Basdeo Panday

Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago

25 May 1933 St. Julien Village, Princes Town, Trinidad and Tobago

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9 November 1995 – 24 December 2001

Trinidadian politician The Hon. Basdeo Panday (pronounced  ; born 25 May 1933) is a Trinidadian lawyer, politician, trade unionist, economist, actor, and civil servant who served as the fifth Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago from 1995 to 2001. He was the first person of Indian descent along with being the first Hindu to hold the office of Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago. He was first elected to Parliament in 1976 as the Member for Couva North, Panday served as Leader of the Opposition five times between 1976 and 2010 and was a founding member of the United Labour Front (ULF), the National Alliance for Reconstruction (NAR), and the United National Congress (UNC). He served as leader of the ULF and UNC, and was President General of the All Trinidad Sugar and General Workers' Trade Union. He is the former Chairman and party leader of the United National Congress. In 2006, Panday was convicted of failing to declare a bank account in London and imprisoned; however, on March 20, 2007, that conviction was quashed by the Court of Appeal. On May 1 he decided to resign as Chairman of the United National Congress, but the party's executive refused to accept his resignation. He lost the party's internal elections on January 24, 2010 to Deputy Leader and now former Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar. In 2005, he was awarded the Pravasi Bharatiya Samman by the Ministry of Overseas Indian Affairs.