Born to a farmer’s family in a village in India’s northern state of Uttar Pradesh on July 10, 1951, Rajnath Singh began his career as a professor in Physics.
He served as the Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh, India’s most populous state and a Cabinet Minister in the Atal Behari Vajpayee Government (1998-2004). He has also served as the president of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) twice, 2005 to 2009 and 2013 to 2014.
In 2014, Singh was appointed Union Minister for Home Affairs by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. This ministry is responsible for homeland security and paramilitary forces. Singh launched two online portals: Cyber Crime Prevention against Women and Children (CCPWC) to check objectionable online content, and the National Database on Sexual Offenders (NDSO) to aid in monitoring and investigation of sexual crimes.
In the 2019 elections, Rajnath Singh contested the elections from Lucknow, a city in his home state of Uttar Pradesh, and won the election. He has been appointed as the Union Minister for Defense. Departments under the Ministry of Defense include the Armed Forces (Army, Air Force, Navy and Coast Guard) and Defense Production (state-owned companies such as Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd., Bharat Electronics Ltd., Bharat Earth Movers Ltd., and state-owned departments such as the Ordnance Factories). The Defense Research and Development Organization is also under the administrative control of the Ministry of Defense.
India’s Defense Ministry is responsible for all defense acquisition, domestic and global. India has the third largest military in the world, and according to SIPRI is among the top two importers of defense equipment in the world. Foreign suppliers to India include Boeing, Lockheed Martin, Frances’s Dassault, Russian government-owned companies, Israel Aircraft Industries, among others.
