Neelam Sanjeeva Reddy was India's sixth President. He was elected unopposed on July 21, 1977, a few months after Fakhruddin Ali Ahmed's untimely death.

Born on May 18, 1913, in a peasant family at Illuri village in Anantapur district in what is now Andhra Pradesh, Reddy studied at the Theosophical High School in Adyar, Madras, and later at the Arts College at Anantapur.

In 1931, he gave up his studies to join the freedom movement and was jailed for most of the period, 1940 to 1945.

After stints in the legislature, party and government at the Centre and in Hyderabad, he became the first chief minister of the new state of Andhra Pradesh in October 1956.

On June 9, 1964, he was appointed a member of Lal Bahadur Shastri's Cabinet as minister of steel and mines.

On March 17, 1967, he was elected Speaker of the Lok Sabha. On July 19, 1969, he resigned the speakership to file his nomination for the Presidency, but was defeated by then prime minister Indira Gandhi's candidate, fellow Telugu V V Giri.

Upset by the defeat, Reddy semi-retired from politics for a couple of years, returning to the fray on May 1, 1975, addressing a public meeting in Hyderabad along with Jayaprakash Narayan. In March 1977, he fought the Lok Sabha election from Nandyal as a Janata Party nominee and was the only non-Congress candidate to win from Andhra Pradesh.

He was unanimously elected Speaker of the Lok Sabha on March 26, 1977. He relinquished the office on July 13, 1977 to file his nomination for the Presidency. In acknowledgement that he was unfairly deprived of the post the last time around, he was unanimously sponsored as the consensus candidate for the Presidency by all the political parties.

February 18, 1982. President Neelam Sanjeeva Reddy, accompanied by Vice-President M Hidayatullah, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, Lok Sabha Speaker Balram Jakhar, and Parliamentary Affairs Minister Bhishma Narain Singh among others.

Also see: All the PM's Men