PRATIBHA PATIL.......FIRST WOMAN PRESIDENT OF INDIA.

Pratibha Patil was born to Narayan Paglu Rao in Nadgaon, Maharashtra. She studied at R.R. School at Jalgaon. She received her M.A.from Mooljee Jaitha (M.J.) College, Jalgaon (affiliated to North Maharashtra University, Jalgaon) and obtained a law degree from the Government Law College, Mumbai (affiliated to University of Bombay). During her college days, she excelled in table tennis, winning various inter-college tournaments.In 1962, Pratibha Patil was voted "College Queen" of M.J. College.The same year, she won an assembly election from Edlabad constituency on the Indian National Congress ticket.
She married educator Devisingh Ransingh Shekhawat on July 7, 1965. The couple have a son and a daughter.

Pratibha Patil began her political career in 1962 at the age of 27. Under the mentorship of senior Congress leader and ex-Chief Minister Yashwantrao Chavan, she became a deputy minister for education after re-election in 1967 (in the Vasantrao Naik ministry). In her next terms (1972-78) she was a full cabinet minister for the state. In successive congress governments, she handled the portfolios of tourism, social welfare and housing under several chief ministers, Vasantdada Patil, Babasaheb Bhosle, S. B. Chavan and Sharad Pawar. She was continually re-elected to the assembly, either from Jalgaon or the nearby Edlabad constituencies, until 1985, when she was elected to the Rajya Sabha as a Congress candidate. She has never lost an election that she has contested.In 1985, she was elected to the Rajya Sabha, and served as its deputy chairwoman from November 1986 to November 1988. Her term expired in April 1990. The following year, in the elections when Rajiv Gandhi was assassinated she won election 10th Lok Sabha from at Amravati constituency, her husband's city, where he had once been mayor, thus first time entering in lower house of national parliament Lok Sabha.

In November 2004, eight years after she had completed her term in the 10th Lok Sabha, Pratibha Patil was recalled from political hibernation to become the first woman Governor of Rajasthan. She was the second politician from Maharashtra in this post, the first being Vasantdada Patil. With Pratibha Patil as Governor, Rajasthan had women in three significant positions of power in the state, including Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje and Assembly Speaker Sumitra Singh.On 14th June, United Progressive Alliance (UPA), the ruling alliance of political parties in India headed by Congress (I), and the Indian left nominated her as their candidate for the Presidential Election to be held on 19 July 2007.She emerged as a compromise candidate after the Left parties would not agree to the nomination of present Home Minister Shivraj Patil. At that point, Sonia Gandhi proposed Pratibha Patil's name.

She won the presidential election held on July 19, 2007 defeating her nearest rival Bhairon Singh Shekhawat by over 300,000 votes