Ajit Singh (politician)

Ajit Singh (Hindi: अजित सिंह) is an Indian politician. He is the founder and chief of the Rashtriya Lok Dal, a political party recognized in western part of state of Uttar Pradesh, and son of former Prime Minister of India late Choudhary Charan Singh. He was born on 12 February 1939 at village Bhadola in Meerut, Uttar Pradesh.

Ajit Singh was first elected to Rajya Sabha (the upper house of Indian Parliament) in 1986. 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.

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. He was re-elected to Lok Sabha in Indian general election, 1991. He briefly served as Minister of Food in P. V. Narasimha Rao's cabinet.

Ajit Singh was re-elected in 1996 but lost in 1998. He then founded Rashtriya Lok Dal and was re-elected in 1999, 2004 and 2009.

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

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

He was educated in Col. Brown Cambridge School, Dehradun. He is a B.Sc., from Lucknow University, B.Tech. from IIT Kharagpur and M.S. from Illinois Institute of Technology. He was a computer scientist by profession.

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

Ajit Singh's official bungalow 12, Tughlaq Road during his stint in the parliament as a Member of Parliament remained a much-visited site by the followers of Late Chaudhary Charan Singh who came there to pay their regards to their leader and seek help for their various problems. Thus there was a demand by various political leaders including Samajwadi Party Leader Shivpal Singh Yadav, Chief Minister of Haryana Bhupinder Singh Hooda and Ajit Singh himself to convert 12, Tughlaq Road into Ch. Charan Singh's memorial.

This demand was not accepted by Indian government. Protests were organized by supporters of Ajit Singh by threatening to block water supply to National Capital Region. Ajit Sigh vacated the bungalow on 26 September 2014. Efforts are on by the supporters of Chaudhary Charan Singh to declare 12, Tughlaq Road as his memorial. Ch. Ajit Singh has also demanded a Bharat Ratna for Chaudhary Charan Singh, a demand which has met with support from various quarters.