numbers-runner for the Buffalo crime family at night to earn a living.

Early career
In 1964, James fled to Toronto. Soon after his arrival three drunk men tried to attack him outside a club; a trio of other men came to his aid. One of them, Levon Helm, was at the time a member of Ronnie Hawkins' backing band. Helm invited James to their show later that night and he ended up performing onstage with the band. To evade US military authorities, James went under the assumed name "Ricky James Matthews". That same year, James formed The Mynah Birds, a band that produced a fusion of soul, folk and rock music. In 1965, the band briefly recorded for the Canadian division of Columbia Records, releasing a single, "Mynah Bird Hop"/"Mynah Bird Song". At one point, Nick St. Nicholas, later of Steppenwolf fame, was a member; by the time "Mynah Bird Hop" was recorded bassist Bruce Palmer had replaced him. James and Palmer recruited guitarists Tom Morgan and Xavier Taylor and drummer Rick Mason to form a new Mynah Birds lineup, and soon traveled to Detroit to record with Motown. Before the group began recording their first songs for the label, Morgan left, unhappy about the label's attitude toward the musicians. Neil Young eventually took his place. It was while in Detroit that James met his musical heroes, Marvin Gaye and Stevie Wonder. After meeting Wonder and telling him his name, Wonder felt the name "Ricky James Matthews" was "too long" and told James to shorten it to "Ricky James".

In 1966, a financial dispute in Toronto between James and the Mynah Birds' handler, Morley Shelman led to Motown's learning of James's fugitive status with the Navy. Hoping to prevent any scrutiny, Motown execs told Rick they would not be releasing any more of his material and convinced him to come back and work with them after straightening out his legal issues. James surrendered himself to the FBI, and, in May 1966, was sentenced by the Navy to five months' hard labor for unauthorized absence. He was not yet 19 years old. James escaped from the Brooklyn Naval Brig after only six weeks' confinement, but following another six months as a fugitive, surrendered himself a second time. With help from his mother, James found legal assistance from his cousin, future Congressman Louis Stokes, and another attorney, former Marine Captain John Bracken, who pled James's second court-martial down from a potential five years' hard labor to five months. After his release from Portsmouth Naval Prison in August 1967, James returned to Toronto and endured another detention, initially derailing resumption of his career with Mynah Bird bandmate Neil Merryweather, with whom he would later collaborate, first at Motown and then in Los Angeles.

In 1968, again working under the pseudonym Ricky Matthews, James produced and wrote songs at Motown for acts such as The Miracles, Bobby Taylor & the Vancouvers, and The Spinners. It was during this third stint at Motown that James met musician Greg Reeves. Reeves, hoping to find a better situation than the US$38 a week (US$0 in dollars) he was earning as a session bassist for Berry Gordy, joined James, looking to "hitch a lift from Neil Young's rising star," and relocated to Los Angeles.

On one of his first nights in Los Angeles, James was crashing on musician Stephen Stills' couch. When he awoke, he saw a stoned young man sitting on the floor in the lotus position. The man's wrists were bleeding so a scared James sought help. James was later formally introduced to the man who was Jim Morrison, lead singer of the Doors. After the Doors opened for Buffalo Springfield at the Whisky a Go Go, Morrison tricked James into taking acid.

In California, James initially worked as a duo with Greg Reeves, but soon after James introduced Reeves to Neil Young, it was Reeves, not James, who was hired as bassist for the newly formed rock supergroup, Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. Around this time James formed several versions of the rock band Salt'N'Pepper. James claimed that in 1969 Sebring invited him to attend a party at actress Sharon Tate’s house, but he was too hungover to get out of bed. The next morning, he discovered that Sebring had been murdered when he saw the Los Angeles Times headline "Sharon Tate, Four Others Murdered."

In 1970, James and Salt'N'Pepper member Ed Roth participated in the recording of Bruce Palmer's solo album The Cycle Is Complete. The duo also recorded as part of the group Heaven and Earth in Toronto. Heaven and Earth eventually changed their name to Great White Cane and recorded a self-titled album for the Los Angeles label Lion Records, released in 1972. James formed another band, Hot Lips, afterwards. He also briefly replaced Mendelson Joe in the Toronto blues band McKenna Mendelson Mainline. During this period, James and Mainline guitarist Mike McKenna co-wrote the song "You Make the Magic", which would later be released by The Chambers Brothers as a B-side to their single "Boogie Children."

Solo career
In 1973, James signed with A&M Records, where his first single under the name Rick James, "My Mama", was released in 1974, becoming a club hit in Europe.

In 1976, James returned to Buffalo and formed the Stone City Band. Shortly thereafter, he recorded "Get Up and Dance!", his second single to be released. In 1977, James and the Stone City Band signed a contract with Motown's Gordy Records imprint, where they began recording their first album in New York City.

In April 1978, James released his debut solo album, Come Get It!, which included the Stone City Band. The album launched the top 20 hit, "You and I", which became his first number-one R&B hit. The album also included the hit single, "Mary Jane". It eventually sold two million copies, launching James's musical career to stardom, and helping out Motown Records at a time when label fortunes had dwindled. In early 1979, James's second album, Bustin' Out of L Seven, followed the previous album's success, eventually selling a million copies. A third album, Fire It Up, was released in late 1979 going gold. Around that same period, James launched his first headlining tour, the Fire It Up Tour, and agreed to invite the then-upcoming artist, Prince, as well as singer Teena Marie, as his opening act.

Following the end of the tour in 1980, James released the ballads-heavy Garden of Love, which became his fourth gold record. In 1981, James recorded his best-selling album to date, Street Songs, which like his previous four albums, was a concept album. Street Songs featured a fusion mix of different genres, including rock and new wave, as well as James's brand of crossover funk, enabling James's own style of "punk funk". The album featured hit singles such as "Ghetto Life", the Teena Marie duet "Fire and Desire", "Give It to Me Baby", and his biggest crossover hit to date, "Super Freak", which peaked at number 16 on the Billboard Hot 100 and sold over 1 million copies. Street Songs peaked at number one R&B and number three pop and sold over 3 million copies alone in the United States. Following up that success, James released two more gold albums, 1982's Throwin' Down and 1983's Cold Blooded.

During this period, when Prince also became a success as a producer of other acts including The Time and Vanity 6, James launched the acts Process and the Doo-Rags, and the Mary Jane Girls, featuring his former background singer Joanne "JoJo" McDuffie as the lead vocalist and background performer, finding success with the latter group, due to the hits, "All Night Long", "Candy Man", and "In My House". In 1982, James produced the Temptations' Top 10 R&B hit, "Standing on the Top". In 1983, James recorded the hit duet, "Ebony Eyes", with singer Smokey Robinson, as well as a ballad "Tell Me What You Want" with an introduction by Billy Dee Williams. In 1985, James produced another hit for entertainer Eddie Murphy with the song "Party All the Time". That same year he appeared on an episode of The A-Team with Isaac Hayes. After the release of his ninth solo album, The Flag, in 1986, James signed with Warner Bros. Records, which released the album Wonderful in 1988, featuring the hit, "Loosey's Rap".

James's controversial and provocative image became troublesome sometimes. Famous for promoting the use of marijuana live in concerts during a time that simple possession could lead to a long-term prison sentence, James was often threatened by cops in various cities that he would be arrested if he smoked marijuana on stage during performances of songs such as "Fire It Up" and "Mary Jane". According to Kerry Gordy, most Motown executives erroneously thought the latter song was a "simple cute love song to a girl" not knowing the song was about marijuana.

James's overtly sexual bravado made it tough for him to be a bigger mainstream act. After the debut of the fledgling music video network MTV in August 1981, James tried to present the music video to "Super Freak" to the label, only for the channel to turn the video down. James accused the network of racism. MTV denied this, stating the real reason "Super Freak" was turned down by MTV was because they felt James's video was too vulgar for the channel. When younger artists such as Michael Jackson and Prince found fame on the channel, James accused the two singers of being "tokens" in a 1983 interview, demanding that any black artist that has a video aired on MTV take their video off the channel in protest. James's rant was cosigned by David Bowie, who argued with MTV VJ Mark Goodman about the lack of black artists being featured on the channel despite the successes of Jackson and Prince.

When MTV and BET both avoided playing the video for "Loosey's Rap" because of its graphic sexual content, James considered the networks hypocritical in light of them still playing provocative videos by artists such as Madonna.

Decline
In 1989, James's 11th album, Kickin' , was released only in the UK. By 1990, he had lost his deal with Reprise/Warner Bros., and James began struggling with personal and legal troubles. That year MC Hammer released his hit signature song, "U Can't Touch This", which sampled the prominent opening riff from "Super Freak". James and his co-writer on "Super Freak", Alonzo Miller, sued Hammer for shared songwriting credit and all three received a Grammy Award for Best R&B Song in 1991.

In 1997, James released Urban Rapsody, his first album since his release from prison on assault charges and he toured to promote the album. That year, he discussed his life and career in interviews for the VH1 musical documentary series, Behind the Music, which aired in early 1998. James's musical career slowed again after he suffered a minor stroke during a concert in 1998. He was featured on the song "Love Gravy" with Ike Turner for the 1998 soundtrack album Chef Aid: The South Park Album. James accepted an offer by Eddie Murphy to appear in the comedy-drama Life (1999).

Chappelle's Show
In early 2004, after years out of the spotlight, James participated in a comedy sketch on Chappelle's Show, in a segment called "Charlie Murphy's True Hollywood Stories." James and Murphy recounted humorous stories of their experiences together during the early 1980s. During the sketch, James's character, played by Dave Chappelle, utters the now famous catchphrase, "I'm Rick James, bitch!" The sketches were punctuated by James, explaining his past behavior with the phrase, "Cocaine is a hell of a drug!"

James enjoyed a career revival after his appearance on the show. He supported Teena Marie's tour of her album La Doña and toured with her in May 2004, playing with her at the KBLX Stone Soul Picnic, Pioneer Amphitheatre, Hayward, California. James gave his last public appearance and performance at the fourth annual BET Awards on June 29, 2004. He performed a live rendition of "Fire & Desire" with Teena Marie. James called out a girl backstage who didn't recognize him by saying, "Never mind who you thought I was, I'm Rick James, bitch!" The audience erupted and gave James a standing ovation as he walked off the stage.

Autobiography
At the time of his death, James was working on an autobiography, The Confessions of Rick James: Memoirs of a Super Freak, as well as a new album. The book was finally published in 2007 by Colossus Books and features a picture of his tombstone. Noted music journalist/biographer David Ritz, who had been employed by James to work on the book with him, later said that this version did not truly reflect how the musician wanted himself portrayed. In 2014, Ritz published his own, re-edited version, Glow: The Autobiography of Rick James.

Music publishing sale
In November 2020, James's estate confirmed the sale of a 50% stake in his publishing and masters catalog to the Hipgnosis Songs Fund, founded by Canadian music industry executive and entrepreneur Merck Mercuriadis.

Documentary
In 2021, James was the subject of a documentary film, Bitchin': The Sound and Fury of Rick James, directed by Sacha Jenkins, that was produced and broadcast by Showtime. According to Rotten Tomatoes, the documentary has 100% positive reviews from 13 professional reviewers.

Stage musical
Rick James life will be depicted in a 2024 touring stage production musical titled Super Freak: A Rick James Story produced by Ja'Caryous Johnson and James' daughter Ty James. Stokley Williams of the notable R&B band Mint Condition is set to star in the titular role.

Relationships and children
James had two children with Syville Morgan, a former singer and songwriter. They had a daughter, Tyenza, and a son, Rick Jr.

James dated actress Linda Blair from 1982 to 1984. They met after James read an interview where Blair called him sexy. He contacted her and spent time getting to know the actress during a short stint living at the Chateau Marmont in Hollywood. Early in their relationship, Blair became pregnant and had an abortion. James wrote in his memoir, "I loved Linda and it hurt me that she would choose to abort our child without even wanting to talk to me about it first. I still look back on her choice with sadness and wonder about our baby, and how having that child might have changed my life." His hit song "Cold Blooded" was about his relationship with Blair. "It was about how Linda could freeze my blood," he wrote in his memoir.

In 1989, James met 17-year-old party-goer Tanya Hijazi. The two began a romance in 1990. In 1993, the couple had their only child and James's youngest, Tazman. Following their respective releases from prison for assaulting Mary Sauger and Frances Alley, they married in 1996 and divorced in 2002.

James was very close with Teena Marie, whom he met and began collaborating with in 1979. Teena Marie stated they were engaged "for two weeks." Their professional partnership lasted into 2004, when Marie released her comeback album, La Doña, which included her and James's duet "I Got You". When James died, Teena Marie said she was "devastated by his death" and struggled with a painkiller addiction following his passing.

Friendships
James had a close friendship with Eddie Murphy, whom he met in 1981. He was also close to Murphy's older brother Charlie Murphy, who worked as a security guard for his brother. On the Chappelle show skits, Charlie Murphy recalled occasions of mistreatment by James.

James was good friends with actress Debbie Allen. Allen once invited James to a Broadway show and sent a car to pick him up; during the show, James fell asleep due to exhaustion from prior sexual activities. Afterwards, Allen confronted him in the dressing room. She pinned him down and pleaded that he was throwing his life away. "All you do is get high and have sex," she said. He promised to change his ways, but he broke his promise that same night.

James was also a friend of fellow Motown act performers Smokey Robinson and Marvin Gaye, singers James idolized as a teenager. Additionally, he befriended Gaye's second wife, Janis, and he was godfather of Gaye's daughter Nona. James's relationship with Robinson began shortly after James signed with Motown and, in 1983, the duo recorded the hit "Ebony Eyes".

James also idolized former Temptations lead singer David Ruffin and Ruffin's self-proclaimed cousin, bass vocalist Melvin Franklin, and grabbed at the chance to produce the hit "Standing on the Top" for them in 1982. Before that, the then-current lineup of the group recorded background vocals on two James-associated projects—James's Street Songs (singing "Ghetto Life" and "Super Freak") and Teena Marie's It Must Be Magic (singing on the title track). In "Super Freak", "It Must Be Magic", and "Standing on the Top", James famously shouted out, "Temptations, SING!"

Drug abuse and health problems
James's drug abuse began in his teens, first with marijuana and heroin. He began using cocaine in the late 1960s. Although James claimed that he quit cocaine when he entered prison, his autopsy showed there was a small amount of the drug in his bloodstream at the time of his death.

His drug use led to major health problems. In April 1984, he was hospitalized after being found unconscious at his house by a friend. In 1998, James suffered a stroke after a blood vessel ruptured in his neck during a concert at Mile High Stadium in Denver. Earlier that year he had hip replacement surgery to repair bone damage "from jumping around on stage and substance abuse."

Kidnapping, rape, and assault convictions
By the 1990s, James's drug abuse was public knowledge. He was heavily addicted to cocaine and later admitted to spending about $7,000 per week on drugs for five years straight. On August 2, 1991, James and his girlfriend Tanya Hijazi were arrested on charges of holding 24-year-old Frances Alley hostage for up to six days, tying her up, forcing her to perform sexual acts, and burning her legs and abdomen with the hot end of a crack cocaine pipe during a week-long cocaine binge. James faced a maximum sentence of life in prison if convicted on all charges, which included assault with a deadly weapon, aggravated mayhem, torture, forcible oral copulation, false imprisonment and kidnapping.

On November 3, 1992, while out on bail for that incident, James, under the influence of cocaine, assaulted music executive Mary Sauger at the St. James Club and Hotel in West Hollywood. Sauger said she met James and Hijazi for a business meeting, but that the two then kidnapped and beat her over a 20-hour period.

James was found guilty of both offenses but was cleared of a torture charge that could have put him in prison for the rest of his life. While serving his five-year sentence at Folsom Prison, James lost a civil suit to Sauger, who was awarded nearly $2 million in damages in 1994. James was ordered to pay her about $1 million; the hotel and a private security firm were found liable for nearly $750,000 in damages due to negligence. James was released from prison on August 21, 1996, after serving more than two years.

In 1998, James was accused of sexually assaulting a 26-year-old woman, but the charges were later dropped. In 2020, his estate was sued for $50 million by a woman who accused him of raping her when she was 15 years old at a group home for troubled youths in Buffalo, New York, in 1979. The suit was later dismissed.

Death
On the morning of August 6, 2004, James's caretaker found him dead in his Los Angeles home at the Oakwood Toluca Hills apartment complex, just outside Burbank. He was 56 years old. His longtime publicist, Sujata Murthy, released a statement to the media stating he died of natural causes. James died from pulmonary failure and cardiac failure, associated with his various health conditions of diabetes, a stroke, pacemaker, and heart attack. His autopsy found alprazolam (Xanax), diazepam, bupropion (Wellbutrin), citalopram (Celexa), hydrocodone, digoxin (Digitalis), chlorpheniramine, methamphetamine, and cocaine in his blood. However, the coroner stated that "none of the drugs or drug combinations were found to be at levels that were life-threatening in and of themselves".

Following a public viewing for fans, a private memorial was held at Forest Lawn Memorial Park – Hollywood Hills. A public funeral was held at St. John Baptist Church in Buffalo, New York on Saturday, Aug. 14, 2004, with an estimated 6000 fans attending the viewing, and cremation following the service; a free tribute concert took place later that day in Martin Luther King Park. His ashes were buried at the Forest Lawn Cemetery in Buffalo.

Accolades
James received the following honors:
 * 1982: American Music Award for Favorite Soul/R&B Album (Street Songs)
 * 1996: Inducted into the Buffalo Music Hall of Fame.

Grammy Awards
James was nominated for three Grammy Awards, winning one as a co-writer for MC Hammer's song "U Can't Touch This".

 * 1982
 * "Super Freak"
 * Grammy Award for Best Rock Vocal Performance, Male
 * Nominated
 * 1982
 * "Street Songs"
 * Best R&B Vocal Performance, Male
 * Nominated
 * 1991
 * "U Can't Touch This"
 * Grammy Award for Best R&B Song
 * 1991
 * "U Can't Touch This"
 * Grammy Award for Best R&B Song

Discography
James's entire Motown Records back catalogue was released in 2014 on iTunes for the first time in digitally remastered form. This marked the first time many of his albums were widely available since their initial releases. Physical copies of James's albums, namely Fire It Up, Garden of Love and The Flag, have become rare and highly sought-after by fans.

 * Studio albums
 * Come Get It! (with The Stone City Band, 1978)
 * Bustin' Out of L Seven (1979)
 * Fire It Up (1979)
 * Garden of Love (1980)
 * Street Songs (1981)
 * Throwin' Down (1982)
 * Cold Blooded (1983)
 * Glow (1985)
 * The Flag (1986)
 * Wonderful (1988)
 * Kickin' (1989)
 * Urban Rapsody (1997)
 * Rick James Forever (2005)
 * Deeper Still (2007)

title: Rick James


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All India Forward Bloc

The All India Forward Bloc (abbr. AIFB) is a left-wing nationalist political party in India. It emerged as a faction within the Indian National Congress in 1939, led by Subhas Chandra Bose. The party re-established as an independent political party after the independence of India. During the 1951–1952 and 1957 Indian general election, the party was known as Forward Bloc (Marxist). It has its main stronghold in West Bengal. The party's current Secretary-General is G. Devarajan. Veteran Indian politicians Sarat Chandra Bose (brother of Subhas Chandra Bose) and Chitta Basu had been the stalwarts of the party in independent India.

Leveraging Netaji's sway over the populace, the organization had established its electoral footprint after Independence in states like Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Kerala, and Assam, with West Bengal as its primary bastion. However, after eight decades, the party, now confined to select regions, lacks any Members of Parliament or Legislative Assembly representatives.

Formation of the Forward Bloc
The Forward Bloc of the Indian National Congress is a Political Party that was formed on May 3, 1939, by Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose in Makur Unnao, Uttar Pradesh, who had resigned from the presidency of the Indian National Congress on 29 April after being outmaneuvered by Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi. The formation of the Forward Bloc was announced to the public at a rally in Calcutta. Bose said that all who were joining,must never turn their back to the British and must fill the pledge form by cutting their finger and signing it with their blood. First of all, seventeen young girls came up and signed the pledge form. Initially the aim of the Forward Bloc was to rally all the leftwing sections within the Congress and develop an alternative leadership inside the Congress. Bose became the president of the Forward Bloc and S.S. Kavishar its vice-president. A Forward Bloc Conference was held in Bombay in the end of June. At that conference the constitution and programme of the Forward Bloc were approved. In July 1939 Subhas Chandra Bose announced the Committee of the Forward Bloc. It had Subhas Chandra Bose as president, S.S. Kavishar from Punjab as its vice-president, Lal Shankarlal from Delhi, as its general secretary and Vishwambhar Dayalu Tripathi and Khurshed Nariman from Bombay as secretaries. Other prominent members were Annapurniah from Andhra Pradesh, Senapati Bapat, Hari Vishnu Kamath from Bombay, Pasumpon U. Muthuramalingam Thevar from Tamil Nadu and Sheel Bhadra Yagee from Bihar. Satya Ranjan Bakshi, was appointed as the secretary of the Bengal Provincial Forward Bloc.

In August, the same year Bose began publishing a newspaper titled Forward Bloc. He travelled around the country, rallying support for his new political project.

The first conference
The next year, on 20–22 June 1940, the Forward Bloc held its first All India Conference in Nagpur. The conference declared the Forward Bloc to be a socialist political party, and the date of 22 June is considered as the founding date of the party by the Forward Bloc itself. The conference passed a resolution titled 'All Power to the Indian People', urging militant action for struggle against British colonial rule. Subhash Chandra Bose was elected as the president of the party and H.V. Kamath as the general secretary.

Arrest and exile of Bose
Soon thereafter, on 2 July, Bose was arrested and detained in Presidency Jail, Calcutta. In January 1941 he escaped from house arrest, and clandestinely went into exile. He travelled to the Soviet Union via Afghanistan, seeking Soviet support for the Indian independence struggle. Soviet leader Joseph Stalin declined Bose's request, and he then travelled to Germany. In Berlin he set up the Free India Centre, and rallied the Indian Legion.

Inside India, local activists of the Forward Bloc continued the anti-British activities without central co-ordination. For example, in Bihar members were involved in the Azad Dasta resistance groups, and distributed propaganda in support of Bose and Indian National Army. They did not have, however, any organic link either with Bose nor the INA.

Post-war reorganisation
At the end of the war, the Forward Bloc was reorganised. In February 1946 R.S. Ruiker organised an All India Active Workers Conference at Jabalpur, Madhya Pradesh. The conference declared the formation of the 'FB Workers Assembly', in practice the legal cover of the still illegal Forward Bloc. Notably some leading communists from Bombay, like K.N. Joglekar and Soli Batliwalli, joined the 'FB Workers Assembly'. The Workers Assembly conference declared that the "Forward Bloc is a Socialist Party, accepting the theory of class struggle in its fullest implications and a programme of revolutionary mass action for the attainment of Socialism leading to a Classless Society."

Ahead of the 1946 assembly elections the ban on the Bloc was lifted in June that year. The Working Committee of the Forward Bloc met on 10 June.

Elections to the Constituent Assembly and to provincial legislatures were held in December 1946. The Forward Bloc contested the elections. H.V. Kamath won a seat in the Constituent Assembly and Jyotish Chandra Ghosh, Hemantha Kumar Basu and Lila Roy were elected to the Bengal Legislative Assembly.

Arrah conference
The Bloc held its 2nd All India Conference in Arrah, Bihar on 12–14 January 1947. S.S. Kavishar (a leading member of the Subhasist sector) was elected president and Sheel Bhadra Yagee (a leading member of the Marxist sector) was elected general secretary.

Split between Yagee and Ruikar
Following Independence and Partition, the party national council met in Varanasi February 1948. The national council meeting was also preceded by a decision of the Indian National Congress in the beginning of the year to expel all dissenting tendencies within the Congress, including the Forward Bloc. Thus the party decided to renounce any links with the Congress once and for all, and reconstruct itself as an independent opposition party. Moreover, it passed a resolution that the party be divided into a Forward Bloc for India and a Forward Bloc for the new nation of Pakistan. This would soon prove to be very controversial. The general secretary Yagee did, in line with the Varanasi resolution, dissolve the Bengal committee of the Forward Bloc and set-up ad hoc committees for West Bengal and East Bengal. Now the division between 'Marxists' and 'Subhasists' resurfaced. The 'Subhasists', and S. S. Kavishar in particular, criticised Yagee's actions.

The split was now a fact. The 'Subhasist' group, led by Ruiker and Cavesheer, called for a conference in Chandannagar, West Bengal. Their conference was held on 29–31 December. On the same dates Yagee organised a conference in Calcutta. Effectively there was now two Forward Blocs, the Forward Bloc led by Ruiker and the Forward Bloc led by Yagee. Yagee was elected general secretary and K.N. Joglekar, chairman of the Yagee-led group.

Roughly speaking the Yagee's party had its main base in Bihar, Punjab and West Bengal, whereas the Ruiker-led group had its strongholds in Madhya Pradesh and West Bengal.

In Tripura, a united front was formed by the Communist Party of India,Tripura Ganatantrik Sangha, Ganamukti Parishad, Ganatantrik Nari Samiti and independents to contest the election to the Tripura electoral college (whose function was to appoint a Rajya Sabha delegate from Tripura) jointly. The Forward Bloc participated in mass rallies on 2 October and 2 December 1951. However, just before the election the Forward Bloc withdrew from the front and decided to contest three of the 30 seats on their own. None of the Forward Bloc candidates were elected.

The 5th party conference (a 4th party plenum had been held in Ingota, U.P. in 1949) was held in Puri, Odisha on 28–31 December 1952. Mohan Singh was elected chairman and Dhillon as general secretary.

Expulsion of Yagee and Singh
In 1955, the Indian National Congress adopted socialism as its policy. Thus, leaders like Yagee and Singh then proposed that, as the Congress had become a socialist party, the Forward Bloc ought to merge with it. Singh and Yagee, without consulting the Central Committee nor the party membership, declared the unification of the Forward Bloc into the Congress. Many sections of the party disagreed with this move, and a Central Committee meeting was held in Nagpur 11–15 May. The Central Committee decided to expel Singh and Yagee. Hemanta Kumar Bose was elected as the new chairman and R.K. Haldulkar as general secretary.

Socialist unity
In 1964, a unity process was initiated by the Praja Socialist Party, which eventually resulted in the formation of the Samyukta Socialist Party. The Forward Bloc was invited to join the new party, and the Delhi unit of the party did take part in a joint socialist anti-Nehru campaign conference in April 1964.

Death of U.M. Thevar
The party stalwart in Tamil Nadu, U. Muthuramalingam Thevar, died on 30 October 1963. Following his death a power-struggle began between two of his disciples, Sasivarna Thevar and P.K. Mookiah Thevar. Mookiah Thevar emerged victorious and Sasivarna Thevar left to form his own party, the Subhasist Forward Bloc.

A by-election for the Aruppukottai Lok Sabha constituency seat vacated by U. Muthuramalingam Thevar's death was held in 1964, in which the Forward Bloc was defeated for the first time.

Progressive Front in Tripura
In 1965, the party joined a 'Progressive Front' in Tripura. The front consisted of the Communist Party of India, the Forward Bloc and a break-away faction of the Socialist Party. The front demanded nationwide land reforms, strengthening of the national defence, withdrawal from the Commonwealth, nationalisation of foreign capital, a rational food policy, release of all political prisoners and scrapping of the Indo-American agreement of food supply. Existence of the new front was declared at a meeting in Agartala on 17 November. Mass rallies of the front were held in Belonia on 28 November and then in Birchandra Bazar (near Belonia) on 1 December. The front did not last, though, as in the 1967 election the communist parties aligned with a splinter group of the Congress Party. The Forward Bloc did not present any candidates in that election.

1968 split in Tamil Nadu
In 1968, two influential party leaders in Tamil Nadu Velayudham Nayar (then a central committee member of the party) and S. Andi Thevar broke away from AIFB and founded the Revolutionary Forward Bloc. Nayar and Thevar accused the Forward Bloc of having deviated from its socialist principles through its co-operation with the rightwing Swatantra Party.

West Dinajpur clashes
In July 1969, violent clashes erupted in West Dinajpur district, West Bengal, between peasants aligned with the Communist Party of India (Marxist) and East Pakistani refugee cultivators, who supported the Forward Bloc. CPI(M) leader Hare Krishna Konar characterised the events as a degeneration of the agrarian struggles in rural West Bengal.

Split in the Indian National Congress
In 1969, a major split occurred in the Indian National Congress. Indira Gandhi had entered into open conflict with the traditional Congress leadership. Effectively two separate Congress parties appeared, the Congress(R) led by Indira and the Congress(O) led by Kamaraj. The split was in many ways a left-right one, with Indira whipping up populism against the established party elites. The Forward Bloc did in some ways welcome the new developments. It appreciated Indira's stands and reformulated its anti-Congress line to focus mainly opposition to the traditional Congress elite (i.e., the Congress(O)). In the 1969 presidential elections, AIFB supported Indira's candidate V.V. Giri. This caused an abrupt break-up of the Swatantra-AIFB alliance in Tamil Nadu, as the Swatantra Party sought to align itself with the Congress(O).

1971–72 elections
On 20 February, just ahead of the 1971 general elections, the All India Forward Bloc chairman Hemantha Kumar Bose was murdered in Calcutta. An emergency central committee meeting was held on 24 February, which appointed P.K. Mookiah Thevar as the new chairman of the party.

In the 1971 Lok Sabha election, the Forward Bloc launched 24 candidates around the country. Two were elected, P.K. Mookiah Thevar from Ramanathapuram and Jambuwantrao Dhote from Nagpur. The party contested three seats in the interior of Maharashtra, where it performed well. Dhote, who was then known as Vidarbha ka Sher (the Lion of Vidarbha), had joined the Forward Bloc and campaigned for a separate Vidarbha state with the Forward Bloc as his platform. Dhote was hugely popular in the region at the time, and could draw crowds of hundreds of thousands to his meetings.

In Tamil Nadu, the party contested one seat, Ramanathapuram, with the support of its allies in the Progressive Front (most notably the Congress(R) and Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam). Meanwhile, the Forward Bloc played an important role in securing Mukkulathor votes for its Progressive Front allies.

In West Bengal, the party contested 10 Lok Sabha seats. The party obtained some significant voting in constituencies like Cooch Behar (22.17%) and Birbhum (19.70%), but in general it was defeated by the CPI(M) candidates.

Moreover, the party contested three seats in Bihar, one in Haryana, one in Madhya Pradesh, four in Uttar Pradesh and one in Delhi. In total, the candidates of the party obtained 962,971 votes (0.66% of the national vote).

In the 1971 state legislative assembly election in Odisha, the party contested four seats. It got 8393 votes (0.19% of the statewide vote), but was not close to winning any seat. In Tamil Nadu, the party contested nine seats in the southern part of the state within the framework of the Progressive Front. Out of these nine candidates, seven won. In total, its vote stood at 268,721 (1.71% of the statewide vote). One of its candidates came second and in the Mudukulathur constituency (that had been the centre of the violent 1957 Ramnad riots) the AIFB candidate R. Rathina Thevar came third with 17244 votes (31.02%). The most spectacular victory was that of P.K. Mookiah Thevar (who contested Lok Sabha and assembly elections simultaneously) who got 49292 votes (74.46%) in the Usilampatti constituency, defeating S. Andi Thevar of the Revolutionary Forward Bloc. Lastly in West Bengal the party contested 52 constituencies, but could only win three seats. Its vote stood at 374 141 (2.90% of the statewide vote).

On 28 March 1972, the party was able to win a seat in the Tamil Nadu Legislative Council (the upper house of the state assembly) for the first time. R. Sakthi Mohan was elected with the votes of the AIFB, DMK, PSP, Muslim League and the Tamil Arasu Kazhagam.

In the 1972 state legislative assembly election, the Forward Bloc presented one candidate in Assam, five in Bihar and two in Madhya Pradesh. In Maharashtra, the party contested 26 seats. Like in the 1971 Lok Sabha elections, the party did well in the interior areas of the state. It won the Nagpur North and Yeotmal seats, and came second in several others. In total, the AIFB candidates in Maharashtra got 363 547 votes (2.4% of the statewide vote). In West Bengal, where fresh elections to the state assembly were again held in 1972, the Forward Bloc launched 18 candidates. It got 331 244 votes (2.48% of the statewide vote), but could not win a single seat.

Realignment in Tripura
After having contested the 1972 elections on its own, the Forward Bloc decided to join a 'United Front' led by the communist parties in Tripura. The front demanded clear-cut policies for procurement and distribution of food grains, stopping spiralling prices of essential commodities, a land reform legislation for delimitation of Tribal reserve areas and creation of employment opportunities for the unemployed. A 24-hour Tripura Bandh was organised by the front on 16 December. On 3 May 1974 the four parties organised a 12-hour Tripura Bandh.

1977 elections
Nineteen seventy seven was a crucial year in Indian political history. For the first time in independent India, the Congress Party was routed in a national election. The Forward Bloc had contested four seats in the Lok Sabha election. In West Bengal, it had three candidates which were supported by the Left Front, out of whom all three were elected. Moreover, the party contested one seat in Haryana.

In Tripura, a Left Front was formed consisting of the CPI(M), RSP and the Forward Bloc. The Front launched one Forward Bloc candidate, Brajagopal Roy in the Town Bordowali constituency. Roy won the seat with 7m800 votes (62.76%). In the beginning of 1978, the Left Front formed a majority government in the state, with Brajagopal Roy appointed minister in the state government.

Recent history
Ahead of the 2000 Bihar legislative election, AIFB took part in building a front together with the Bharatiya Jan Congress, the Bihar Vikas Party, the Janata Dal (Secular), the Samajwadi Janata Party and the Nationalist Congress Party. The front vowed to maintain equidistance towards the two major blocs in Bihari politics, the Rashtriya Janata Dal and the National Democratic Alliance, condemning them as 'casteist and communal'.

In 2002, AIFB was one of four left-wing parties that nominated Lakshmi Sahgal as a candidate for the presidency of India. Sehgal, who challenged the main candidate A.P.J. Abdul Kalam, got around 10% of the votes.

In the 2004 Lok Sabha elections, the party received 0.4% of votes and three seats (All from West Bengal).

Just before the 2006 Tamil Nadu legislative election, the party was joined by the actor Karthik. Karthik was given the post of president of the Tamil Nadu state unit by the national party leadership and was put in charge of the election campaign of the party in the state. The party decided to contest a large number of seats without joining either of the two major political blocs in Tamil Nadu. The appointment of Karthik as the new leader of the state unit provoked the sole Forward Bloc legislator and secretary of the state unit, L. Santhanam, to leave the party. In the election the party lost its representation in the assembly. A few months later, the party leadership expelled Karthik on the grounds of 'anti-party activities'.

Ahead of the 2006 West Bengal legislative election, a section of the party led by Jayanta Roy, former AIFB Rajya Sabha member, and Chhaya Ghosh, former West Bengal Minister of Agriculture, broke away and formed the Indian People's Forward Bloc. This party aligned itself with the Indian National Congress. The Bharatiya Forward Bloc, a former Forward Bloc splinter group, merged into the All India Forward Bloc prior to the 2006 election.

President

 * 1) Subhas Chandra Bose (1940)
 * 2) Sardul Singh Kavishar (1947)
 * 3) Mohan Singh (1952)
 * 4) Hemanta Kr. Basu (1958)
 * 5) P. K. Mookiah Thevar (1979)
 * 6) P. D. Paliwal (1984)
 * 7) A. R.Perumal (1991)
 * 8) Ayyanam Ambalam (1998)
 * 9) D. D. Shastri (2001)

General Secretary

 * 1) Hari Vishnu Kamath (1940)
 * 2) Sheel Bhadra Yajee (1947)
 * 3) Ramchandra Sakharam Ruikar (1948)
 * 4) K. N. Joglekar (1948)
 * 5) Gurbaksh Singh Dhillon (1952)
 * 6) R. K. Haldulkar (1958)
 * 7) Chitta Basu (1979)
 * 8) Debabrata Biswas (1997)
 * 9) G. Devarajan (2023)

Chairman

 * 1) N. Velappan Nair
 * 2) Naren Chatterjee

Vice president

 * U. Muthuramalingam Thevar (1955)

West Bengal
AIFB has branches throughout the country, but the main strength of the party is concentrated in West Bengal. Notably though AIFB is co-operating with CPI(M) in West Bengal, Tripura and on the national level, AIFB is not part of the Left Democratic Front in Kerala.

Tripura
The Forward Bloc established its presence in Tripura in 1944, founded by Kamala Ranjan Talapatra. Bengali immigrants like Sailesh Sen, Gopi Ballav Saha, Dwijen Deu, Anil Dasgupta, Hiren Nandi and Sati Bhardwaz are the other active members of the party. They took part in various political campaigns. However, around 1955–1956 most of the founding core of the party in Tripura joined the RSP. Today, AIFB is a member of opposition Left Front coalition. In the 2003 Tripura legislative election the Tripura State Committee president Brajagopal Roy contested the Town Borowali constituency on behalf of the Left Front. Roy got 9844 votes (43.57%), but was defeated by a Congress candidate. The AIFB state unit publishes Tripura Bani.

Uttar Pradesh
In the 2007 assembly election, 2007 in Uttar Pradesh AIFB launched three candidates, Ram Lakhan in Bisalpur (732 votes, 0.51% of the votes in the constituency), Samar Singh in Fatehpur Sikri (870 votes, 0.69%) and Jabar Singh in Hastinapur (503 votes, 0.42%).

Haryana
AIFB has a small state unit in Haryana. The chairman of Haryana state committee is Naveen Kumar. In the 2005 election to the Haryana legislative assembly AIFB ran a single candidate, Mukhtiar Singh Kaushik in the Nilokheri constituency. Kaushik got 442 votes (0.44%).

Southern India
In Andhra Pradesh the party had significant presence during the 1950s, but then declined sharply. In 2005 the party took an initiative to revive its Andhra Pradesh State Committee.

In Telangana 2018 Assembly AIFB performed very well in some Constituencies. In Ramagundam Assembly constituency AIFB candidate Korukanti Chander won with almost 32,000 huge majority. In Bhupalapally AIFB candidate Gandra Satyanarayana Rao stood 2nd place with almost 52,000 votes.

In 2024 Lok sabha elections, AIFB joined DMK-led Alliance in Tamil Nadu.

Mass organisations

 * All India Youth League (youths organisation)
 * All India Students Bloc (student's organisation)
 * Trade Union Coordination Centre (trade union organisation)
 * All India Agragami Kisan Sabha (peasants' organisation)
 * All India Agragami Mahila Samiti (women's organisation)
 * Indian National Cyber Army (social media organisation)
 * Agragami Adivasi Samiti (tribal's organization)
 * Azad Hind Vahini
 * Lok Sanskrity Sansad
 * All India Lawyers Federation

title: All India Forward Bloc


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Instrument rating

Instrument rating refers to the qualifications that a pilot must have in order to fly under instrument flight rules (IFR). It requires specific training and instruction beyond what is required for a private pilot certificate or commercial pilot certificate, including rules and procedures specific to instrument flying, additional instruction in meteorology, and more intensive training in flight solely by reference to instruments.

Training and testing
Testing consists of a written exam and a practical test (also known as a check ride in the US, or a flight test in other countries). The check ride is divided into an oral component (certain countries only) to verify that the applicant understands the theory of instrument flying and an actual flight to ensure the pilot possesses the practical skills required for safe IFR flight.

For most private pilots, the most significant value of flying under IFR is the ability to fly in instrument meteorological conditions (such as inside clouds or days with poor visibility). Additionally, all flights operating in Class A airspace must be conducted under IFR. In the United States, an instrument rating is required when operating under special visual flight rules (SVFR) at night.

Requirements
Requirements for an instrument rating in the United States are listed in section 61.65 of the Federal Aviation Regulation are:
 * 50 hours of Pilot in Command cross country
 * 40 hours of simulated or actual instrument time
 * 15 hours of flight instruction towards instrument rating

The Canadian license VFR-Over-the-Top (VFR OTT) allows private as well as commercial pilots to cross IMC areas when start and end of the trip is performed under VFR conditions.

In the UK, private pilots can attend a less intensive training to the Instrument Rating (Restricted) rating, restricted to the national airspace. This does not confer the privileges of a full Instrument Rating, but allows flight in IMC outside class A airspace, and flight on a SVFR clearance with in-flight visibility below 10 km (but more than 3 km).

An instrument rating test can be taken in either single or multi engine aircraft, with the qualification awarded being known as an SEIR or MEIR respectively. A pilot may be qualified to fly multi engine aircraft, but only hold a SEIR - in which case he/she would only be allowed to fly SE aircraft in IMC. To upgrade to a MEIR, further training and another check ride would be required. An MEIR holder is automatically granted SEIR privileges.

In addition, under EASA, an instrument rating is issued as either single pilot (SP) or multi pilot (MP) and must be re-validated separately every 12 months. Typically, a pilot will get their first SP MEIR on a light piston twin, then when they move to an airline, they will get an MP MEIR as part of their type rating training. If they do not re-validate their SP MEIR, they could find themselves in the position of being allowed to fly IFR in a jet but not a piston.

title: Instrument rating


text:
Civic Coalition ARI

Civic Coalition ARI (Coalición Cívica ARI, CC-ARI), until October 2009 known as Support for an Egalitarian Republic (Afirmación para una República Igualitaria, ARI), is a centrist political party in Argentina founded in 2002 by Elisa Carrió.

It is a member of Cambiemos since 2015 together with centrist and centre-right parties.

Many consider it a social liberal and an innovative party. It offers a political option located in the centre, where the defense of republican institutions and democratic freedoms prevails. It groups together modern social democrats, who accept the "Fundamentals of the economy" and publicly condemn the dictatorship of Fidel Castro; together with democratic liberals, supporters of civil liberties that clearly separate them from conservatives, primarily defenders of the rule of law and pragmatists.

Creation and history
Elisa Carrió, a former Radical Civic Union (UCR) politician, created the ARI after the breakup of the government alliance that brought Fernando de la Rúa to the presidency in 1999.

The 2001 elections gave ARI 17 of the 257 seats in the Argentine Chamber of Deputies, and one senator. Carrió got a 14.1% share of the vote in the 2003 presidential elections. In the 2005 elections, ARI won eight seats. In the 2007 elections, ARI won the governorship of the deep-south Province of Tierra del Fuego, when Fabiana Rios, an ARI deputy, defeated the pro-government candidate Hugo Cóccaro, on June 24, 2007. Tierra del Fuego is currently (as of 2008) the first and only province ruled by ARI.

The party has established itself as a major force in the City of Buenos Aires, in Buenos Aires Province, and in the aforementioned Province of Tierra del Fuego.

In the presidential elections of 2007, Carrió came second, heading the Civic Coalition with Rubén Giustiniani. She obtained about 23% of the vote, coming in a second behind Cristina Fernández de Kirchner. She won the majority vote in two of the three largest cities of Argentina: Buenos Aires and Rosario, but she suffered a larger defeat in Buenos Aires Province, the most populated district, and could not force a run-off election. ARI did however win four Senate seats (2 of the City of Buenos Aires and 2 of Tierra del Fuego) and a considerable number of seats in the Argentine Chamber of Deputies, with further Congress seats for other members of the Coalition.

Current status
On 31 January 2015, through their personal accounts on social networks, Mauricio Macri and Elisa Carrió simultaneously announced that they "sealed the unity." Each one headed a formula of his same party in the primaries of August; the winner of the internship competed in the national generals on October.

2007 split
As part of building a broader coalition ahead of the 2007 elections, Carrió reached out to centre-right figures such as Patricia Bullrich and María Eugenia Estenssoro, who was elected Senator for Buenos Aires. This proved controversial in ARI ranks and some national legislators formed a separate block called the Autonomous ARI in Congress. In May 2008, the block, led by Eduardo Macaluse, announced that they were forming a new party, Solidarity and Equality (Solidaridad e Igualdad – SI). Others who left ARI were Carlos Raimundi, Leonardo Gorbacz, Delia Bisutti, Nélida Belous, Verónica Venas, Emilio García Méndez, Lidia Naim and María América González. Senator María Rosa Díaz also appeared at the launch of SI. Several of the legislators that created the new party had won their seats in the 2007 election as part of the Civic Coalition, which they later opposed. The ARI deputies from Tierra del Fuego sit with the SI members in a separate block in the Chamber of Deputies. Subsequently, Senators María Rosa Díaz and José Carlos Martínez left ARI altogether in March 2009.

In October 2009, the official name was changed into Partido Coalición Cívica para la Afirmación de una República Igualitaria (Civic Coalition Party for the Support of an Egalitarian Republic). Usually it is shortened to Coalición Cívica ARI (Civic Coalition ARI).

Ideology and values
According to Maximiliano Ferraro, its national chairman, "the Civic Coalition and Lilita Carrió represent values and ideas that are linked to the republic, liberal democracy, humanism, the ethics of otherness and ecumenism."

Elisa Carrió is considered a liberal, Christian and heterodox politician in Argentina.

Gregorio Hernández Maqueda, chairman of CC-ARI in the province of Córdoba, declared that his vigilance is the fulfillment of the maximum alliance agreed by the people and for the people: the Constitution. He affirms that the other side of poverty is not lack of resources or wars, but corruption. He believes that Mauricio Macri has achieved a government that "brought freedom where there was only authoritarianism, truth where there was only lies and hope where there was only resignation."

In the Civic Coalition, of its 10 members, only one Juan Manuel López voted in favor of legalization of abortion. The most outraged by the result of the vote was Elisa Carrió, who threatened to break the coalition. His words fell lousy in the leadership of Cambiemos.

Being an opponent, during the conflict between ruralists and the government, Carrió said that the "way out is the countryside."

title: Civic Coalition ARI


text:
Radical Civic Union

The Radical Civic Union (Unión Cívica Radical, UCR) is a centrist and liberal political party in Argentina. It has been ideologically heterogeneous, ranging from conservatism to social democracy, but since 1995 it has been a member of the Socialist International.

Founded in 1891 by radical liberals, the UCR is the second oldest political party active in Argentina, after the Liberal Party of Corrientes. The party's main support has long come from the middle class. For many years, the UCR was either in opposition to Peronist governments or illegal during military rule. The party has stood for liberal democracy, secularism, free elections and civilian control of the military. Especially during the 1970s and 1980s, it was perceived as a strong advocate for human rights.

The UCR had different fractures, conformations, incarnations and factions, through which the party ruled the country seven times with the presidencies of Hipólito Yrigoyen (1916-1922 and 1928-1930), Marcelo Torcuato de Alvear (1922-1928), Arturo Frondizi (1958-1962), Arturo Illia (1963-1966), Raúl Alfonsín (1983-1989) and Fernando de la Rúa (1999-2001). After 2001, the party has been particularly fragmented. As the Justicialist Party led by Nestor and Cristina Kirchner moved to the left, the UCR aligned itself with anti-Peronist centre-right parties.

Since 2015, the UCR has been a member of the centre-right Cambiemos / Juntos por el Cambio coalition, along with Republican Proposal and Civic Coalition ARI, and supported Mauricio Macri in the 2015 and 2019 presidential elections. For the 2023 elections, the party supported the candidacy of Patricia Bullrich.

History
The party was a breakaway from the Civic Union, which was led by Bartolomé Mitre and Leandro Alem. The term 'radical' in the party's name referred to its demand for universal male suffrage, which was considered radical at the time, when Argentina was ruled by an exclusive oligarchy and government power was allocated behind closed doors.

The party unsuccessfully led an attempt to force the early departure of President Miguel Juárez Celman in the Revolution of the Park (Revolución del Parque). Eventually a compromise was reached with Juárez Celman's government. Hardliners who opposed this agreement founded the current UCR, led by Alem's nephew, the young and charismatic Hipólito Yrigoyen. In 1893 and 1905, the party led unsuccessful revolutions to overthrow the government.

With the introduction of free, fair and confidential voting in elections based on universal adult male suffrage in 1912, the Party managed to win the general elections of 1916, when Hipólito Yrigoyen became president. As well as backing more popular participation, UCR's platform included promises to tackle the country's social problems and eradicate poverty. Yrigoyen's presidency however turned out to be rather dictatorial; he refused to cooperate with the Congress and UCR in government fell short of the democratic expectations it had raised when in opposition.

The UCR remained in power during the next 14 years: Yrigoyen was succeeded by Marcelo T. de Alvear in 1922 and again by himself in 1928. The first coup in Argentina's modern history occurred on September 6, 1930, and ousted an aging Yrigoyen amid an economic crisis resulting from the United States' Great Depression.

From 1930 to 1958, the UCR was confined to be the main opposition party, either to the Conservatives and the military during the 1930s and the early 1940s or to the Peronists during the late 1940s and early 1950s.

It was only in 1958 that a faction of the party allied with banned Peronists (in the Intransigent Radical Civic Union founded in 1956, splitting from what then called itself the People's Radical Civil Union) came back to power, led by Arturo Frondizi. The growing tolerance of Frondizi towards his Peronist allies provoked unrest in the army, which ousted the president in March 1962.

After a brief military government, presidential elections took place in 1963 with the Peronist Party banned (as in 1958). The outcome saw the candidate of the People's Radical Civic Union (the other party's faction) Arturo Illia coming first but with only 25% of the votes (approximately 19% of the votes were blank ballots returned by Peronists owing to their party being banned). Although Argentina experienced during Illia's presidency one of the most successful periods of history in terms of economic performance, the president was ousted by the army in June 1966. Illia's peaceful and ordered style of governing — sometimes considered too "slow" and "boring" - was heavily criticized at the time.

During the 1970s Peronist government (1973–1976), the UCR was the second-most supported party, but this didn't actually grant the party the role of being the political opposition. In fact, the Peronist government's most important criticisms came from the same Peronist Party (now called Justicialist Party). The UCR's leader in those times, Ricardo Balbín, saluted Peron's coffin (Perón had died on July 1, 1974, during his third mandate as president) with the famous sentence "This old adversary salutes a great friend", thus marking the end of the Peronist-radical rivalry that had marked the pace of the Argentine political scene until then. The growing fight between left-wing and right-wing Peronists took the country into chaos and many UCR members were targeted by both factions. The subsequent coup in 1976 ended Peronist rule.

During the military regime, many members of the UCR were "disappeared", as were members of other parties.

Between 1983 and 1989, its leader, Raúl Ricardo Alfonsín, was the first democratically elected president after the military dictatorship headed by generals such as Jorge Videla, Leopoldo Galtieri and Reynaldo Bignone. Alfonsín was succeeded by Carlos Saúl Menem of the Peronist Justicialist Party (PJ).

The election of Mr. Alfonsin, who campaigned hard for clean government and civil rights, represented a fundamental change toward genuine democracy in Argentina.

In 1997, the UCR participated in elections in coalition with Front for a Country in Solidarity (FREPASO), itself an alliance of many smaller parties.

This strategy brought Fernando de la Rúa to the presidency in the 1999 elections. During major riots triggered by economic reforms implemented by the UCR government (with the advice of the International Monetary Fund), President de la Rúa resigned and fled the country to prevent further turmoil. After three consecutive acting presidents assumed and resigned their duties in the following weeks, Eduardo Duhalde of the PJ took office until new elections could be held.

After the 2001 legislative elections, the party lost and became the second-largest party in the federal Chamber of Deputies, winning 71 of 257 seats. It campaigned in an alliance with the smaller, more leftist FREPASO.

The party has subsequently declined markedly and its candidate for president in 2003, Leopoldo Moreau, gained just 2.34% of the vote, beaten by three Peronists and more seriously, by two former radicals, Ricardo López Murphy of Recrear and Elisa Carrió of ARI, who have leached members, support and profile from the UCR. Since Nestor Kirchner's led peronist PJ switched into political left, the UCR start to alliance with center-right anti-peronists.

In the 2005 legislative elections, the UCR was reduced to 35 deputies and 13 senators, but remains the second force in Argentine politics.

Ahead of the 2007 election, the remaining Radicals divided, between those who wanted to find an internal candidate and those who wanted to back a candidate from another movement, mostly former economy minister Roberto Lavagna, supported by former president Raúl Alfonsín.

In May 2005, the National Committee of the UCR, then led by Ángel Rozas, intervened (suspended of authorities of) the Provincial Committee of the UCR in Tierra del Fuego Province after Radical governor Jorge Colazo spoke in favour of Kirchner's reelection. The intervention was rejected by the Provincial Committee.

A party convention held in Rosario in August 2006 officially rejected the possibility of alliances with Kirchner's faction of Justicialism and granted former Party President Roberto Iglesias the permission to negotiate with other political forces. This led to several months of talks with Lavagna.

The continued dissidence of the Radicales K prompted the intervention of the UCR Provincial Committee of Mendoza on 1 November 2006, due to the public support of President Kirchner by Mendoza's governor, the Radical Julio Cobos. The measure was short-lived, as the Mendoza Province Electoral Justice overturned it three days later. Deputy and UCR National Committee Secretary General Margarita Stolbizer stated that the party is virtually "broken due to the stance of the leaders who support the alliance [with Kirchner]".

Roberto Iglesias eventually resigned the presidency of the party in November 2006 due to differences with Lavagna, having reached the conclusion that an alliance with him would be a mistake, and joined Stolbizer's camp, maintaining that the party should look for its own candidate (the so-called Radicales R). On 1 December 2006 the National Committee appointed Jujuy Province Senator Gerardo Morales as its new president. Morales stated that he wanted to follow the mandate of the Rosario convention (that is, looking for a possible alliance with Roberto Lavagna).

Morales went on to become Lavagna's running mate in the presidential election of October 2007, coming third. Although this campaign represented the mainstream of the national UCR leadership, substantial elements backed other candidates, notably the Radicales K. Cobos was elected vice president as the running mate of Cristina Fernández de Kirchner through the Plural Consensus alliance, and several Radicals were elected to Congress as part of the Kirchners' Front for Victory faction. The official UCR ranks in Congress were reduced to 30 in the Argentine Chamber of Deputies and 10 in the Argentine Senate.

In recent years, the UCR has been riven by an internal dispute between those who oppose and those who support the left-wing policies of Peronist President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner and her husband and predecessor Néstor Kirchner. However, most Radicales K support for the Kirchners ended by mid 2008, when Vice President Julio Cobos opposed the Government bill on agricultural export taxes. He later rejoined UCR, becoming a prominent figure in the opposition, despite being still the Vice President.

The UCR joined the Civic and Social Agreement to run for the 2009 elections. The loose coalition obtained 29% of the national votes and came a close second to the Front for Victory and allies national outcomes. The Party's reorganization, as well as the 2009 elections, resulted in a gain of party representatives in the National Congress.

In 2015, the UCR formed a coalition with Republican Proposal, a center-right political party, to form Cambiemos. Cambiemos won the presidential election, which ended its 12 years of opposition. The alliance with Republican Proposal was criticized by the Socialist International and the Young Radicals were suspended from the International Union of Socialist Youth.

Ideology and factions
The UCR is generally classified as a centrist, or liberal. Due to its heterogeneity, the UCR has also been described as a big tent or catch-all party and social-liberal party, but it is also occasionally classified as a social-democratic. Radicals call themselves the party of civil liberties, democracy and the Constitution. In their history, they resisted authoritarian regimes, won universal suffrage and starred in the struggle for the causes of the popular majorities.

Raúl Alfonsín thought that radicalism advocated social democracy. He wanted to form a "broad popular, democratic, reformist and national movement"; to end privilege, authoritarianism and demagoguery and consolidate an authentic social democracy in the country. He also explained that Radicals do not define themselves, as European political parties usually do, on the left–right political spectrum, as radicalism is an ethic before being an ideology. However, according to Alfonsín, Radicals felt very comfortable as "observers" of all the tendencies that make up European social democracy. Moreover, in 1995 Raúl Alfonsín brought radicalism into the world organization of center-left parties, the Socialist International. Another former leader, Angel Rozas, defined the political-ideological identity of the party as humanist and center-left. He and his faction gave a progressive look to the party.

On the conservative side of the party sat Ricardo Balbín. The party was particularly divided since the 1960s and again since the end of the 1990s. After Balbín's death, Fernando de la Rúa who gave a neoliberal and conservative tint to the party and who famously said that "we are radicals, not socialists", kept UCR conservatives active until he became president in 1999.

During the 1989 general election, Eduardo Angeloz promised a "red pencil" to cut public deficit spending and mentioned the possible privatization of state companies, which would later be carried out by his rival, the Peronist Carlos Menem.

Since de la Rúa's demise in 2001, the UCR has become more and more fragmented politically and geographically. Besides the interventions in Tierra del Fuego and Mendoza, in September 2006, the party leaders had admitted that they reviewing requests of intervention against the provincial committees of Río Negro and Santiago del Estero. In Santa Fe, the UCR had teamed up with the Socialist Party to support Socialist candidate for governor Hermes Binner, in exchange for the vice-governorship, taken by the former governor Aldo Tessio's daughter, the fiscal federal Griselda Tessio, winning the 2007 elections.

The Unión Cívica Radical (UCR) has gradually shifted toward center-right positions since the 2005 legislative elections, due to internal divisions and the exclusion of the Alfonsinismo from its ranks. This political process has led the UCR to adopt a more conservative orientation in its focus and ideological alignment. According to the president of the party, now within the organization we can find a centrist sector and another linked to right-wing values.

Leaders
The UCR is headed by a National Committee; its president is the de facto leader of the party. A national convention brings together representatives of the provincial parties and affiliated organisations such as Franja Morada and Radical Youth, and is itself represented on the National Committee.

 * Presidents of the National Committee:
 * (1891-1896) Leandro N. Alem
 * (1896-1897) Bernardo de Irigoyen
 * (1897-1930) Hipólito Yrigoyen
 * (1930-1942) Marcelo T. de Alvear
 * (1942-1946) Gabriel Oddone
 * (1946-1948) Eduardo Laurencena
 * (1948-1949) Roberto J. Parry
 * (1949-1954) Santiago H. del Castillo
 * (1954-1957) Arturo Frondizi
 * (1971-1981) Ricardo Balbín
 * (1981-1983) Carlos Contín
 * (1983-1991) Raúl Alfonsín
 * (1991-1993) Mario Losada
 * (1993-1995) Raúl Alfonsín
 * (1995-1997) Rodolfo Terragno
 * (1997-1999) Fernando de la Rúa
 * (1999-2001) Raúl Alfonsín
 * (2001-2005) Ángel Rozas
 * (2005-2006) Roberto Iglesias
 * (2006-2009) Gerardo Morales
 * (2009-2011) Ernesto Sanz
 * (2011) Ángel Rozas
 * (2011) Ernesto Sanz
 * (2011-2013) Mario Barletta
 * (2013-2015) Ernesto Sanz
 * (2015-2017) Jose Manuel Corral
 * (2017-2021) Alfredo Cornejo
 * (2021-2023) Gerardo Morales
 * (2023-present) Martín Lousteau

Splits

 * Antipersonalist Radical Civic Union (1924)
 * Radical Civic Union - Board Renewal (1945)
 * Intransigent Radical Civic Union (1957)
 * Civic Coalition ARI (2001)
 * Recreate for Growth (2002)
 * FORJA Concertation Party (2007)
 * Generation for a National Encounter (2007)

Focus: Yrigoyen presidency
In 1903, Hipólito Yrigoyen began to reorganize the UCR for a new revolution. Two years after he led the armed uprising known as the Revolution of 1905, which although it failed to put sufficient pressure on the official party, it was able to cause a party breakdown.

The more progressive leaders of the autonomists, such as Carlos Pellegrini and Roque Sáenz Peña, began to support that it was necessary to make institutional changes to hold back the growth of social and political conflict.

When Roque Sáenz Peña was elected president in 1910, the UCR already was not in the position to carry out new assembled uprisings, but the general belief that existed was that a revolution was imminent. Saénz Peña y Yrigoyen, who had been maintaining a personal friendship from childhood, they then had a private meeting in which they agreed to sanction a law of free suffrage. Two years later, in 1912, they approved the law of universal secret, and obligatory voting for men, known as The Sáenz Peña Law. On the other hand, it was also the first Argentinian political party to present a legal project for women to vote in 1919, that eventually did not pass given the conservative majority in Congress. Gabino Ezeiza was a great Payador, and he musically described the popular culture in favor of Yrigoyen.

The UCR put an end to their electoral political abstention, and went to the parliamentary elections, without forming electoral alliances. For the first time in Argentina, they voted in a voting booth to guarantee a secret ballot."The predictable vote, the secret vote, and democracy. Before 1912, Argentina was using an electoral system in which votes were expressed verbally, or by ticket, in public place, and in a voluntary way, called the 'predictable vote', which broke the electoral system. The struggle for democracy in Argentina, not related initially as much with universal suffrage but with the secret vote, in a voting booth, which made independent the wish of the voter from all external pressures. The Sáenz Peña Law of 1912 established the secret and obligatory vote, but due to the fact that it did not recognize the right of women to vote or to be voters, it is incorrect to say that Argentina had a truly universal voting system until 1947."The UCR first won the elections to governor in Santa Fe (Manuel Menchaca), from which followed a trail of triumphs in the rest of the country.

Among the radical leaders at this time were: José Camilo Crotto (CF), Leopoldo Melo (CF), Vicente Gallo (CF), Fernando Saguier (CF), Marcelo T. de Alvear (CF), José L. Cantilo (CF), Delfor del Valle (PBA), Horacio Oyhanarte (PBA), Rogelio Araya (SF), Rodolfo Lehmann (SF), Enrique Mosca (SF), Elpidio González (CBA), Pelagio Luna (LR), Miguel Laurencena (ER), José Néstor Lencinas (Mza), Federico Cantoni (SJ).

The electoral triumphs of radicalism caused the collapse of the parties from the prior political system to the Sáenz Peña Law. The UCR auto-dispersed due to an initiative of Honorio Pueyrredón and its members massively joined radicalism. The National Autonomist Party dissolved.

On 2 April 1916, for the first time in Argentinian history, they carried out the presidential elections by means of a secret ballot. The UCR obtained 370,000 votes, against the 340,000 votes of all the other parties and in the Electoral College their way was put to a vote. Due to this, a long cycle of 14 consecutive years of radical government ensued. The Radical UCR won the presidential elections on three successive occasions:  Hipólito Yrigoyen (1916-1922), Marcelo T. de Alvear (1922-1928), and Hipólito Yrigoyen once again (1928-1930). The series of radical governments would be violently interrupted by means of a military coup on December 6, 1930. The secret vote opened a new chapter in Argentinian History.

The government of the UCR indicated the arrival of the government and the direction of the state organization of members of the medial sects that until this moment were indeed excluded from these functions.

The first presidency of Hipólito Yrigoyen promoted a series of politics of a new type, which in conjunction was signaling a transformative nationalist tendency, between that which  emphasized the creation of the state-owned oil business YPF, the new rural laws, the fortification of the public railways, the Reform University, and a strongly autonomous political exterior for the greatest improvements.

On the matter of labor, he propelled several laws for workers such as the law of the 8 hour work day and the law of Sunday rest, and he intervened as a neutral mediator in the conflicts between labor unions and big companies. However, during his time in government, several large worker massacres such as the Tragic Week, La Forestral massacre, and the Firing Squad Executions of Patagonia occurred, with thousands of workers killed. The historian Halperín Donghi explains that the radical governments resolved the problem of regional equality in Argentina, but as a consequence of this, they brought social inequalities to a higher level at the same time. This is because radicalism was lacking solutions for the people on the bottom of the social hierarchy, through systematically neglecting class differences.

Radicalism, during the first government of Yrigoyen, was in the minority in Congress: In the Deputy Chamber 45 members were radicals and 70 opposers, while amongst the 30 members of the Senate 4 were radicals. Nonetheless, Yrigoyen kept up an anti-accord force and a slightly inflammatory conversation and negotiation, not only with the traditional conservative parties that were controlling the senate, but also with the new popular parties that had gained leadership from the secret ballot: the Socialist Party and the Democratic Progressive party. Also, Yrigoyen took forward a political system of interventions to the provinces and a style of personal and direct management, that would be severely critical for his opposition both inside and outside of the UCR, calling it "personalism".

title: Radical Civic Union