7 PRATIBHA PATIL

Pratibha Devising Patil was born on 19 December 1934 is an Indian politician who served as the 12^th president of India from 2007 to 2012. A member of the Indian national congress, Patil is the only women to hold the office. She previously served as the Governor of Rajasthan from 2004 to 2007.The BBC has described Patil's political career prior to assuming presidential office as "long and largely low-key". In 1962, at the age of 27, she was elected to the Maharashtra legislative assembly for the Jalgaon Constituency. Thereafter she won in the Muktainagar (formerly Edlabad) constituency on four consecutive occasions between 1967 and 1985, before becoming a Member of Parliament in the Rajya Sabha between 1985 and 1990. In the 1991 election for the 10^TH Lok Sabha she was elected as a Member of Parliament representing the Amravati Constituency. A period of retirement from politics followed later in that decade. Patil had held various Cabinet portfolios during her period in the Maharashtra Legislative Assembly and she had also held official positions while in both the Rajya Sabha and Lok Sabha. In addition, she had been for some years the president of the Maharashtra Pradesh congress committee and also held office as Director of the National Federation of Urban Co-operative Banks and Credit Societies and as a Member of the Governing Council of the National Co-operative Union of India. On 8 November 2004 she was appointed as the 24th Governor of Rajasthan, the first woman to hold that office and according to the BBC was "a low-profile" incumbent. Patil set up Vidya Bharati Shikshan Prasarak Mandal, an educational institute which runs a chain of schools and colleges in Amravati, Jalgaon, pune and Mumbai. She also set up Sharm Sadhna Trust which runs hostels for working women in New Delhi, Mumbai and Pune; and an engineering college for rural students in Jalgaon district. She also co-founded a cooperative sugar factory known as sant Muktabai sahakari Sakhar Karkhana at Muktainagar.