1. Dinesh Trivedi was a Member of Parliament in Rajya Sabha from West Bengal and a former Member of Parliament, Lok Sabha representing Barrackpore constituency of West Bengal.
25 Facts About Dinesh Trivedi
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Dinesh Trivedi is the former Union Minister for Railways and the former Union Minister of State for Health and Family Welfare under Manmohan Singh's cabinet.
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Dinesh Trivedi is the Chairman of the Indo-European Union Parliamentary Forum, and other Parliamentary Forums.
4.
On 12 February 2021, Dinesh Trivedi resigned from Trinamool Congress and decided to quit his Rajya Sabha seat.
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Dinesh Trivedi joined the Bharatiya Janata Party on 6 March 2021.
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Dinesh Trivedi's parents lived in a number of places before coming to New Delhi, where he was born.
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Dinesh Trivedi attended boarding schools in Himachal Pradesh, before graduating in commerce from St Xavier's College, Calcutta.
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Dinesh Trivedi trained to be a pilot, a result of his childhood dream of flying for the Indian Air Force.
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Dinesh Trivedi is a trained sitar player and enjoys classical music.
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Dinesh Trivedi applied to train as an actor at the Film Institute, Pune, but did not follow it up as he then believed it not to be a serious job, as reported by Rediff.
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Dinesh Trivedi was drawn towards a picture of Swami Vivekananda in an advertisement by the Ramkrishna Mission, and decided to be a monk, but did not do so due to strong advice by his family and a Swami in Chicago.
12.
Dinesh Trivedi dons rings with sapphire, emerald and coral on his right hand to ward off the ill-effects of the mangal griha.
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Dinesh Trivedi joined the Congress party in the 1980s, but switched over to the Janata Dal in 1990.
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Dinesh Trivedi joined the cabinet as the Minister of State for Health and Family Welfare in 2009.
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Dinesh Trivedi has advocated de-politicizing the Railways and would like to restructure the Indian Railway Board, which lacked synergy before he joined.
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Dinesh Trivedi is pushing for a national policy on railways, that would continue irrespective of political changes in the government.
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Dinesh Trivedi has said that the ministry is open to the idea of privatisation, which would allow more funds to be allocated to help the system cope with capacity.
18.
Dinesh Trivedi stepped down as the Railway Minister on 18 March 2012, a couple of days after presenting his first ever Railway Budget in which he increased passenger fare.
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Dinesh Trivedi expressed his interest to start high speed passenger trains in India with Japanese help or French support.
20.
In 2011, the script of the James Bond film Skyfall, part of which was shot on trains in India, had to be changed when Dinesh Trivedi insisted that people not be shown travelling on the roofs of trains, which is illegal.
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However, before the formal orders could be issued, Dinesh Trivedi involved the Prime Minister and Mamata Banerjee to get the room allotted to himself to avoid "utter humiliation of the Railway Ministry and 14 lakh Railway employees".
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On 14 March 2012, Dinesh Trivedi announced the annual rail budget 2012 that included an all over hike in passenger fares, ranging from 2 paise to 30 paise per kilometre for reasons of safety along with network expansion and modernisation.
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Finally, on 18 March 2012, Dinesh Trivedi resigned after making a direct phone call to Mamata Banerjee for confirmation of the party position.
24.
On forwarding the resignation to the President with recommendation of acceptance, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh praised the budget presented by Dinesh Trivedi and expressed "regret" on his "departure".
25.
Dinesh Trivedi is married to Minal, who holds a PhD in genetics.