Daman Singh is an Indian writer and novelist. She is the daughter of former Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.
Wiki/Biography
Daman Singh was born on Wednesday, September 4, 1963, in Chandigarh (age 59; as of 2022). Her zodiac sign is Virgo. In 1966, Manmohan Singh moved with his family to New York and worked at UNCTAD.
Manmohan Singh with daughters Upinder Singh and Daman Singh in Coney Island, New York, 1967
However, Manmohan and his wife Gulsharan want their daughter to grow up in India and embrace Indian values. So, they returned to India. She completed her primary education at Presentation Convent High School and later, she attended the Convent of Jesus and Mary, New Delhi. She said of her childhood in an interview:
I grew up in Delhi and had a fairly sheltered childhood. Life consists of school and family. I went to a girls’ school, a convent, where the discipline was very strict. Good grades are an unspoken rule, so I study harder. I have two sisters with me at home. We lived in a sparsely populated government bungalow, so there was a general lack of friends. This means we have a lot of free time. My interests are reading, gardening and observing nature. “
Daman grew up with two sisters, all three of whom were voracious readers, a trait instilled in them by their father. In an interview, she recalled her childhood memories and said:
Our most exciting outing was when my father took us to a bookstore. Our birthday gifts are always books. There was a time when we lived just a stone’s throw from the Derry Sports Club, which had a great library. I remember fighting with my sisters over library cards, borrowing two books, then rushing home and scrambling to finish them so I could borrow the next two books. “
Childhood photos of Upinder Singh, Daman Singh and Amrit Singh
In 1984, she completed her bachelor’s degree. B.A. (Honours) in Mathematics from St. Stephen’s College, Delhi. Thereafter, she went on to obtain an MBA degree from Institute of Rural Management (IRMA), Anand, Gujarat.
appearance
Height (approximately): 5′4″
Hair color: black
Eye color: black
Daman Singh left for Trivand escorted by Binu John, Amith Barua and Satish Jacob Lang attends Kovalam Literary Festival
family and caste
Amrit Singh belongs to a Koli Sikh family.
Parents and siblings
Her father, Manmohan Singh, was an Indian National Congress politician who served as the 13th Prime Minister of India. Her mother’s name is Gulsharan Kaur. She is the second among sisters. Her sister Amrit Singh is an American human rights lawyer, while her sister Upinder Singh is a historian.
Dharmaman Singh with her parents Manmohan Singh and Gurshalan Kaur
Manmohan Singh with daughter Upinder Singh (in red circle) and wife Gursharan Kaur
Dharmaman Singh’s sister Amrit Singh
husband and children
She is married to IPS officer Ashok Patnaik, who was the chief executive of India’s National Intelligence Grid (NATGID). They have a son named Luohan.
Dharmaman Singh’s husband Ashok Patnaik
Manmohan Singh’s family portrait with Daman Singh’s son Rohan (seated in the middle with Gursharan Kaur)
Profession
She worked in rural development for 20 years before becoming a full-time writer. While attending IRMA in Gujarat, she conducted fieldwork in Bikaner district, Rajasthan. She later started working in rural development and traveled extensively in Rajasthan, Gujarat, Uttar Pradesh and Bihar (now Jharkhand) and in West Bengal, Odisha and Andhra Pradesh Bang did a little traveling. She is associated with the NGO Wildlands Promotion Association. In an interview, while talking about the vast field experience she gained in various villages across India, she said:
I used to travel a lot, even riding in bullock carts. It put me in touch with people. By the way, I have traveled in United Bihar, especially the areas now in Jharkhand. It was my first time in Patna but the rural background of Jharkhand can be found in my book. “
Later, she moved to Mizoram. In 1996, she published her first book, The Last Frontier: The People and Forests of Mizoram. This book traces the environmental history of Mizoram from the nineteenth century, through colonial rule, to the post-independence period, while examining the relationship between the people and the environment.
Returning to Delhi, she again worked with various NGOs for a period before joining Tata Energy Research Institute (TERI), where she worked as a freelance consultant for six years. Her career as an adviser ended when her father became India’s prime minister in 2004. Talking about the same in an interview, she said:
But my career as a rural development consultant was over. I couldn’t pursue my career because when I went to the countryside, I was bound by garlands and expectations. When I thought I was ordinary, I had become a VIP. “
She wrote her first novel, 9 by Nine (2008), which revolves around the lives of three characters, Anjali, Paro and Tara, and is full of disturbing events, ruptures of partnership and the loss that ultimately led to their transformation.
In 2010, the novel “Sacred Forest” was published. The novel tells the story of 12-year-old boy Ashwin and his pregnant mother and domineering father. As the story unfolds, Ashwin’s dreams of cricket stardom are under attack when riots break out in his quiet town.
In 2014, she wrote Strictly Personal: Manmohan and Gulshalan, an attempt to debunk the many myths surrounding her prominent politician father Manmohan Singh and his wife Gulshalan Kaur. Other books she has authored include Kitty’s War (2018).
Facts/Trivia
- An admirer of the pre-cellphone era, Daman Singh hasn’t owned a cell phone in a long time and believes it keeps her sane. She said in an interview,
I am lucky to have a husband who has a regular job. I told him a few years ago, now you make money to support us. I will follow my dream. I chose to quit my busy career. I do not have a phone. I think it keeps me sane…when I see other people with their phones I wonder, oh my God, how do they live! I just can’t do it. I live in my own world and see what I want to see. Of course, if I lived a different life, my kids would have to contact me. But now, I can happily work without it. My life is simple and I can get by just fine without my phone. I found other people’s lives to be complicated, and my own life to be vastly simplified…in many ways, I chose to opt out of complexity. “
- An excerpt from Daman’s book Strictly Personal: Manmohan and Gurshalam (2014) reveals that Manmohan Singh’s home in Ashok Vihar, Delhi, was used during the 1984 anti-Sikh riots Attacked by thugs. At that time, Manmohan Singh was the governor of Delhi. The Reserve Bank of India came to Delhi to pay tribute to Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, who was assassinated by her Sikh bodyguards on October 31, 1984, for authorizing a blueprint at the Golden Temple in Amritsar earlier that year. Operation Star. Manmohan Singh’s eldest daughter Upinder Singh and her husband Vijay Tanka were living at the home at the time. When the mob closed in and burned down their home, Vijay Tankha tricked them into believing that the house belonged to him. As he was a Hindu, the goons spared the house. Finally, the family sold the house in 1986 because several houses in the area still showed signs of the riots.
- When her sister Arbinder chose to study history, Manmohan was not particularly happy with her decision. Daman reveals in her book that Manmohan had a low opinion of social science disciplines other than his own. Manmohan’s occasional careless remarks about historical research hurt Upinder. Therefore, Daman studied mathematics to please her father. However, when Daman switched to IRMA, her father was unhappy again.
- In an interview, she revealed that she broke her leg while skiing, which made going to IIT Kanpur an option for her, so she joined IRMA in Gujarat. she says,
I would have loved to continue studying mathematics, but unfortunately I was not able to get a scholarship to study in the United States or the United Kingdom. My other option was to go to IIT Kanpur (which has an impressive flying club). However, I accidentally broke my leg while skiing and couldn’t go to Kanpur for the interview. So either Mathematics from Delhi University or IRMA. “
- Earlier, she was non-vegetarian but later, she became vegetarian.
- In April 2019, Times of India reporter Bharti Jain made serious accusations of fraud and conspiracy against former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Twitter, saying that his daughter Daman (Daman) and Amrit (Daman) received salary from Nalanda University (NU) as faculty members during their stay in the United States. In a series of tweets, Bharti Jain leveled serious allegations of financial misconduct and nepotism against Nobel laureate Senator Amartya. The fact-checking website Alt News Desk has since clarified that the statement was false.
Two other Honorary Fellows were appointed as Daman Singh and Amrit Singh.Manmohan Singh’s middle and younger daughters…they stay in the United States to receive their salaries
— Bharti Jain (@bhartijainTOI) April 28, 2019
Categories: Biography
Source: HIS Education