Activist, adviser, minister & now CM: Delhi gets it youngest woman chief minister in Atishi

NEW DELHI: Atishi is set to become the third woman chief minister of Delhi, following Sushma Swaraj from the BJP and Sheila Dikshit from the Congress.

Swaraj's term was brief, lasting only 52 days from October 13 to December 3, 1998, while Dikshit held office for three consecutive terms from December 1998 to December 2013, making her the longest-serving CM.

Among these three, Atishi will be the youngest. Dikshit was 60 when she became CM, and Swaraj was 46. However, Atishi will be the second youngest CM in Delhi's history, after Brahm Prakash, the city's first chief minister, who was nearly 34.

Here's all you need to know about Delhi's new chief minister:

Activist, Adviser, minister & now chief minister

• Atishi, born in June 1981 to Delhi University professors Vijay Kumar Singh and Tripta Wahi.
• She completed her schooling at Springdales School, Delhi.
• She graduated with a history degree from St. Stephen's College and later earned two master's degrees—one in history from Oxford University and another in educational research as a Rhodes Scholar.

• She gained prominence in 2012 with her involvement in the India Against Corruption movement and played an active role in the Jal Satyagraha in Madhya Pradesh in 2015.
• Her husband, Praveen Singh, is an alumnus of IIT-Delhi and IIM-Ahmedabad and works as a researcher and social worker.
• Atishi entered politics in 2013 with the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and was instrumental in drafting the party’s manifesto.
• In 2018, she dropped the surname "Marlena" (combination of Marx and Lenin) head of the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, where she later lost to BJP's Gautam Gambhir in East Delhi.
• She won the Kalkaji assembly seat in 2020 and has since been a key figure in AAP’s policy formation, particularly in education reforms as an adviser to former education minister Manish Sisodia.
• In March 2023, after Sisodia’s resignation, she was appointed as a Cabinet minister, overseeing 13 portfolios including finance, education, and PWD.