P. Chidambaram
Palaniappan Chidambaram was born on 16th September, 1945, in the Sivaganga district of Tamil Nadu. He currently holds the most coveted portfolio of Finance minister in the congress party- led United Progressive Alliance coalition government led by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. He has held the portfolio since May 2004.
He is married to Nalini Chidambaram, a prominent lady lawyer practising with the Madras High Court, primarily in women’s issues. He has a son Karthik Chidambaram who is also into politics. P. Chidambaram was born into an affluent family. He holds a B.SC., a LL.B. and a M.B.A. and was educated at the University of Madras and Harvard University.
In 1969, he enrolled as an Advocate in the Madras High Court and established a successful law practice. He started his political career at the age of 23. He was union leader of MRF and worked his way up in the Congress party. He was the TN Youth Congress president and then the general secretary of the TNC unit. His biggest break was when the Congress gave him the ticket to contest the Lok Sabha for the first time in 1984. His national prominence is largely to due to Rajiv Gandhi. His rise from his youth congress days to his status of Finance minister has been truly a story of steady growth from the bottom to the top. P. Chidambaran is a simple practical person. Whether he is addressing the financial media in Mumbai or presenting India’s views at the World Economic Forum at Switzerland he does it with the same elan’. He is the trustee of the Rajiv Gandhi Foundation, associated with charitable causes and a trustee of the Tamil ‘llakkiya Chintanai’ (Tamil Literary Foundation- literally, Tamil Literary Thoughts) Chennai, India. He is fond of literature and sports. He has also delivered many lectures at home and abroad. In 1998-97, his ‘dream budget’ as it came to be called received acclaim from economists. He was applauded for the way in which he had brought discipline in government spending and for the way in which he had launched an ambitious tax reform programme, to tackle an unwieldy fiscal deficit. P. Chidambaram. There are many distinctive things about Chidambaram. He never takes his oath in the name of God, always in the name of the constitution showcasing that truthfulness in law is more important to him than religion. On the lighter side, he is a self confessed chocoholic. He eats chocolates when he’s low, when he’s happy, and even when he wants to concentrate. His immense love for children has led him to contribute immense parts of his wealth to charities associated with childcare.
Chidambaram doesn’t believe in bending rules and laws. He has been known to be in favour of making new rules when old ones become redundant. Yet, Chidambaram has had to face his share of controversies. He represented the bankrupt American energy giant Enron, as a senior lawyer in India, and is again set to revive its Dhabol power project. A firm believer in free trade, Chidambaram believes that only countries that are open to competitive societies can succeed in removing poverty. In a profession where double-speak is the standard, Chidambaram is a man of principles and a man who can be counted on for being straight. With Chidambaram at the helm of economic reforms it is only a matter of time before India’s quest to be an economic superpower sees the light of day.
