Gulzari Lal Nanda was born on July 4, 1898, in Sialkot (Punjab). He was educated at Lahore, Agra and Allahabad. He worked as a research scholar on labour problems at the University of Allahabad (1920-1921) and became Professor of Economics at the National College, Bombay in 1921. He joined the Non-Cooperation Movement the same year. In 1922, he become Secretary of the Ahmedabad Textile Labour Association in which he worked until 1946. He was imprisoned for Satyagraha in 1932, and again from 1942 to 1944.
He was elected to the Bombay Legislative Assembly in 1937 and was Parliamentary Secretary (Labour and Excise) to the Government of Bombay from 1937 to 1939. Later, as Labour Minister of the Bombay Government from 1946 to 1950. He was a Member of the National Planning Committee. He was largely instrumental in organising the Indian National Trade Union Congress and later became its President.
Sri Nanda was elected to the Lok Sabha in 1957 and was appointed Union Minister for Labour and Employment and Planning and, later, as Deputy Chairman of the Planning Commission. He was re-elected to the Lok Sabha in the 1962 from Sabarkantha Constituency in Gujarat. He initiated the Congress Forum for Socialist Action in 1962. He was Union Minister for Labour and Employment in 1962 and 1963 and Minister for Home Affairs from 1963 to 1966.
Following the death of Jawaharlal Nehru, he was a sworn in as acting Prime Minister of India on May 27, 1964. Again on January 11, 1966, he was sworn in as acting Prime Minister following the death of Shri Lal Bahadur Shastri. He was awarded Bharat Ratna.
