Vilasrao Deshmukh

Vilasrao Deshmukh Biography

Vilasrao Deshmukh was an Indian politician, cabinet minister and former chief minister of Maharashtra who has served two terms. This politician belonged to Indian National Congress and was one of the influential leaders from the state of Maharashtra. As the Chief Minister of Maharashtra, he served two terms - 7 September 2004 – 5 December 2008 and 18 October 1999 – 16 January 2003. Deshmukh was a Member of Parliament in Rajya Sabha and cabinet minister serving as the Minister of Earth Sciences when he passed away in 2012. He has held portfolios of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises, Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises, Panchayati Raj and Heavy Industries and Public Enterprises. Noed Bollywood actor Riteish Deshmukh is his middle son and actress Genelia D'Souza is his daughter-in-law. Vilasrao Deshmukh passed away due to multiple organ failure, 6 months after the marriage of Riteish.

He was born on 26 May 1945. He entered politics in the early 1970’s. He became a member of the Latur Village Panchayat in 1974 and became its village chief same year. He was associated with the village panchayat till 1980. He became the President of Osmanabad District Youth Congress from 1975 to 1978 and participated in the Maharashtra Legislative Assembly elections for the first time in 1980. He got continuously elected in the Assembly elections till 1995. He served as the Minister of State and the Cabinet Minister in state and Prime Minister’s cabinet throughout his political career.

However he lost state assembly elections in 1995 in big margin and got re-elected in 1999 from Latur Constituency with a huge margin of 90K votes. Deshmukh was the first person to ask for farmer loan waiver in UPA-I and he did so during his tenure as chief minister. However he resigned his post as chief minister of Maharashtra following Mumbai terror attacks in 2008.

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Updated: May 08, 2014