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C.A. Shah
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Chirag Ali Shah was a Fiji Indian farmer and politician, who served in the Legislative Council both as a nominated and an elected member.
Since 1937, the Government of Fiji had followed a policy of nominating a Muslim to one of the two seats reserved for nominated Indian members in the Legislative Council. In 1963, although a Muslim, Sidiq Koya, was elected, the Government continued with its policy and nominated Ra farmer, C.A. Shah, also a Muslim, to the Legislative Council.
C.A. Shah, soon aligned himself with the other three members of the Citizens Federaton and in 1964 was one of the founding members of the Federation Party. His inclusion provided diversity to the hierarchy of the party which was dominated by lawyers, businessmen and academics. He took part in the 1965 Constitutional Conference in London with his other colleagues in the Federation Party. In the 1966 elections he won the Tavua/Ra seat for the Federation Party in a three-way contest with 58% of the vote. He had a tougher fight in the 1968 by-election when his opponent was a former member of the Federation Party in the Legislative Council (who had defected to the Alliance Party) and lawyer, M.T. Khan, but again he won with grass-roots support.