Ram Baran Yadav, A MBBS of Calcutta Medical College and a Postgraduate from School of Tropical Medicine, Calcutta, was elected as the first president of Nepal, by the re-poll held on 21st July in the Constituent Assembly by defeating his nearest rival, Maoist sponsored Ram Raja Prasad Sing by a comfortable margin of 26 votes. He polled 308 votes out of 590 votes polled in a house of 594 with four abstentions.
This was the first major vote in assembly after the abolition of 240-year-old monarchy with the exit of King Gyanendra. The 61-year-old Yadav studied in Calcutta 36 years ago and was in India for a total of eleven years before returning to Nepal for practice. He was also the personal physician of B.P.Koirala, the great old man of Nepal politics, who has been Prime Minister of Nepal as many as six times.
Yadav joined politics with Nepali Congress in 1980 and soon was a confidant of B.P.Koirala family for his commitment towards democracy. He was jailed in 1990 for three months for participation in democratic movement, which ultimately led Multi-Party democracy (with the King as head of State) in Nepal.
He was made the health minister in the B.P.Koirala government for two terms and established a health care system in the remote area of the hilly country.
Hailing from a farmer family of Dhanusha district of southeast Nepal close to Indian boarder, Yadav will be sworn as President of Nepal on 22nd July filling the vacancy of the deposed King Gyanendra.
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