Droupadi Murmu Lost Her Husband, Two Sons Within Six Years. Know About The President-Elect's Family Life

Droupadi Murmu Family: The soft spoken tribal leader from Odisha's Rairangpur lost her husband, two sons, mother and brother in just six years between 2009-2015. 

Known to keep a low-profile, India's President-designate Droupadi Murmu has overcome several personal tragedies in her life. The soft spoken tribal leader from Odisha's Rairangpur lost her husband, two sons, mother and brother in just six years between 2009-2015. 

Born on June 20, 1958, in a simple Santhal tribal family, Murmu completed her Bachelor's degree in Arts from Bhubaneswar's Ramadevi Women's College in Bhubaneswar. She then served as a junior assistant in the irrigation and power department in Odisha government. She was also an honorary assistant teacher in the Shri Aurobindo Integral Education Centre in Rairangpur.

Murmu married Shyam Charan Murmu and had three children -- two sons and a daughter -- with him. According to news reports, one of her sons, Laxman Murmu (25), died in 2009. Her second son passed away in a road accident a few years later in 2012. 

Two years later, Murmu faced another personal loss as her husband passed away due to cardiac arrest. Murmu's daughter Itishree works at UCO bank in Odisha. She got married to Ganesh Hembram, who is a rugby player, in 2015. They have a little daughter.

"Rugby has a lot of scope in future. I have already devoted my life to the sport. So, there is no question joining politics or any other field now," Hembram had told reporters in 2015 when Murmu was sworn-in as Jharkhand Governor.

Believed to be deeply spiritual, Murmu is a keen practitioner of the meditation techniques of the Brahma Kumaris, a movement she embraced after she lost her loved ones.

According to IANS, around 13 years ago Murmu first got connected with the Brahma Kumari Sansthan in Mount Abu in Rajasthan.

Her first brush with politics came in 1997 when she was elected councillor of the district board in Rairangpur. Later, she became MLA from the same constituency. She also received the Neelkanth Award for Best Legislator by the Odisha Legislative Assembly.

Murmu served twice as an MLA and once as a minister in the BJD-BJP coalition government in Odisha, before being sworn in as the Governor of Jharkhand on May 18, 2015. Murmu stayed in the post till 2021 before moving to her village in Rairangpur. She was the first woman Governor of the state and the first female tribal leader to serve as a Governor in any Indian state.