Gandhi, Rajiv, << GAHN dee or GAN dee, rah jeev >> (1944-1991), was prime minister of India from 1984 to 1989. On May 21, 1991, he was assassinated while campaigning to become prime minister again. In 1999, India’s Supreme Court sentenced four people to death and three others to life imprisonment for the killing. In 2000, the death sentence of one of the condemned prisoners was reduced to life imprisonment. All of those convicted were members of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). The LTTE was involved in a civil war in Sri Lanka and had opposed a 1987 peace plan Gandhi had supported.
Rajiv succeeded his mother, Indira Gandhi, as prime minister. Indira had also been assassinated (see Gandhi, Indira). As prime minister, Rajiv promoted economic development, population control, and the reduction of tensions among India’s ethnic and religious groups.
Rajiv Gandhi was born on Aug. 20, 1944, in Bombay (now Mumbai). From 1962 to 1965, he studied mechanical sciences at Cambridge University and the University of London, in England. He met Sonia Maino while studying in Cambridge. They married in 1968 and had two children, Rahul and Priyanka. After returning to India, Gandhi worked for nine years as a commercial airline pilot.
Gandhi was elected to Parliament in 1981. He then became a close political adviser to his mother. In 1983, his mother appointed him as a general secretary of the Congress-I Party, which she headed. After Indira was assassinated in October 1984, the party chose Rajiv to succeed her as its head. As party head, Rajiv became prime minister. The Congress-I Party won parliamentary elections held in December, and Gandhi remained prime minister. In 1989 elections, the Congress-I Party lost its majority in Parliament. Vishwanath Pratap Singh replaced Gandhi as prime minister. But Gandhi remained head of his party until his death. In 1998, his widow, Sonia Gandhi, became leader of the Congress Party. In 2017, their son, Rahul, succeeded her as leader of the party. He served from 2017 to 2019. Sonia Gandhi then returned as interim party leader from 2019 to 2022.
