Premalakaki Chavan

Premalabai Chavan (2 July 1918 – 8 July 2003) was an Indian politician and was a member of the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha. The Founder-President of the All India Women's Cricket Association, she was involved in various other activities that contributed to the welfare of women in Indian society. Premalakaki Chavan is notable for holding the record for the most number of representations (four) in the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha, by a female M.P. from Maharashtra.

Chavan was born to the M. N. Rao Jagdale in the Baroda district of Gujarat. She completed her primary and secondary education at S.N.D.T. in Indore, after which she went to St. Xavier's College Bombay, where she received a Diploma in Montessori Education. Premalakaki married Dajisaheb Chavan on 27 April 1942. She was the mother of the ex-Chief Minister of Maharashtra, Prithviraj Chavan, along with Nirupama Ajitrao Yadav and Vidlyulata Vyankatrao Ghorpade.

Chavan was a member of the Peasants and Workers Party of Maharashtra from 1952-60. Later, she represented the Indian National Congress party in the Fifth Lok Sabha (1971–77), the Sixth Lok Sabha (1977–79), the Eighth Lok Sabha (1984–89), and the Rajya Sabha (1980–84). After her husband's death, she was elected unopposed to the Lok Sabha in a by-poll in 1973. She was re-elected from the Karad constituency for the next three terms. After the post-emergency split in the Congress, when many party veterans in the state aligned with the congress led by Devraj Urs, Chavan chose to remain with Indira Gandhi and also served as the Congress(i) State President at that time. When Indira Gandhi returned to power in 1980, she nominated Premalakaki to Rajya Sabha in 1981. Chavan was re-elected to the Lok Sabha from Karad in 1989. Premalakaki retired from politics in 1991 when Rajiv Gandhi asked her son to continue the family's political legacy in parliament.

Premala Chavan participated in the Lok Sabha until 1991, until which point she had contested from her late constituency and served in the same capacity for all consecutive terms.

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