Swami Keshwanand

Swami Keshwanand (12 March 1883 – 13 September 1972), born Birama, was an Indian freedom fighter and social reformer.

Early life

Swami Keshwanand was born on 1883 in a Hindu Jat family in the village of Magloona in Sikar district of present-day Rajasthan. He was the son of Thakarsi, a camel-driver, and his wife Saran. When Birama was five, his family left Magloona for the nearby town of Ratangarh.

His father, who escorted prosperous Seths (Businessmen) from Ratangarh to Delhi on his camel, died in 1890 when Birama was seven. This reduced Birama's already slim chances of becoming educated. It is said that for a prolonged period, his mother had to adopt an itinerant lifestyle in search of shelter and fodder for her animals. In 1897, they settled at the village Kelania in present-day Sri Ganganagar. His mother died in 1899 due to a famine in Rajasthan. According to Swami Keshwanand's own account of the 1899 famine: