Dharmendra Pradhan

Dharmendra Pradhan (born June 26, 1969) is an Indian politician serving as the Minister of Education and Minister of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship in the Government of India.

An alumnus of Talcher College and Utkal University, he has also been the Minister of Petroleum & Natural Gas and the Minister of Steel.

He was born on June 26th, 1969, into the Khandayat caste in Odisha state, and hails from the city of Talcher.

He became an A.B.V.P. activist while studying as a higher secondary student at Talcher College (Orissa) and later became the president of the student union of Talcher College.

Pradhan started his political career as an Akhil Bhartiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) activist in 1983 and was elected as its secretary.

He holds a post-graduate degree in Anthropology from Utkal University in Bhubaneswar.

Pradhan is the son of Debendra Pradhan, who was also a Minister of State in the Vajpayee government from 1999 to 2004.

After serving in different positions in the BJP, he was elected to the Lok Sabha in 2004 from Deogarh.

He was also elected the member of the Rajya Sabha for two terms each from Bihar and Madhya Pradesh.

Dharmendra Pradhan has been the longest serving Minister for Petroleum and Natural Gas in the history of independent India.

Earlier, he was a member of the 14th Lok Sabha.

Joining as the Minister of State (In-charge) in 2014, he was later promoted to the Cabinet rank in 2017.

Pradhan was promoted to Cabinet Minister on 3rd of September 2017.

Shri Pradhan currently represents Madhya Pradesh in the Rajya Sabha as a Member of Parliament.

On May 31, 2019, Shri Pradhan began his second consecutive tenure at the Ministry of Petroleum & Natural Gas, Government of India.

Popularly called the "Ujjwala Man", Pradhan is credited with the success of the Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana launched by the Ministry of Petroleum & Natural Gas under which over 8 million LPG connections have been provided to women from Below Poverty Line (BPL) families over the past 6 years.

Ujjwala Yojana has been hailed as the vehicle for driving women empowerment and social change.

International Energy Agency termed Ujjwala Yojana as a "game-changer in ending energy poverty".

IIM Ahmedabad published a working paper on "Lighting up Lives through Cooking Gas and transforming society".

PM Ujjwala Yojana, among other initiatives is also considered one of the key factors behind the re-election of the Modi Government in 2019 Lok Sabha election.

Pradhan has led some key decisions in the hydrocarbon sector.

Pradhan, supported by the Union Cabinet, has brought in a new Hydrocarbon Exploration & Licensing Policy, which through its uniform licensing for explorations and production of all forms of hydrocarbon, open acreage policy and marketing and pricing freedom will enhance domestic oil & gas production with substantial investment in the sector in India and generate sizable employment.

He also led consumer initiatives like PAHAL which is the world's largest Direct Benefit Transfer Scheme and the Give It Up campaign, that was liberally supported by the Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi, aimed at encouraging affluent citizens to surrender their LPG subsidy for the needy receiving a successful response of 10 million consumers.

Dharmendra Pradhan, as the Petroleum Minister has been driving India's energy transition balancing India's energy demand and India's commitment to climate change mitigation efforts.

He has provided leadership to efforts around making India, a gas-based economy.

With around $60 billion of investments lined up in India's gas infrastructure, Pradhan has been working to expand the city gas distribution network and piped gas network in the country.

He has underlined that India is going to chart its own path of energy transition which will balance India's energy demand and decarbonisation efforts.

In a brief tenure as the Minister of Steel, Dharmendra Pradhan has been working to facilitate augmentation of production capacity, ensure growth of secondary steel sector, jobs creation, ensures value addition and import substitution.

With particular focus on enhancing steel usage in India, he launched Ispati Irada, a collaborative campaign to involve all stakeholders in this drive.

He also launched Mission Purvodaya in steel sector to drive transformation of eastern India through the growth of steel industry which has majority presence in eastern India.

As Minister of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship, Pradhan launched many key initiatives focusing on reskilling and upskilling the manpower of India and focusing on bridging the skill gap for the Indian youth.

During his tenure, the total number of Industrial Training Institutes (ITIs) increased by over 40% and student enrollment increased by over 28% till 2019.

He brought in new paradigms in the regulatory environment by mooting National Council for Vocational Education and Training (NCVET) as new unified national reg IBM, Adobe etc. to introduce new age skills related to Industry 4.0.

He also launched one of the world's largest counselling programs named Skill Saathi.

In May 2019, Pradhan continued his Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas and got the Ministry of Steel.

In July 2021, Pradhan became Minister of Education in Second Modi ministry after the Cabinet reshuffle replacing Ramesh Pokhriyal.