Sinha speaking at World Economic Forum on East Asia in 2008
Sinha was the finance minister until 1 July 2002, when he exchanged jobs with foreign minister Jaswant Singh. Sinha, during his tenure, was forced to roll back some of his government's major policy initiatives for which he was much criticised. Still, Sinha is widely credited with pushing through several major reform measures that put the Indian economy on a firm growth trajectory. Among them are lowering of real interest rates, introducing tax deduction for mortgage interest, freeing up the telecommunications sector, helping fund the National Highways Authority, and deregulating the petroleum industry. Sinha is also known for being the first Finance Minister to break the 53-year tradition of presenting the Indian budget at 5 pm local time, a practice held over from British Rule days that sought to present the Indian budget at a time convenient to the British Parliament (11:30am GMT) rather than India's Parliament.
Sinha has written a comprehensive account of his years as Finance Minister titled Confessions of a Swadeshi Reformer.
Yashwant Sinha has been accused by opponents, and by other political observers of trying to promote nepotism by nominating his son Jayant Sinha as a successor to contest from Hazaribagh overlooking the interests of many other loyal party workers, though he tried to justify the nomination of his son as a party decision.
Sinha was awarded 'Officier de la Legion d’Honneur in 2015, the highest civilian distinction of France.It was bestowed upon him in recognition of his work as Union Minister of Finance, Minister of External Foreign Affairs and for his invaluable contribution to international issues.
Yashwant Sinha (born 6 November 1937) is an Indian administrator and politician who is the joint opposition's candidate for the 15th presidential candidate. He served as the Minister of Finance from 1990 until 1991 under Prime Minister Chandra Shekhar and again from March 1998 to July 2002 under Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee. He also served as the Minister of External Affairs from July 2002 until May 2004. He was a senior leader of the Bharatiya Janata Party before he left the party on 21 April 2018.
InMarch 2021, he joined the All india Trinamool congress however he left in June 2022 as he was selected by the Combined Opposition Parties as their Presidential Candidate for the 2022 Presidential election.
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