The park's name points back to one man. The reserve's own official About page states it in a single sentence: the park was named after the famous freedom fighter C. Rajagopalachari, popularly known as Rajaji, and the naming came with the 1983 intent notification that merged three wildlife sanctuaries. This page gives that sentence, the notification dates the Gazette recites behind it, and a short life of the man himself, stopping where the park's own story starts. It invents no ceremony, no dedication and no motive beyond the words the official pages publish.
Sources checked on 28 October 2026: the reserve's official About page for the naming sentence and the 1983 merger; the Environment Ministry's 2018 Gazette draft for Rajaji, published in the Gazette of India, for the two notification dates recited in its opening paragraphs; and the illustrated booklet on C. Rajagopalachari published by the Lok Sabha Secretariat for the biography. No travel website, listicle or tour-blog tale is used anywhere on this page.
The official sentence, as it stands
The About page reads, in its own spelling: “In 1983 the intent notification of Rajaji National Park was issued after merging the three wildlife sanctuaries of Uttarakhand – Rajaji, Motichur and Chilla. It was named after the famous freedom fighter C.Rajgopalachari popularly known as "Rajaji"." That is the entire official statement of the naming: a year, a merger, a name and a person. The page does not say who chose the name, when the choice was announced, or what ceremony marked it, and neither does any other official source used here. Those gaps are left as gaps.
The two dates the Gazette recites
The Gazette draft of 2018 recites the underlying record in its opening paragraphs. It places the first notification in 1983, under Uttar Pradesh Government notification No. 5440/XIV-3-84/76 dated 12 August 1983, and it records that Rajaji National Park was finally notified under Uttarakhand Government notification No. 3807/X-2-2013-19(7)2002 dated 14 September 2013. The same document then records that Rajaji was declared a tiger reserve in April 2015 over a total area of 1,075.17 sq km, with the national park forming the core.
Two clarifications, so that the citation is not mistaken for more than it is. First, that Gazette document's own subject is a proposed eco-sensitive-zone regulation, which is not the subject of this page and is not discussed here; it is cited only for the notification dates printed in its recitals. Second, the dates it gives are notification dates, not naming dates: no separate date for the act of naming appears in any of these records, so none is supplied.
The man the park was named for
Chakravarti Rajagopalachari was born on 10 December 1878 at Thorappalli in Salem district, in what was then the Madras Presidency. He studied law, passed his Bachelor of Law examination in 1899 and began practice at Salem, where he built a reputation that carried him into public life early. The sequence that follows provides context for the reserve's identification of him as a freedom fighter, drawn from the Lok Sabha Secretariat's illustrated booklet:
- July 1917: nominated chairman of the Salem Municipality, where he extended water supply to areas where the untouchables lived and pressed for schools that accepted children of the backward classes and the untouchables.
- 1930: led the Vedaranyam Salt March in the Madras Province, starting from Tiruchi on 13 April and reaching Vedaranyam after sixteen days, for which he was sentenced to six months' imprisonment. The booklet records that he emerged from that satyagraha as a national hero.
- 14 July 1937: assumed office as Prime Minister of the Madras Province, where his government pursued social and economic reform.
- 1948 to 1950: the last and only Indian to hold the post of Governor-General of India, taking the office after the viceroyalty of Lord Mountbatten and holding it until the office ended with the republic.
- Later: served as a Union Home Minister after the death of Sardar Patel.
- 1952 to 1954: Chief Minister of Madras State, taking the leadership of the Congress legislature after the 1952 elections.
- 1954: one of three Indians honoured with the Bharat Ratna that year.
- 1959: founded the Swatantra Party, which campaigned for a market economy.
- 25 December 1972: died, at the age of 94, having been born in December 1878.
That is a career in nine lines, and it is deliberately not a full biography. What matters for this page is the shape of it: a statesman whose public life ran from municipal administration in Salem to the country's highest offices, and whose name was already a familiar one-word shorthand in south India long before a park in Uttarakhand took it.
Posthumous by more than ten years
The arithmetic is simple and worth stating plainly. Rajagopalachari died on 25 December 1972, and the intent notification that the reserve's own About page dates to 1983, recited in the Gazette as 12 August 1983, followed his death by more than ten years. The official sentence records no ceremony, and no other official source used here records one either. Any page that tells you otherwise is not working from these documents, and none of it appears here.
The person, the park and the tiger reserve
Rajaji is the person, and the name attaches to the national park that was formed in 1983 by merging the Rajaji, Motichur and Chilla sanctuaries. The tiger reserve is a later, wider declaration made around that park, which is why the two words are not interchangeable in the official texts. Our national park versus tiger reserve article handles that nomenclature properly, and the park's history and geography covers how the merged area was formed and how it sits across Dehradun, Haridwar and Pauri Garhwal. Neither is repeated here; this page is about the name and the man behind it.
What this page does not repeat
- No naming ceremony and no dedication date. The official records give a notification and a name, and nothing else.
- No travel-site tales. Stories attached to the name by tour operators and listicles are not sourced to any official page and are not carried over.
- No primacy claim for the Bharat Ratna. He was one of three recipients in 1954, and the booklet's ordering wording is not repeated.
- No 1947 date for the Governor-Generalship, and no age of 93 at death. He held that office from 1948 to 1950, and he was 94 when he died.
- No literary award claim. No award for writing is asserted here, because the official record for it was not verified for this page.
Where to read next
For how the merged park was formed and what lies inside it, read history and geography. For why the park and the tiger reserve are different words for different things, read park versus tiger reserve. For the landscape's older human story, Chilla heritage and the Van Gujjars cover the settlements and pastoral communities of the same forests.
The park’s name and Rajaji: questions answered
Who was Rajaji?
Chakravarti Rajagopalachari, popularly known as Rajaji, born on 10 December 1878 at Thorappalli in Salem district and died on 25 December 1972, was a freedom fighter, lawyer, administrator and statesman. The reserve’s official About page gives him in one sentence: the park was named after the famous freedom fighter C. Rajagopalachari, popularly known as Rajaji. That page is the source for the naming statement used here, at https://rajajitigerreserve.uk.gov.in/About.aspx.
When was the park named, and is there any record of a ceremony?
No ceremony, unveiling or separate naming date appears in the official records used for this page. The reserve’s About page says the intent notification of Rajaji National Park was issued in 1983 after merging the three wildlife sanctuaries of Rajaji, Motichur and Chilla, and that the park was named after Rajaji. The 2018 Gazette draft recites the underlying notifications: one dated 12 August 1983 and the final notification dated 14 September 2013. Read together they also show the naming was posthumous, because Rajaji died in 1972. The Gazette text is at https://moef.gov.in/uploads/2019/10/rajaji-1.pdf.
What in his life bears on a park being named for him?
The essentials, taken from the illustrated booklet published by the Lok Sabha Secretariat, are these: born 10 December 1878 at Thorappalli; he began law practice at Salem in 1899; he was nominated chairman of the Salem Municipality in July 1917; he led the Vedaranyam Salt March of 1930, starting on 13 April and reaching Vedaranyam after sixteen days, for which he was sentenced to six months; he assumed office as Prime Minister of the Madras Province on 14 July 1937; he became the last and only Indian to hold the office of Governor-General of India, from 1948 to 1950; he later served as a Union Home Minister and as Chief Minister of Madras State from 1952 to 1954; he was one of three Indians honoured with the Bharat Ratna in 1954; he founded the Swatantra Party in 1959; and he died on 25 December 1972. The booklet is at https://sansad.in/uploads/09122021_124446_1021206167_bab3b3527a.pdf.
Was he really the first recipient of the Bharat Ratna?
He received the Bharat Ratna in 1954, and this page describes him as one of three Indians honoured that year rather than as the first. The Lok Sabha Secretariat booklet does print the sentence that he was the first to receive the award, and this page does not repeat it, because three awards were made in 1954 and the wording would misdescribe them. The booklet also prints 1947 for the Governor-General transition and an age of 93 at his death, neither of which is repeated here: he held that office from 1948 to 1950, and he was 94 when he died, having been born in December 1878.
Is Rajaji the name of the park, the tiger reserve, or a person?
The person. Rajaji is the name people used for C. Rajagopalachari, and the national park took his name when the 1983 notification merged the three sanctuaries. The tiger reserve is a later and wider declaration made around that park, which is a separate question of nomenclature covered in our park-versus-tiger-reserve article rather than here. This page is only about the man and the sentence that links him to the name; the park’s formation and geography are covered separately in the history and geography article, and the heritage of the Chilla area in its own piece.