Albert Kónya

Who was Albert Kónya?

Albert Kónya was a Hungarian physicist and politician, who served as Minister of Education between 1956 and 1957. He graduated in the József Attila University of Szeged. He fought in the Second World War from 1942 until the war's end. He was a prisoner of war for a short time in 1945. After the war he taught in the Budapest University of Technology and Economics. From 1950 he served as head of the Physics Department of the University of Miskolc. After that, in 1951 he became dean of the Faculty of Mechanics.

In 1952 he did his first steps in the politics. He was appointed Deputy Minister of Education in 1952. Kónya held this position until 1956 to helping the two ministers, József Darvas and Tibor Erdey-Grúz's work. In 1954 he was elected as alternate member of the Hungarian Working People's Party's Central Leadership. He became Minister of Education on 30 July 1956. He also held his position during the Hungarian Revolution of 1956.

Not much before the revolution he supported the students' university autonomy in Budapest and Szeged. He did not oblige the students to the learning of the Russian language.