Yashodhara Raje Scindia (born 19 June 1954) is an Indian politician and Minister of Sports and Youth Welfare, Technical Education and Skill Development and Employment of

Madhya Pradesh Madhya Pradesh (, ; meaning 'central province') is a state in central India. Its capital is Bhopal, and the largest city is Indore, with Jabalpur, Ujjain, Gwalior, Sagar, and Rewa being the other major cities. Madhya Pradesh is the seco ...

. She is also the former Minister for Commerce, Industries and Employment in

Government of Madhya Pradesh Government of Madhya Pradesh also known as the State Government of Madhya Pradesh, or locally as the State Government, is the supreme governing authority of the Indian state of Madhya Pradesh and its 52 districts. It consists of an executive ...

. She is the youngest daughter of

Jivajirao Scindia Maharaja Jivajirao Scindia KStJ (26 June 1916 – 16 July 1961) was an Indian prince and government official. In the British Raj, he was the ruling Maharaja of the princely state of Gwalior in central India from 1925 until 1947. Afte ...

Maratha The Marathi people ( Marathi: मराठी लोक) or Marathis are an Indo-Aryan ethnolinguistic group who are indigenous to Maharashtra in western India. They natively speak Marathi, an Indo-Aryan language. Maharashtra was formed as ...

Maharaja of Gwalior Gwalior state was a semi-autonomous Maratha state. It was centred in modern-day Madhya Pradesh, arising due to the rise of the Maratha Empire and fragmentation of the Mughal Empire. It was ruled by the Scindia, House of Scindia (anglicized fro ...

and the Late Rajmata Vijayaraje Scindia of Gwalior. She was first elected from

Gwalior (Lok Sabha constituency) Gwalior Lok Sabha seat is one of the 29 Lok Sabha constituencies in the Indian state of Madhya Pradesh state. This constituency covers the entire Gwalior district and part of Shivpuri district. Vidhan Sabha segments Gwalior Lok Sabha constitu ...

to the 14th Lok Sabha via a by-poll in 2007 and again in 2009 General Election. She is a

Member of Legislative Assembly A member of the Legislative Assembly (MLA) is a representative elected by the voters of a constituency to a legislative assembly. Most often, the term refers to a subnational assembly such as that of a state, province, or territory of a country. ...

from

Shivpuri Shivpuri is a city and a municipality in Shivpuri district located in the central Indian state of Madhya Pradesh. It is in the Gwalior Division of northwest Madhya Pradesh and is the administrative headquarters of Shivpuri District. It is sit ...

constituency in

since 2013. She was educated at The Cathedral and John Connon School in

Mumbai Mumbai (, ; also known as Bombay — List of renamed Indian cities and states#Maharashtra, the official name until 1995) is the capital city of the Indian States and union territories of India, state of Maharashtra and the ''de facto'' fin ...

, then the Presentation Convent, Kodaikanal, and her final 2 years at the Scindia Kanya Vidyalaya, Gwalior, a school founded by her mother.

Personal life and family

Her siblings are Vasundhra Raje Scindia former Chief Minister of

Rajasthan Rajasthan (; lit. 'Land of Kings') is a state in northern India. It covers or 10.4 per cent of India's total geographical area. It is the largest Indian state by area and the seventh largest by population. It is on India's northwestern s ...

, late

Madhavrao Scindia Madhavrao Jivajirao Scindia (10 March 1945 – 30 September 2001) was an Indian politician and a minister in the Government of India. He was a member of the Indian National Congress party. Scindia was the son of Jiwajirao Scindia, the last rul ...

, Padmavati Raje 'Akkasaheb' Burman and Usharaje Rana. Usha Raje Rana married

Pashupati Shamsher Jang Bahadur Rana Pashupati Shamsher Jang Bahadur Rana ( ne, पशुपति शम्शेर जङ्ग बहादुर राणा) is a politician from the Rana dynasty. He served in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Nepal), Ministry of Foreign Affair ...

, grandson of

His Highness Highness (abbreviation HH, oral address Your Highness) is a formal style used to address (in second person) or refer to (in third person) certain members of a reigning or formerly reigning dynasty. It is typically used with a possessive adject ...

Shree Shree Shree

Maharaja Mahārāja (; also spelled Maharajah, Maharaj) is a Sanskrit title for a "great ruler", "great king" or " high king". A few ruled states informally called empires, including ruler raja Sri Gupta, founder of the ancient Indian Gupta Empire, a ...

Sir ''Sir'' is a formal honorific address in English for men, derived from Sire in the High Middle Ages. Both are derived from the old French "Sieur" (Lord), brought to England by the French-speaking Normans, and which now exist in French only as ...

Mohan Shamsher Jang Bahadur Rana Field-Marshal Shree Shree Shree Maharaja Sir Mohan Shumsher Jung Bahadur Rana ( ne, मोहन शम्शेर जङ्गबहादुर राणा), GCB, GCIE, GBE (23 December 1885 – 6 January 1967) was the prime minister ...

Nepal Nepal (; ne, :ne:नेपाल, नेपाल ), formerly the Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal ( ne, सङ्घीय लोकतान्त्रिक गणतन्त्र नेपाल ), is a landlocked country in S ...

is the now erstwhile Maharaja of Nepal. Her brother was

who was born in 1945. He was an eminent politician belonging to 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 E ...

party as opposed to his mother and sisters who belong to the

Bhartiya 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 ...

. He was married to Madhavi Raje Scindia of Nepal and had two children Chitrangada Raje Scindia who married into the erstwhile royal family of Kashmir and Jyotiraditya Madhavrao Scindia the former Member of Parliament from the Congress Party of the Guna constituency in Madhya Pradesh. Madhav Rao died in a plane crash in 2001. Her other sister is Vasundhara Raje Scindia of Dholpur who is a member of the Bhartiya Janata Party. Vasundhara has one son Dushyant Singh the Yuvraj of Dholpur who is currently the Member of Parliament from the

Jhalawar Jhalawar () is a city, municipal council and headquarter in Jhalawar district of the Indian state of Rajasthan. It is located in the southeastern part of the state. It was the capital of the former princely state of Jhalawar, and is the admin ...

in Rajasthan. Yashodhara moved to New Orleans, USA in 1977 after marrying Sidharth Bhansali a cardiologist. She has 3 children, Akshay a producer at MTV Desi in New York (26 yrs), Abhishek a student at the NYU Stern School of business (born in 1985) and Trishala a student at NYU (born in 1988). Whilst there, she was amongst other things, board member of the Delta Festival Ballet, an Advisory Board Member of the Contemporary Art Center, a Fellow of the New Orleans Museum of Art as well as single-handedly raised a quarter of a million dollars for the Audubon zoological society. The funds were dedicated to a permanent Indian exhibit space at the Audubon zoo (Voted the # 3 zoo in the whole of USA). After raising the funds she conceptualized and supervised the making of the entire exhibit which was made by local craftsmen in India and then transported in small pieces by sea and re-assembled at the site. She finalized her divorce and entered politics after returning to India in 1994.

Political life and career

She returned to India in 1994 and went into formal politics, contesting the Madhya Pradesh State Assembly Elections in 1998 as a member of the Bhartiya Janata Party and then being re-elected 5 years later once again, for a second term in 2003 in the State Assembly elections. She is an active member of her State Legislative Party. She served in Madhya Pradesh Government as a Cabinet Minister for Tourism, Sports & Youth Welfare. In October/November 2006 Yashodhara created a controversy of sorts when she got the BJP to issue a notice saying that she would be officially addressed as "Shrimant" which means your highness or your majesty. In by-elections to be held in early March 2007, she has been nominated as the party's candidate from Gwalior, Madhya Pradesh. On Sunday 11 March 2007 Yashodhara Raje Scindia of the BJP was declared elected to the Gwalior Lok Sabha seat. She defeated her nearest Congress rival Ashok Singh by over 35,000 votes. On 8 December 2013 she won Legislative Assembly elections in Shivpuri with 76,330 votes. Again, she won from Shivpuri Assembly constituency in 2018 with 24,282.

Ancestry

References

External links

Yashodhara Raje Scindia
Rediff - 28 February 1998

17 November 2003
Yashodhara wins Gwalior bypoll hands down
12 March 2007
Jyotiraditya Schindia
{{DEFAULTSORT:Scindia, Yashodhara Yashodhara Bharatiya Janata Party politicians from Madhya Pradesh 1954 births Living people India MPs 2004–2009 British emigrants to India India MPs 2009–2014 Madhya Pradesh MLAs 1998–2003 Madhya Pradesh MLAs 2003–2008 Lok Sabha members from Madhya Pradesh Madhya Pradesh MLAs 2013–2018 State cabinet ministers of Madhya Pradesh Indian female royalty People from Gwalior 21st-century Indian women politicians 21st-century Indian politicians Madhya Pradesh MLAs 2018–2023 Women members of the Madhya Pradesh Legislative Assembly

Personal life and family

Political life and career

Ancestry

See also

References

External links