Dr. Manmohan Singh

Manmohan Singh is the 13th and current Prime Minister of India. He is the only Prime Minister since Jawaharlal Nehru to return to power after completing a full five-year term. A Sikh, he is the first non-Hindu to occupy the office. Singh is also the 7th Prime Minister from the Indian National Congress (Congress) party. He is a four-time Member of Parliament from the Upper House of the Parliament of India, the Rajya Sabha, representing the state of Assam. His term in the 14th Rajya Sabha was from 22 May 2004 to 26 February 2009. In the 15th Rajya Sabha his term started 22 May 2009 and is scheduled to continue till 2014. On 27 May 2012, he became the first Indian Prime Minister to visit Myanmar in 25 years. Born in Gah, Punjab in British India in 1932, he migrated to India with his family at the time of Partition in 1947. Singh studied at Panjab University, University of Cambridge and University of Oxford. Thereafter, while Singh was working at United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), Lalit Narayan Mishra, the then Indian Minister for Foreign Trade, appointed Singh as an advisor to his ministry. He was appointed Governor of the Reserve Bank of India between 1982 and 1985, Deputy Chairman of the Planning Commission of India from 1985 to 1987 and Secretary General of the South Commission from 1987 to 1990. Elected to the Rajya Sabha in 1991, he was inducted into Prime Minister P. V. Narasimha Rao's cabinet as Finance Minister the same year, a post he held until 1996. His tenure as Finance Minister is best remembered for the economic reforms he carried out, which ended the Licence Raj system and helped open the Indian economy. When the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance (UPA) came to power after the 2004 general elections, Singh became Prime Minister when Congress President Sonia Gandhi unexpectedly declined the position. In 2009, the UPA and Singh were reelected for a second consecutive five year term. Key legislation passed during his tenure include the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act and the Right to Information Act, 2005. Major initiatives include the National Rural Health Mission of India and the Unique Identification Authority of India.