Early life and background

Nitish Kumār was born in Bakhtiarpur, Bihar to Kaviraj Ram Lakhan Singh and Parmeshwari Devi. His father was a
freedom fighter and was close to the great Gandhi" class="mw-redirect"">Gandhian Bihar Vibhuti Narayan Sinha"">Anugrah Narayan Sinha, one of the founders of modern
Bihar.
His nickname is 'Munna'.
He is a teetotaler, doesn’t smoke,
and is a frugal eater.
He has a degree in Electrical
Engineering from the Bihar College
of Engineering, now NIT Patna

Political career

Early career

Nitish Kumar participated in Jayaprakash Narayan's movement between 1974 and 1977, and was close, among others, to Satyendra Narayan Sinha, a prominent
leader of the time. He was first elected to the Bihar Legislative Assembly in 1985 as
independate candidate. In 1987, he became the President of the Yuva Lok Dal. In 1989, he became the Secretary-General of
the Janata
Dal in Bihar. He was also elected to the 9th Lok
Sabha the same year.

Union Minister in Center

In 1989, Nitish Kumar was appointed as the Union Minister of State for Agriculture in the Cabinet of Prime
Minister Vishwanath Pratap
Singh. In 1991, he was re-elected to the Lok Sabha and became
General Secretary of the Janata Dal at the national level and the Deputy
Leader of Janata Dal in the Parliament. He represented Barh
parliamentary constituency (Bihar) in the Lok Sabha between 1989 and
2004.

He briefly served as the Union Cabinet as Minister for Railways and Minister for Surface Transport and then as the Minister for Agriculture
in 1998-99. In August 1999, he resigned following the railway accident
at Gaisal in North
East India.

Later that year, he rejoined the Union Cabinet as Minister for Agriculture. From 2001 to May 2004 he served as the Union Cabinet
Minister for Railways in the NDA Government of Bihari Vajpayee"">Atal Bihari Vajpayee. In the 2004 Lok Sabha
elections he contested elections from two constituencies, Barh and Nalanda.
He was elected from Nalanda but lost from his traditional constituency,
Barh. He was the leader of the Janata Dal (United) Parliamentary Party
in the Lok Sabha.

Chief Minister of Bihar

In 2000, Nitish Kumar was appointed the Chief Minister of Bihar but
had to resign 7 days later (March 3, 2000 – March 10, 2000). In November
2005, he led the National Democratic Alliance to
victory in the 2005 Bihar assembly
elections bringing an end to the 15-year rule of the Yadav"">Lalu Prasad Yadav-led Rashtriya Janata Dal. He was sworn in
as the Chief Minister of
Bihar on 24 November 2005.Under his regime Bihar developed
electronic version of RTI Act. In additon to that he also launched
e-shakti, through which the ruralpeople can get information through
telephone on the jobs available at their location under NREGS.

Personal life

On February 22, 1973, Nitish Kumar married Manju Kumari Sinha, a teacher by profession. They have a son, Nishant, who is a graduate of BIT, Mesra.^[5]
His wife died in 2007 at the age of 53.

Awards and recognition

• NDTV Indian of the year - Politics, 2009^[6]
• CNN-IBN Indian of
  the year - Politics, 2008^[7][8]

• The Best Chief Minister,^[9] according to the CNN-IBN and Times"">HT State of the Nation Poll 2007.

• Economics Times "Reformer of the Year 2009".

• 'Polio Eradication Championship Award' 2009, by Rotary Internationals. 3rd Indian to get this award.