Pratibha Patil

Biography

Pratibha Patil was born in 1934 in Nadgaon, Jalgaon district, Maharashtra, the daughter of a lawyer. She earned a master's degree in political science and economics at a Jalgaon college affiliated to Poona University and a law degree from Government Law College, Bombay, then practised at the Jalgaon district court.

Elected to the Maharashtra Legislative Assembly in 1962 at 27, she held the Edlabad seat from 1967 to 1985 and served in several state cabinets, in portfolios including social welfare, education and housing, and briefly as leader of the opposition. She sat in the Rajya Sabha from 1985 to 1990, as its deputy chairman from 1986 to 1988, and represented Amravati in the Lok Sabha from 1991 to 1996. She also led the Maharashtra Congress committee and founded educational trusts, a sugar cooperative and a cooperative bank.

In 2004 she became the first woman governor of Rajasthan. The United Progressive Alliance nominated her for president in 2007 as a compromise candidate; despite controversy over her record she defeated Bhairon Singh Shekhawat and on 25 July 2007 became India's first woman president.

Her term was marked by a record number of commuted death sentences and costly foreign trips, and after she left office in 2012 she faced criticism over a retirement home on military land in Pune and over gifts she had to return.