Girija Prasad Koirala (born 1921) is the Prime Minister of Nepal. He has been the leader of that country four times, from 1991 to 1994, from 1998 to 1999, from 2000 until 2001, and from 2006. He was the first democratically elected Prime Minister of Nepal since 1959, when his brother BP Koirala and the Nepali Congress party swept the country's first democratic elections. He is also the President of the Nepali Congress Party. Born in Indian state Bihar, he is the youngest son of Krishna Prasad Koirala and Divya Koirala. Mr. Koirala has been active in politics for over sixty years and started his career as a labour leader in the Jute mills of his hometown Biratnagar. He was elected Prime Minister in Nepal's first election following the Jana Aandolan. He was forced to dissolve parliament and call for elections in November 1994, because the Nepali Congress was unable to continue a coalition government. This led to the Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Marxist Leninist)-led coalition coming to power. When Koirala became Prime Minister in 2000 for his third term, Nepal was fighting a civil war against the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist). His third term was severely wracked by corruption within his government. He himself personally became involved in a shady business deal involving Austrian airline company Lauda Airlines. Following the royal massacre of Nepal, Koirala was further criticized for his inability to handle the crisis. Koirala was finally forced to resign in July 2001 following an involvement of the military in the civil war for the first time. He was replaced by his one-time protege former Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba. After the reinstation of the House of Parliament on April 24, 2006 following the Jana Aandolan 2, Mr. Koirala became Prime Minister for the fifth time in the History of Nepal. Koirala has several opponents among the Nepali public. Despite coming from an activist family, his governments have been accused of rampant corruption on numerous occasions. As Prime Minister, he was accused of allowing the civil war to intensify unchecked. During his third term, he was constantly dogged by the Lauda scandal. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Girija_Prasad_Koirala