Another birthday abroad for Manmohan Singh

It will be another birthday abroad for Prime Minister Manmohan Singh tomorrow when he turns 79, the fourth time in the past eight years after he assumed office.

A workaholic who shies away from any celebrations, Singh celebrates his birthday on September 26 as his parents had given it as his date of birth to get him admitted in a school in a village now in Pakistan during the pre-partition days.

However, his actual date of birth remains a mystery.

Singh, who is now abroad on a six-day visit to the United States, will be transit from New York to India via Frankfurt during his birthday.

On previous such occasions, his birthday was celebrated on Air India One.

In his first year as prime minister in 2004, he celebrated his birthday mid-air on way to Geneva from New York on Air India's Boeing 747-400.

Singh then did not cut the two-and-a-half kg fruit cake specially made for the occasion but joined everyone in having a slice of it.

He had then told accompanying reporters "I really don't know my birthday. This is the date mentioned in my school records."

Once again, four years later, he celebrated his birthday in Washington and the next year he turned another leaf in his life on air while returning from G-20 Summit in Pittsburgh in the US and heading to Geneva.

Singh was born to Sardar Gurmukh Singh and Amrit Kaur in 1932 in Gah of Punjab, which is now in Chakwal District of Pakistan.