Sachin Pilot


Sachin Rajesh Pilot is an Indian politician who was the Deputy Chief Minister of Rajasthan and also President of the Rajasthan Pradesh Congress Committee. As member of the Congress party, he has represented the Tonk assembly seat in Rajasthan since 2018.
Pilot was previously a member of the Indian Parliament for the Ajmer in 2009 and Dausa constituencies of Rajasthan, becoming the youngest member of parliament when he was elected from the latter seat in 2004, aged 26. He lost Lok Sabha election from Ajmer constituency in 2014 He served as the Minister of Corporate Affairs in the second Manmohan Singh Ministry.

Early life

Pilot was born in Saharanpur city of Uttar Pradesh. He is the son of the late Congress leader Rajesh Pilot and Rama Pilot. His father was a Union minister of India. His ancestral village is Vaidpura in Noida.
He studied at Air Force Bal Bharati School, New Delhi, and holds a B.A. from St. Stephens College, University of Delhi, a diploma in marketing from I.M.T. Ghaziabad and an MBA from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, USA.
He was employed with the Delhi Bureau of the British Broadcasting Corporation and then with American multinational corporation General Motors for two years.

Career

Electoral HistoryElectoral HistoryElectoral HistoryElectoral HistoryElectoral HistoryElectoral History
ElectionPartyPartyHouseConstituencyStatus
2004INCLok SabhaDausa'
2009INCLok SabhaAjmer'
2014INCLok SabhaAjmer'
2018INCRajasthan Legislative AssemblyTonk'

In the 2004 Lok Sabha elections, Pilot was elected from the Dausa constituency. At the age of 26, he became the youngest MP in India.
In the 2009 Lok Sabha elections, he defeated the Bharatiya Janata Party's Kiran Maheshwari by a margin of 76,000 votes and won the seat of Ajmer. Pilot was a member of the Lok Sabha's Standing Committee on Home Affairs and member of the Consultative Committee in the Ministry of Civil Aviation.
In 2012, he became the Minister of Corporate Affairs in the second Manmohan Singh ministry.
In the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, he was again nominated from the Ajmer constituency and was defeated by a margin of 1,71,983 votes by Bharatiya Janata Party's sitting MLA Sanwarlal Jat.
In 2014, he was appointed the President of the Rajasthan Pradesh Congress Committee.

Deputy Chief Minister of Rajasthan

In the 2018 Legislative Assembly elections, Pilot won from the Tonk seat, after defeating Yunus Khan by a margin of 54,179 votes. It was speculated that Pilot, who was considered instrumental in the Congress's victory in the state, would be given the post of chief minister. On 17 December 2018, he was sworn in as Deputy chief Minister of Rajasthan under Ashok Gehlot.
On 13 July 2020, Pilot's office issued a statement saying that the government of chief minister Ashok Gehlot was in a minority. An aide of Pilot's indicated that he would not be joining the Bharatiya Janata Party.
The Indian National Congress on 14 July 2020, sacked Sachin Pilot as the Deputy Chief Minister and Rajasthan Congress President for his revolt against the party and its leadership.
After his revolt there was speculation that he would join the BJP, like his former colleague Jyotiraditya Scindia, but on 15 July 2020 he rejected the rumours and stated: "I am still a member of the Congress party".
The Rajasthan Speaker, C.P. Joshi, issued notices to 19 dissident Congress MLAs including Sachin Pilot on 14 July 2020 after the Rajasthan Congress passed a resolution that they be disqualified from the state Assembly as they had defied a party whip to attend two Congress Legislature Party meetings. Pilot challenged this notice in the Rajasthan High Court on 17 July 2020. The High Court asked the Speaker to defer action on disqualification notices till 21 July 2020.

Personal life

Sachin Pilot married Sara Abdullah on 15 January 2004. Sara Abdullah is the daughter of Farooq Abdullah, chairman of Jammu & Kashmir National Conference and ex-Chief Minister of Jammu and Kashmir. Together they have two sons, Aaran and Vehaan.
His father was also member of parliament and was also union minister.
He was one of the 714 Indians mentioned in the Paradise Papers tax evasion.

Army service

Sachin Pilot on 6 September 2012 became the first Union minister of India to be commissioned as an officer in the Territorial Army, fulfilling his desire to follow his father's footsteps to be in the armed forces. He is therefore known as Lieutenant Pilot for being an officer in the Territorial Army.
After being commissioned he said, "This has been my desire to join the army for very long as I wanted to have my links with the armed forces, like my father and grandfather. I am honoured to be part of this family."

Books published