The Uttarakhand Kranti Dal was founded on 25 July, 1979, under the chairmanship of the then Vice-Chancellor of Kumaon University, Shri D.D. Pant.
Since its formation in 1979, the UKD has been fighting for change as a grassroots political vehicle of the people. As the first party to take up the statehood issue, the UKD laboured for many years, laying the ground work for what would emerge as a successful movement for all-around development for the long neglected Himalayan region. However, enormous work remains, as the unfulfilled expectations
of the Uttarakhandi people call out for the continuation of a regional voice in the politics of the state dominated by national parties and their national priorities. In addition to leading the separate statehood movement by building a large and inclusive identity for the region's diverse peoples, the for UttarakhandIn 1980, The Jaswant Singh Bisht opened the party's account by winning the UKD's first legislative assembly seat. In 1985, Kashi Singh Airy won in Pithoragarh, becoming the party's longest serving member, winning again in the new Uttaranchal state assembly elections of 2002. In 1994, the party helped successfully steer a anti-reservation stir into a massive movement for a separate hill state, the only way to address the region's development issues specific to its rugged highland geography. In 1999, Indramani Badoni, one of the original hunger strikers of 1994 and a long-time stalwart of the UKD breathed his last. The party pledged to take up his work as a tribute to his tireless efforts on behalf of the region. In 2000, the state of "Uttaranchal" was created. While welcomed as a major victory by the people, the state's creation was only a partial success as the manner in which it was formed completely disregarded the movement that gave it birth. In the post-statehood period, the UKD has continued to speak out for the rights of the average citizens of state, while pressing to complete the unfinished business of the Uttarakhand Andolan, including defending the state's social and cultural identity as embodied by its true name, Uttarakhand, locating its permanent capital at Gairsain, and fighting for greater grassroots democracy and the basic rights of Uttarakhandi people. We have long stressed that only through a new Uttarakhand can a new India be constructed with a renewal of democracy and the human and social rights of its diverse citizens.
