Arvind Kejriwal

Arvind Kejriwal (born 16 August 1968) is an Indian politician, activist and former bureaucrat, who is serving as the 7th and current Chief Minister of Delhi since 2015, after his first term in the post from 2013 to 2014.

Kejriwal was born in an Agrawal family of Baniyas in Siwani in the Bhiwani district of Haryana, India on 16 August 1968, the first of the three children of Gobind Ram Kejriwal and Gita Devi.

His father was an electrical engineer who graduated from the Birla Institute of Technology, Mesra.

Kejriwal spent most of his childhood in north Indian towns such as Sonipat, Ghaziabad and Hisar.

He was educated at Campus School in Hisar and at Holy Child School at Sonipat.

In 1985, he took the IIT-JEE exam and scored All India Rank (AIR) of 563.

He graduated from Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur, majoring in mechanical engineering.

He joined Tata Steel in 1989 and was posted in Jamshedpur, Bihar.

Kejriwal resigned in 1992, having taken leave of absence to study for the Civil Services Examination.

He spent some time in Calcutta (present-day Kolkata), where he met Mother Teresa, and volunteered with The Missionaries of Charity and at the Ramakrishna Mission in North-East India and at Nehru Yuva Kendra.

Arvind Kejriwal joined the Indian Revenue Service (IRS) as an Assistant Commissioner of Income Tax in 1995, after qualifying through the Civil Services Examination.

In December 1999, while still in service with the Income Tax Department, Kejriwal, Manish Sisodia and others found a movement named Parivartan (which means "change"), in the Sundar Nagar area of Delhi.

A month later, in January 2000, Kejriwal took a sabbatical from work to focus on Parivartan.

Parivartan addressed citizens' grievances related to Public Distribution System (PDS), public works, social welfare schemes, income tax and electricity.

It was not a registered NGO - it ran on individual donations, and was characterised as a jan andolan ("people's movement") by its members.

In 2000, Parivartan filed a public interest litigation (PIL) demanding transparency in public dealings of the Income Tax department, and also organised a satyagraha outside the Chief Commissioner's office.

Kejriwal and other activists also stationed themselves outside the electricity department, asking visitors not to pay bribes and offered to help them in getting work done for free.

In 2001, the Delhi government enacted a state-level Right To Information (RTI) Act, which allowed the citizens to access government records for a small fee.

Parivartan used RTI to help people get their work done in government departments without paying a bribe.

In 2002, the group obtained official reports on 68 public works projects in the area, and performed a community-led audit to expose misappropriations worth ₹ 7 million in 64 of the projects.

On 14 December 2002, Parivartan organised a Jan sunvai (public hearing), in which the citizens held public officials and leaders accountable for the lack of development in their locality.

Later, in 2005, Kejriwal and Manish Sisodia launched Kabir, a registered NGO named after the medieval philosopher Kabir.

Like Parivartan, Kabir was also focused on RTI and participatory governance.

However, unlike Parivartan, it accepted institutional donations.

According to Kejriwal, Kabir was mainly run by Sisodia.

In 2006, Kejriwal was awarded the Ramon Magsaysay Award for his involvement in the Parivartan movement using right to information legislation in a campaign against government corruption.

The same year, after resigning from Government service, he founded the Public Cause Research Foundation to campaign for transparent governance.

Before entering politics, Kejriwal had worked in the Indian Revenue Service.

Kejriwal is a mechanical engineer from Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Kharagpur.

In February 2006, he resigned from his position as Joint Commissioner of Income Tax in New Delhi.

He is also the national convener of the Aam Aadmi Party since 2012.

In 2012, he launched the Aam Aadmi Party.

In 2012, he launched the Aam Aadmi Party, which won in the 2013 Delhi Legislative Assembly election.

Till date Arvind Kejriwal act as a national convenor of AAP.

In 2013, he assumed office as the Chief Minister of Delhi and resigned 49 days later over his inability to mobilise support for his proposed anti-corruption legislation.

He has represented the New Delhi constituency in the Delhi Legislative Assembly since 2015 and from 2013 to 2014.

In the 2015 Delhi Legislative assembly elections, AAP registered an unprecedented majority.

In subsequent 2020 elections, AAP re-emerged victorious and retained the power in Delhi, following which, Kejriwal was sworn in as the Chief Minister of Delhi for the third time in row.

Outside Delhi, his party registered another major victory in 2022 Punjab Legislative Assembly election.

In India, Kejriwal is the most followed Chief Minister on Twitter.