Raju was hired by C. Rajagopalachari, the former Governor General of India and retired Chief Minister of Madras, on 16 December 1959 as the Office Secretary of Swatantra Party, which was launched four months earlier.
[1] When Swatantra Party faded away in 1974, Raju, along with Geeta Doctor, took up full-time editorship of Freedom First in 1978.
To register it again and reclaim the party symbol, the star, they approached the Election Commission of India.
But Indian law demands that all parties swear allegiance to socialism, in accordance with a 1989 amendment of India’s Representation of People’s Act.
They refused and, instead, filed a writ petition in the Bombay High Court challenging this provision.