Nirmala Sitharaman has been the Union Finance Minister in Narendra Modi-led government since 2019. She was also the Defence Minister in Modi's last tenure. Earlier, she held the position of Minister of State (Independent Charge) for Commerce & Industry, during the first three years of the NDA regime. She served as a member of the National Commission for Women between 2003-2005. Sitharaman, the first full-time woman finance minister of the country, has presented five full budgets since July 2019 and will present an interim or vote-on-account budget next week. With the presentation of the interim budget on February 1, 2024, Sitharaman will surpass the records of her predecessors like Manmohan Singh, Arun Jaitley, P Chidambaram, and Yashwant Sinha, who had presented five budgets in a row. After the 2019 general elections, in the Modi 2.0 Government, Sitharaman was given the charge of the finance portfolio. She became the second woman to have presented a budget after Indira Gandhi, who had presented the budget for the financial year 1970-71. That year, Sitharaman did away with the traditional budget briefcase and instead went for a ‘bahi-khata’ with the National Emblem to carry the speech and other documents. Under Sitharaman, India has weathered the Covid pandemic with an array of policy measures announced for the poor and continued its tag of the fastest growing major economy and a ‘bright spot’ in the world economy. She was first invited to become a member fo the BJP's National Executive in 2008, after which she became actively involved with party's economic and political resolutions. She was appointed as the National spokesperson of the party in 2010. In 2012, Sitharaman worked directly under Modi, given the responsibility of organising BJPs media campaign for the elections.