Smriti Irani, Indian actress, producer and politician, Indian Minister of Human Resource Development
Smriti Zubin Irani (née Malhotra; born 23 March 1976) is an Indian politician and a former television actress and producer. She is the Minister of Women and Child Development in the Union Cabinet of India since May 2019. A prominent leader within the Bharatiya Janata Party, she is a Member of Parliament in the Lok Sabha, representing Amethi.
In the 2019 Indian general election, she defeated Rahul Gandhi - the country's principal opposition leader and the president of Indian National Congress - to win the Amethi seat. Previously the Amethi constituency had been represented by the members of the Gandhi family for the last four decades. Earlier in 2011, Irani had become a member of the Rajya Sabha from Gujarat.Irani was the youngest minister in the 2019 Council of Ministers, when she was sworn in as a Cabinet Minister in May 2019 at the age of 43. Having a diverse family background, Irani can speak in several Indian languages including Hindi, Bengali, Marathi, Gujarati, and Punjabi; as her paternal family has a Punjabi and Maharashtrian heritage, while her maternal family has a Bengali heritage.