- NEW DELHI (Reuters) - A prominent
Muslim, known as the father of India's nuclear missile program, was sworn
in on Thursday as India's president in a move seen as bolstering the nation's
secular credentials after a wave of religious violence.
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- The swearing-in of 71-year-old A.P.J. Kalam, a boatman's
son who rose to become a national folk hero by overseeing India's successful
nuclear tests in 1998, followed his landslide election victory last week.
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- Popularly known as "Missile Man," he was sworn
in for his five-year term as India's 11th president in the imposing central
hall of parliament.
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- He is the third Muslim to serve in the largely ceremonial
post in majority Hindu, but officially secular, India.
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- Analysts have said Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee's
nomination of Kalam was a "politically correct" master stroke
following religious riots earlier this year.
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- At least 1,000 people, mostly Muslim, were killed in
western Gujarat state in India's worst religious violence in a decade.
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- "The purpose of having Kalam is the fact that he
is a highly respected Muslim and that takes the edge off Gujarat,"
said political analyst Inder Malhotra.
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- The election as president comes at a time when India
and its Islamic neighbor, Pakistan, are locked in a military stand-off
with a million troops along their border.
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- A strong advocate of Indian self-reliance in technology,
Kalam said in a speech that India must be transformed into a "developed
nation."
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- "This is the time to ignite the minds of the people
for this movement. We will work for it," he said.
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- Kalam is a bachelor, vegetarian, an amateur musician
and a poet, who can recite from the holy Koran and the Hindu holy scripture
Bhagavadgita with equal ease.
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- He drew up at the parliament buildings with outgoing
president K.R. Narayanan in a limousine followed by a ceremonial column
of horses ridden by the president's bodyguard.
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