Ajit Singh (politician)

Ajit singh was first elected to Rajya Sabha (the upper house of Indian Parliament) in 1986 after his father and former prime minister Ch Charan Singh became ill. He was the President of Lok Dal (A) and Janata Party during 1987 and 1988, respectively. In 1989, he was General Secretary of Janata Dal after all the parties decided to merge under the leadership of VP Singh to take on the congress. Ajit Singh brought in most political strength from Uttar Pradesh to VP Singh during that election.[1] At several occasions throughout his political career, Ajit Singh has been a significant political figure in government formations as well as alliances.

He was elected to Lok Sabha (the lower house of Indian Parliament) from Baghpat in 1989. He was Minister of Industry in V. P. Singh's cabinet from December 1989 to November 1990.[1] He was re-elected to Lok Sabha in 1991 Indian general election. He served as Minister of Food in P. V. Narasimha Rao's cabinet.[1]

Ajit Singh was re-elected in 1996 as a Congress candidate but resigned from the party and Lok sabha in 1996. He then founded Rashtriya Lok Dal and was re-elected in 1997 bye-election. He lost the 1998 election and was re-elected in 1999, 2004 and 2009.

From 2001 to 2003, he was Minister of Agriculture in Atal Bihari Vajpayee's government.[1]

After his party joined the ruling United Progressive Alliance in 2011, he was Minister of Civil Aviation from December 2011 to May 2014.[1]

He was the candidate of Muzaffarnagar from RLD and he lost to Sanjeev Balyan of BJP by a margin of 6526 votes.[3]

He is a B.Tech (Computer Science) from IIT Kharagpur and M.S. from Illinois Institute of Technology. He was a computer scientist by profession and one of the first Indians to work with IBM in the 1960s.[1]

He is married to Radhika Singh, and has one son and two daughters.[1] His son Jayant Chaudhary, was a member of 15th Lok Sabha from Mathura, Uttar Pradesh.

• Janata Dal (Ajit)

• Official biographical sketch in Parliament of India website