Droupadi Murmu (, born 20 June 1958) is an Indian politician who has been serving as the 15th

president of India The president of India ( IAST: ) is the head of state of the Republic of India. The president is the nominal head of the executive, the first citizen of the country, as well as the commander-in-chief of the Indian Armed Forces. Droupadi Mur ...

since 25 July 2022. She is the first person belonging to the

tribal The term tribe is used in many different contexts to refer to a category of human social group. The predominant worldwide usage of the term in English is in the discipline of anthropology. This definition is contested, in part due to conflic ...

community and also the second woman after

Pratibha Patil Prathibha DeviSingh Patil (born 19 December 1934) is an Indian politician and lawyer who served as the 12th president of India spanning from 2007 to 2012. She is the first woman to become the president of India. A member of the Indian National ...

to hold the office. She is also the youngest person to occupy the post and the first President born in Independent India. Prior to her presidency she served as the ninth

governor of Jharkhand The governor of Jharkhand is a nominal head of the Indian state of Jharkhand and permanent representative of president of India. The governor is appointed by the president of India for a five-year term. Raj Bhavan in Ranchi serves as the offici ...

between 2015 and 2021, and held various portfolios in the cabinet of

Government of Odisha The government of the Indian state of Odisha and its 30 districts consists of an executive, led by the Governor of Odisha, a judiciary, and a legislative branch. Like other states in India, the head of state of Odisha is the Governor, appoi ...

between 2000 and 2004. Before entering politics, she worked as a clerk in the State Irrigation and Power Department from 1979 to 1983, and then as a teacher in

Rairangpur Rairangpur () is a city and a tehsil of Mayurbhanj district of the state of Odisha, India. It is 287 kilometers from the state capital Bhubaneswar, 82 kilometers from the district headquarters of Baripada, and about 73 kilometers from Jamshedpur ...

until 1997.

Personal life

Droupadi Murmu was born to a Santali family on 20 June 1958, in Uparbeda village in the Baidaposi area of

, Odisha. Her father Biranchi Narayan Tudu was a farmer. Her father and grandfather were traditional heads (designated

Sarpanch A sarpanch ( IAST: ''Sarpañch'' Hindi: ''सरपंच'') or Gram Pradhan or Mukhiya is a decision-maker, elected by the village-level constitutional body of local self-government called the Gram Sabha (village government) in India. The Sarp ...

) of the village council (

Gram Panchayat Gram Panchayat () is a basic village-governing institute in Indian villages. It is a democratic structure at the grass-roots level in India. It is a political institute, acting as cabinet of the village. The Gram Sabha work as the general bod ...

). Her family named her Puti Tudu. She was renamed by her school teacher to Droupadi, and her name was changed several times to those including Durpadi and Dorpdi in the past. Murmu studied elementary education at the local primary school in Uparbeda. At age five, she moved to Bhubaneswar for higher studies. She completed secondary education from Girl's High School Unit-2, and graduated in B.A. from

Rama Devi Women's College Rama Devi Women's University, formerly known as Rama Devi Women's Autonomous College, is a state university for women in Bhubaneswar, Odisha, India. Named after freedom fighter and social reformer Ramadevi Choudhury. History The institution st ...

. She married Shyam Charan Murmu, a banker, in 1980 with whom she had two sons and a daughter. Her husband, two sons, mother, and a brother all died in a span of 7 years, from 2009 to 2015. She is a follower of the

Brahma Kumaris The Brahma Kumaris are a spiritual movement that originated in Hyderabad, Sindh, during the 1930s. She never claimed for a full salary at the school.

Political career

In 1997, Droupadi Murmu was elected as the councillor of the

Nagar Panchayat A nagar panchayat (town panchayat; ) or Notified Area Council (NAC) in India is a settlement in transition from rural to urban and therefore a form of an urban political unit comparable to a municipality. An urban centre with more than 12,000 ...

as an independent candidate from a reserved seat for women. She then joined the

Bharatiya Janata Party The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP; ; ) is a political party in India, and one of the two major Indian political parties alongside the Indian National Congress. Since 2014, it has been the ruling political party in India under Narendra Modi ...

(BJP). She won the 2000 Odisha Legislative Assembly election from Rairangpur Assembly constituency and served two terms in the

Odisha Legislative Assembly The Odisha Legislative Assembly is the unicameral state legislature of Odisha state in India. The seat of the Legislative Assembly is at Bhubaneswar, the capital of the state. The Legislative Assembly comprises 147 Members of Legislative As ...

between 2000 and 2009. During the BJP and BJD coalition government in Odisha, she was the

Minister of State Minister of State is a title borne by politicians in certain countries governed under a parliamentary system. In some countries a Minister of State is a Junior Minister of government, who is assigned to assist a specific Cabinet Minister. In ...

with Independent Charge for Commerce and Transportation from 6 March 2000 to 6 August 2002, and Fisheries and Animal Resources Development from 6 August 2002 to 16 May 2004. In 2007, she received the Nilkanth Award for the Best MLA of the Odisha Legislative Assembly. In 2009, she lost the Lok Sabha election from Mayurbhanj Lok Sabha constituency as the BJD and BJP alliance had ended. She was elected to the BJP National Executive (ST Morcha) in 2013, and was the district president until 2015.

Governor of Jharkhand (2015–2021)

Governor of Jharkhand Draupadi Murmu with Prime Minister Narendra Modi

Murmu was sworn in as the

Governor of Jharkhand The governor of Jharkhand is a nominal head of the Indian state of Jharkhand and permanent representative of president of India. The governor is appointed by the president of India for a five-year term. Raj Bhavan in Ranchi serves as the offici ...

on 18 May 2015, becoming the first woman to hold the position. The BJP was in power in the

Jharkhand Government The Government of Jharkhand also known as the State Government of Jharkhand, or locally as State Government, is the supreme governing authority of the Indian state of Jharkhand and its Districts of Jharkhand, 24 districts. It consists of an exec ...

for most of her six-year tenure as a governor and was also in power in the

Union Government The Government of India ( ISO: ; often abbreviated as GoI), known as the Union Government or Central Government but often simply as the Centre, is the national government of the Republic of India, a federal democracy located in South Asia, ...

throughout her tenure. She administered the oath of office to

Hemant Soren Hemant Soren (born 10 August 1975) is an Indian politician from Jharkhand, who is currently the Chief Minister of Jharkhand. Previously, he had also served as the Chief Minister of Jharkhand from July 2013 to December 2014. He is also the pre ...

Chief Minister of Jharkhand The Chief Minister of Jharkhand is the chief executive of the Indian state of Jharkhand. In accordance with the Constitution of India, the governor is a state's ''de jure'' head, but ''de facto'' executive authority rests with the chief ministe ...

in 2019. Ratan Tirkey, a former BJP politician and activist, said that Murmu had not done enough to make sure that the self-governance rights granted to tribal communities were properly implemented. These rights were granted under the Fifth Schedule and the

Panchayats (Extension to Scheduled Areas) Act, 1996 The Provisions of the Panchayats (Extension to Scheduled Areas) Act, 1996 or PESA is a law enacted by the Government of India for ensuring self governance through traditional Gram Sabhas for people living in the Scheduled Areas of India. Schedu ...

or PESA. Tirkey said, "Despite several requests, the then governor never exercised her powers to implement the Fifth Schedule provisions and Pesa in letter and spirit". Her six-year tenure as Governor began in May 2015 and ended in July 2021.

Pathalgadi movement

In 2016–2017, the

Raghubar Das ministry This is a list of minister from Raghubar Das cabinets starting from 28 December 2014. Raghubar Das is a politician belonging to the Bharatiya Janata Party, and was sworn in as the Chief Minister of Jharkhand on 28 December 2014. On 28 December 2 ...

was seeking amendments to the Chhotanagpur Tenancy Act, 1908, and the Santhal Pargana Tenancy Act, 1949. These two original laws had safeguarded the rights of tribal communities on their land. According to the existing laws, land transactions could only be done between tribal communities. The new amendments gave the tribals the right to allow the government to make commercial use of tribal land and to take tribal land on lease. The proposed bill amending the existing law had been approved by the

Jharkhand Legislative Assembly The Jharkhand Vidhan Sabha or the Jharkhand Legislative Assembly is the unicameral state legislature of Jharkhand Jharkhand (; ; ) is a state in eastern India. The state shares its border with the states of West Bengal to the east, Chha ...

. The bills were sent to Murmu for approval in November 2016. The tribal people had strongly objected to the proposed law. During the

Pathalgadi movement The Pathalgadi movement was started by tribals in Khunti district of Jharkhand as a resistance movement to assert their rights, including the right to sovereign territory. Pathalgadi literally translates to 'carving a stone'. On these stones orders ...

, protests were held against the proposed amendments to the tenancy acts. In one incident, the protest turned violent and the tribals abducted the security detail of the BJP

Member of Parliament A member of parliament (MP) is the representative in parliament of the people who live in their electoral district. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, this term refers only to members of the lower house since upper house members of ...

Karia Munda Kariya Munda (born 20 April 1936) is an Indian politician and the former Deputy Speaker of the 15th Lok Sabha. He has been a former minister in the Government of India, in the Governments led by the Janata Party in 1977 and by Bhartiya Janata P ...

. Police responded with a violent crack-down on tribal communities, that caused the death of a tribal man. Criminal cases were filed against more than 200 people including the tribal rights activist Stan Swamy. Murmu was criticized for her soft stand on police aggression against tribal communities during the movement. According to woman tribal rights activist Aloka Kujur she was expected to speak up to the government in support of the tribals but this did not happen, and instead she appealed to the Pathalgarhi agitation leaders to repose faith in the constitution. Murmu had received total of 192 memorandums against the amendments in the bill. Then opposition leader

had said that the BJP government wanted to acquire tribal land through the two amendment Bills for the benefit of corporates. Opposition parties

Jharkhand Mukti Morcha Jharkhand Mukti Morcha ( lit. ''Jharkhand Liberation Front''; JMM) is a State political party in the Indian state of Jharkhand which was founded by Binod Bihari Mahato. It has one seat in the 17th Lok Sabha. Shibu Soren is the president of t ...

, the

Indian National Congress The Indian National Congress (INC), colloquially the Congress Party but often simply the Congress, is a political party in India with widespread roots. Founded in 1885, it was the first modern nationalist movement to emerge in the British Em ...

, the Jharkhand Vikas Morcha and others had put intense pressure against the bill. On 24 May 2017, Murmu relented and refused to give assent to the bills and returned the bill to the state government along with the memorandums she had received. The bill was later withdrawn in August 2017.

Religion and land bill

In 2017, she approved the Freedom of Religion Bill, 2017, and the bill to amend the Land Acquisition 2013 Act passed by the Jharkhand Assembly. The new religion bill makes it an offence subject to a penalty of three years in prison, to coerce or lure a person to convert their religion. If the person coerced is a member of a Scheduled Caste or tribe, a minor, or female, the prison term increases to four years. Fines can be levied in any case. The bill also made it mandatory for voluntary converts, to inform the Deputy Commissioner about their conversion, and to give full details about the circumstances. The amendments in the Land Acquisition Act, 2013, involved changes in the compensation duration and requirements for social impacts assessment. According to the passed law, monetary compensation for government acquisition of tribal land must be paid within six months of acquisition. The requirement for

social impact assessment Social impact assessment (SIA) is a methodology to review the social effects of infrastructure projects and other development interventions. Although SIA is usually applied to planned interventions, the same techniques can be used to evaluate the s ...

s was dropped for some types of infrastructure projects.

Presidential campaign

In June 2022, the BJP nominated Murmu as the National Democratic Alliance (NDA)'s candidate for

President of India The president of India ( IAST: ) is the head of state of the Republic of India. The president is the nominal head of the executive, the first citizen of the country, as well as the commander-in-chief of the Indian Armed Forces. Droupadi Mur ...

for the 2022 election the following month.

Yashwant Sinha Yashwant Sinha (, born 6 November 1937) is an Indian administrator and politician. He served as the Minister of Finance from 1990 until 1991 under Prime Minister Chandra Shekhar and again from March 1998 to July 2002 under Prime Minister Atal B ...

, was nominated as the candidate for president by the opposition parties. During her election campaign, Murmu visited various states seeking support for her candidature. Several opposition parties like BJD,

YSRCP The Yuvajana Shramika Rythu Congress Party (YSRCP or YCP; ) is an Indian regional political party based in the state of Andhra Pradesh. Its president Y. S. Jagan Mohan Reddy serves as the state's chief minister. It is currently the fifth la ...

, JMM, BSP, SS, JD(S) among others had announced support for her candidature prior to polling. On 21 July 2022, Murmu secured a clear majority in the 2022 Presidential election defeating common opposition candidate

with 676,803 electoral votes (64.03% of total) in 21 of the 28 states (including in the union territory of

Puducherry Puducherry or Pondicherry may refer to: * Puducherry (union territory), a union territory of India ** Pondicherry, capital of the union territory of Puducherry ** Puducherry district, a district of the union territory of Puducherry ** Puducherry t ...

) to become the 15th President of India.

Presidency (2022–present)

On 26 July 2022, Droupadi Murmu took oath as the 15th

, oath of which was administered by the 48th Chief Justice of India N. V. Ramana in the presence of former Presidents, Vice President, Prime Minister and other delegates. She is the first person from India's designated tribal communities to be elected president.See links below *https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/07/21/india-president-tribal/ *https://www.dw.com/en/india-tribal-politician-draupadi-murmu-wins-presidential-vote/a-62559372 *https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/21/world/asia/india-president.html *https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/7/25/droupadi-murmu-takes-oath-as-indias-first-tribal-president *https://www.lemonde.fr/en/international/article/2022/07/28/droupadi-murmu-india-s-first-tribal-president_5991733_4.html *https://www.independent.co.uk/asia/india/draupadi-murmu-india-president-tribal-b2128395.html *https://www.freepressjournal.in/weekend/president-droupadi-murmu-decoding-what-women-leaders-bring-to-the-table-at-the-workplace *https://www.csw.org.uk/2022/07/27/press/5776/article.htm *https://www.culturalsurvival.org/news/droupadi-murmu-sworn-indias-first-indigenous-president *https://www.northeasttoday.in/tag/draupadi-murmu/ *https://www.mansworldindia.com/more/news/droupadi-murmu-makes-history-by-becoming-indias-first-tribal-female-president/ *https://jharkhandstatenews.com/article/top-stories/5563/india-s-first-adivasi-president-droupadi-murmu-may-be-a-star-attraction-on-the-world-indigenous-day-2022/ She is the youngest and first individual born after India's

independence Independence is a condition of a person, nation, country, or state in which residents and population, or some portion thereof, exercise self-government, and usually sovereignty, over its territory. The opposite of independence is the statu ...

in 1947 to have been elected president. Murmu is only the second woman after

to serve as President of India. Murmu addressed the nation for the first time as the President of India, on 14 August 2022, Independence day eve. She greeted the citizens of the country on the 75th Independence. In September 2022, she launched a government program 'Pradhanmantri TB mukht Bharat' - an initiative to eradicate

Tuberculosis Tuberculosis (TB) is an infectious disease usually caused by '' Mycobacterium tuberculosis'' (MTB) bacteria. Tuberculosis generally affects the lungs, but it can also affect other parts of the body. Most infections show no symptoms, in ...

from the country. She became the first ever

, to inaugurate the ' Mysuru Dasara' a 10 day state festival in Karnataka. In the initial months, Murmu paid vast visits to the north-eastern states of the country including

Assam Assam (; ) is a state in northeastern India, south of the eastern Himalayas along the Brahmaputra and Barak River valleys. Assam covers an area of . The state is bordered by Bhutan and Arunachal Pradesh to the north; Nagaland and Manipur ...

Mizoram Mizoram () is a state in Northeast India, with Aizawl as its seat of government and capital city. The name of the state is derived from "Mizo", the self-described name of the native inhabitants, and "Ram", which in the Mizo language means "lan ...

Nagaland Nagaland () is a landlocked state in the northeastern region of India. It is bordered by the Indian states of Arunachal Pradesh to the north, Assam to the west, Manipur to the south and the Sagaing Region of Myanmar to the east. Its capital cit ...

and

Sikkim Sikkim (; ) is a state in Northeastern India. It borders the Tibet Autonomous Region of China in the north and northeast, Bhutan in the east, Province No. 1 of Nepal in the west and West Bengal in the south. Sikkim is also close to the Silig ...

and engaged in ceremonies of various development projects. In November 2022, she paid her first visit to her home state

Odisha Odisha (English: , ), formerly Orissa ( the official name until 2011), is an Indian state located in Eastern India. It is the 8th largest state by area, and the 11th largest by population. The state has the third largest population of ...

after assuming the office of the President, to participate in the launch of various programmes. During this visit she visited her alma mater school and later interacted with school children along the sideways of the road and walked 2 kilometers to pay obeisance to the deities of Puri Jagannath Temple.

Political positions

Murmu has expressed admiration for India's first prime minister,

Jawaharlal Nehru Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru (; ; ; 14 November 1889 – 27 May 1964) was an Indian anti-colonial nationalist, secular humanist, social democrat— * * * * and author who was a central figure in India during the middle of the 20t ...

. She has hailed

Mahatma Gandhi Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (; ; 2 October 1869 – 30 January 1948), popularly known as Mahatma Gandhi, was an Indian lawyer, anti-colonial nationalist Quote: "... marks Gandhi as a hybrid cosmopolitan figure who transformed ... anti- ...

and also

B. R. Ambedkar Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar (14 April 1891 – 6 December 1956) was an Indian jurist, economist, social reformer and political leader who headed the committee drafting the Constitution of India from the Constituent Assembly debates, served ...

for his contributions in making the

Constitution of India The Constitution of India ( IAST: ) is the supreme law of India. The document lays down the framework that demarcates fundamental political code, structure, procedures, powers, and duties of government institutions and sets out fundamental ...

Electoral performance

References

External links

, - , - , - {{DEFAULTSORT:Murmu, Droupadi 1958 births Living people 21st-century Indian politicians 21st-century Indian women politicians Adivasi politicians Bharatiya Janata Party politicians from Odisha Female heads of state Governors of Jharkhand Odisha MLAs 2000–2004 Odisha MLAs 2004–2009 People from Mayurbhanj district Presidents of India Santali people Women in Odisha politics Women presidents Women state governors of India