Meira Kumar

Meira Kumar
Meira Kumar at Third World Conference of Speakers of Parliament
Speaker of Lok Sabha
Incumbent
Assumed office 4 June 2009
Preceded by	Somnath Chatterjee
Member of the Lok Sabha for Sasaram, Bihar
Incumbent
Assumed office 2004
Personal details
Born	(1945-03-31) 31 March 1945 Sasaram, Bengal Presidency, British India (now in Bihar, India)
Political party	Indian National Congress
Spouse(s)	Manjul Kumar
Children	1 son and 2 daughters
Residence	New Delhi, India
Alma mater	University of Delhi
Religion	Hinduism
As of June 3, 2009 Source: [1]

Meira Kumar (Hindi: hi:मीरा कुमार) is an Indian politician and a five time Member of Parliament. She was elected unopposed as the first woman Speaker of Lok Sabha on 3 June 2009. She was born on March 31, 1945 in Bihar, India.

She is a lawyer and a former diplomat. Prior to being a member of the 15th Lok Sabha, she has been elected earlier to the 8th, 11th, 12th and 14th Lok Sabha, wherein she remained Cabinet Minister in the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment (2004–2009).

Early life

Meira Kumar was born in the Patna district in Bihar to the former Deputy Prime Minister and prominent leader Babu Jagjivan Ram and a freedom fighter, Indrani Devi.

She went to Welham Girls School, Dehradun and Maharani Gayatri Devi Girls' Public School, Jaipur. She did her M.A, L.L.B, Educated at Indraprastha College and Miranda House, Delhi University.

Career

Foreign Service

In 1970, she joined the Indian Foreign Service and spent her life in many countries.

Political career

Meira Kumar entered electoral politics in 1985 and was elected from Bijnor in Uttar Pradesh defeating political heavyweights like Ram Vilas Paswan and Mayawati, two powerful dalit leaders. She was a member of the eighth, eleventh and twelfth Lok Sabha's from Karol Bagh in Delhi. She lost her seat in the BJP wave of 1999, but was able to get re-elected with a record majority from her father's former constituency of Sasaram in Bihar in 2004 and 2009.

She served in the Congress-led Government as the Minister of Social Justice and Empowerment from 2004 to 2009. In 2009 she was briefly inducted as member of the cabinet as Union Minister for Water Resources. On being nominated for the position of speaker, she submitted her resignation three days after assuming ministerial office. She was elected the Speaker of Lok Sabha, thereby becoming the first woman speaker of the country.

It has wrongly been misreported in Media that she had spent around 10 crore Indian Rupees to make foreign visits. The Parliament Secretariat claimed that some news papers had misreported and created the impression that this was spent on holidays abroad. It clarified that the money was spent not by her alone but by the Parliamentary delegation which included several MPs from all political parties, and that each and every visit was for official business. In her official capacity, the Speaker has to lead Indian Parliamentary Delegations to the Conferences of the Inter- Parliamentary Union (IPU) and the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association (CPA), of which India is a member," the statement said. However the 29 trips made in a mere period of 37 months(an average of 1 trip per 37 days) is unprecedented and has been seen as sheer waste and misuse of public funds in context of a developing country like India.

Personal life

Meira Kumar is married to Manjul Kumar, a Supreme Court lawyer and they have three children, one boy and two girls, Anshul, Swati and Devangana.Anshul, married to Mnica and has one daughter name Anahita. Daughter Swati married to Rnjeet and has a daughter Amrita and a son Anhad.Her second daughter Devangana married to Amit and has a son named Farzan.

She is a keen sportswoman and holds medals for rifle shooting. She is also a published author.

External links

• Meira Kumar Biography Govt. of India Portal
• Kamal Nath gives clean chit to Lok Sabha Speaker Meira Kumar in bungalow controversy