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Tag Archives: Indian People


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Leo Varadkar Elected Taoiseach

On June 2, 2017, Leo Varadkar, son of Indian immigrants, wins the leadership contest against his only rival, Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage Simon Coveney, with 60% of the votes to lead Fine Gael, the biggest party in the coalition government. He is set to become the first openly gay Taoiseach (prime minister) of the Republic of Ireland and the youngest leader in the European Union. His election is seen as a change in political generations and social outlook in Ireland.

The current Taoiseach, 66-year-old Enda Kenny, announced his resignation the previous month after six years at the head of the centrist party, setting off a battle to lead the ruling Fine Gael.

“If somebody of my age, of my mixed-race background and of all the things that make up my character can potentially become leader of our country, then I think that sends out a message to every child born today that there is no office in Ireland that they can’t aspire to,” Varadkar tells Newstalk radio.

The Fine Gael parliamentary party votes overwhelmingly (70 percent) in favor of Varadkar while 65 percent of members favor Coveney. As Varadkar is backed by most lawmakers and local representatives, he gains victory under the center-right party’s electoral college system.

Varadkar’s position is confirmed later in the month after parliament resumes following a break.

Varadkar’s father, Ashok, a doctor, moves to Ireland in the 1970s and his youngest son is born in Dublin in 1979. He studies medicine at Trinity College Dublin and spends several years as a junior doctor before qualifying as a general practitioner in 2010.

Varadkar is first elected in local elections in 2003 and in 2007 to the lower house of Ireland’s assembly, the Dáil Éireann. He comes to public prominence in 2015 when Ireland votes in favor of same-sex marriage.

Varadkar is on the right wing of the centrist Fine Gael party and has held three cabinet posts since 2011 – Minister for Social Protection, Minister for Health and Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport. More recently, in the time leading up to his election as Taoiseach, he heads a publicity campaign highlighting social welfare fraud.

Varadkar’s most pressing first international task is negotiating Ireland’s new arrangement with the United Kingdom after it leaves the European Union.

In a radio interview in 2015, Varadkar speaks for the first time about being gay, “It’s not something that defines me. I’m not a half-Indian politician, or a doctor politician or a gay politician for that matter. It’s just part of who I am. It doesn’t define me. It is part of my character I suppose.”

Varadkar’s partner is also a doctor in Dublin.

(From: “Ireland’s ruling party elects Varadkar new leader” by Jane Mcintosh, Deutsche Welle (DW), http://www.dw.com, June 2, 2017)


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Birth of Leo Varadkar, Fine Gael Politician & Taoiseach

Leo Eric Varadkar, Irish Fine Gael politician who is serving since June 2020 as Tánaiste and Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment, is born on January 18, 1979, in the Rotunda Hospital, Dublin.

Varadkar is the third child and only son of Ashok and Miriam (née Howell) Varadkar. His father was born in Bombay (now Mumbai), India, and moved to the United Kingdom in the 1960s to work as a doctor. His mother, born in Dungarvan, County Waterford, meets her future husband while working as a nurse in Slough, Berkshire, England. He is educated at the St. Francis Xavier national school in Blanchardstown, Dublin, and then The King’s Hospital, a Church of Ireland secondary school in Palmerstown. During his secondary schooling, he joins Young Fine Gael. He is admitted to Trinity College Dublin (TCD), where he briefly reads law before switching to its School of Medicine. At TCD, he is active in the university’s Young Fine Gael branch and serves as Vice-President of the Youth of the European People’s Party, the youth wing of the European People’s Party, of which Fine Gael is a member. He is selected for the Washington Ireland Program for Service and Leadership (WIP), a half-year personal and professional development program in Washington, D.C., for students from Ireland.

Varadkar graduates in 2003, after completing his internship at King Edward Memorial Hospital in Mumbai. He then spends several years working as a non-consultant hospital doctor in St. James’s Hospital, Dublin, and Connolly Hospital, Blanchardstown, before specialising as a general practitioner in 2010.

In 2004, Varadkar joins Fine Gael and becomes a member of Fingal County Council and later serves as Deputy Mayor of Fingal. He is elected to Dáil Éireann for the first time in 2007. During the campaign for the 2015 same-sex marriage referendum, he comes out as gay, becoming the first serving Irish minister to do so.

Varadkar is elected a Teachta Dála (TD) for the Dublin West constituency in 2007. He serves under Taoiseach Enda Kenny as Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport from 2011 to 2014, Minister for Health from 2014 to 2016, and Minister for Social Protection from 2016 to 2017.

In May 2017, Kenny announces that he is planning to resign as Taoiseach and Fine Gael leader. Varadkar stands in the leadership election to replace him. Although more party members vote for his opponent, Simon Coveney, he wins by a significant margin among Fine Gael members of the Oireachtas and is elected leader on June 2. Twelve days later, he is appointed Taoiseach, and at 38 years of age becomes the youngest person to hold the office. He is Ireland’s first, and the world’s fourth, openly gay head of government and the first Taoiseach of Indian heritage.

In 2020, Varadkar calls a general election to be held in February. While polls in 2019 have suggested a favourable result for Fine Gael, they ultimately come in third in terms of seats and votes, behind Fianna Fáil and Sinn Féin, with 35 seats, a loss of 15 seats for the party from the previous general election, when it had finished in first position. He resigns and is succeeded by Micheál Martin as Taoiseach. He is subsequently appointed Tánaiste and Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment as part of a three-party coalition composed of Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael and the Green Party.