Maneka Gandhi is the daughter of Lt. Col. Tarlochan Singh Anand and Amardeep kaur Anand. She was born in Delhi and educated at the Lawrence School, Sanawar and later at Lady Shri Ram College for Women in New Delhi she earned an ISC. She did modeling for Bombay Dyeing and that was where she was spotted by Sanjay Gandhi. She met him when she was 17 and got married within a year.

Gandhi was the petitioner in the case of Maneka Gandhi v Union of India, a 1979 case involving freedom of movement. "The case involved the refusal by the government to grant a passport to Gandhi, which thus restrained her liberty to travel." In its ruling in the case, the Supreme Court of India in a departure from its earlier stand taken in its ruling in A.K.Gopalan v. State of Madras (1950), expanded the scope and content of the right to life and liberty by introducing the concept of substantive due process to Indian law. In writing that decision, the court found that "Democracy is based essentially on free debate and open discussion, for that is the only corrective of government action in a democratic setup."

Maneka had become politically active after Sanjay's death as she believed she was the rightful owner of Sanjay's legacy and was displeased with Rajiv being promoted as the new political heir of Indira. This led her mother-in-law Indira Gandhi to "throw her out" of the house. Maneka accused Indira of physically and mentally abusing her. Indira had accused her of uniting with her political enemies even as Maneka maintained she was loyal to her mother-in-law. In March 1983, she announced the formation of a new political party named after her husband, Rashtriya Sanjay Manch emphasising on youth orientation. She described it as "centrist" and said its main focus would be on employment.

In June 1983, Maneka and her supporters were arrested and later released for staging illegal marches in New Delhi and Punjab.

In July 1984, she announced at a press conference she would seek election to Parliament from the seat held by her brother-in-law Rajiv, Amethi. She was the only candidate against Rajiv, who had by then taken on responsibilities of Congress after her mother's assassination, in the elections which were held just 2 months after Indira's assassination. She was defeated by a huge margin.

She joined the Janata Dal in 1988 and served as the general secretary of JD 1988-1989. She won her first election in 1989 and served as Minister of Environment from 1989 to 1991 in the cabinet of V.P. Singh. In 1996 and 1998, she was reelected to the Lok Sabha as an independent member from Pilibhit in Uttar Pradesh and served in the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) led governments as Minister of State for Social Justice and Empowerment, and Minister for Culture. She created the Department for Animal Welfare and served as its Minister along with her other portfolios. While she was Minister for Social Justice and Empowerment, she played a historic role in the Indian pension reforms effort, through the early phase of Project OASIS. OASIS is an acronym for Old Age Social and Income Security. Maneka Gandhi played a key role in the initiation and early thinking on these issues, going up to the point where it was transferred to the Ministry of Finance (where Yashwant Sinha was minister) for implementation. This went on to become the celebrated New Pension System (NPS) which was implemented for new recruits into the central government from 2004 onwards.

She contested the 2004 Lok Sabha elections on the BJP ticket and became Member of Parliament from Pilibhit. She has won every time she has contested from Pilibhit except once, even though she has changed parties often and contested on different tickets. This is considered to be an indicator of her personal popularity in the region, which has been attributed to her nurturing the constituency and her Punjabi origins.

Her son Varun Gandhi contested and won as BJP's candidate in Indian general elections, 2009 from Pilibhit. She is also BJP's candidate for the 15th Lok Sabha from the Aonla seat in Uttar Pradesh and she has won this seat.

Gandhi is a self-described environmentalist and animal rights leader in India. She was appointed chairwoman of the Committee for the Purpose of Control and Supervision of Experiments on Animals (CPCSEA) in 1995. Under her direction, CPCSEA members carried unannounced inspections of laboratories where animals are used for scientific research were conducted.

She started the organisation People for Animals in 1992 and it is the largest organisation for animal rights/welfare in India. Maneka Gandhi is also a patron of International Animal Rescue. She is a vegan and has advocated this lifestyle on ethical and health grounds. She also anchored a weekly Television program named "Heads and Tails" highlighting sufferings meted out to animals due to their commercial exploitation. She has also authored a book under the same title. Her other books were about Indian people names.She is a cast member for the documentary A Delicate Balance.

As a journalist, Maneka Gandhi made headlines for her shocking publication in Surya Magazine of photos showing sexual intercourse between Suresh Ram (son of the then Defence Minister Babu Jagjivan Ram) and Sushma Chaudhury, a University of Delhi student. Her daring publication of the photos ran the risk of violation of obscenity laws. The revealing pictures were published apparently to discredit Jagjivan Ram, who defected from the Indira Gandhi government and helped bring Janata Party to power in 1977. He was one of the contenders for the post of Prime Minister of India.

She married Sanjay Gandhi, the son of the then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi in a civil ceremony on 23 September 1974. Indira Gandhi gifted her among other gifts, a khadi sari made out of yarn spun by her father Jawaharlal Nehru when he was in jail.

Maneka and Sanjay had a son in 1980 who they named Feroz Varun Gandhi. Months later, Sanjay was killed in a plane crash. An editor of Surya India magazine, Gandhi entered politics in 1982 after her husband's death in a plane crash. She had a public falling out with Indira Gandhi, after Maneka signalled her intention to step into her late husband's shoes in the Congress Maneka publicly accused her mother-in-law and Prime Minister of India Indira Gandhi of physically and mentally abusing her before throwing her out of the house where they lived after Sanjay's death.

She also took her mother-in-law, the Prime Minister to court for claiming Sanjay's belongings. The judge ruled that Indira, Maneka and her son Varun were each entitled to a third of stock that Sanjay owned. Maneka appealed against this ruling and her lawyer told the court that Indira was not entitled to share of Sanjay's stock as she had married Feroze Gandhi, a Parsi and thus was not a Hindu. Indira's lawyer used a photograph of her wedding as evidence to show that the marriage had been performed as per Hindu rituals.

On 31 October 1984, her mother-in-law, Prime Minister of India and her political opponent Mrs. Indira Gandhi was assassinated by her Sikh bodyguards. Maneka condemned the assassination as a "frightening act of violence". She called for an independent commission to probe the assassination composed of "eminent persons with a reputation for honesty and fearlessness but who have no political connection".

• 1988-89 - General-Secretary, Janata Dal (J.D.)

• 1989 - Elected to 9th Lok Sabha (1st term) From Pilibhit parliamentary constituency

• 1989-91 - Union Minister of State (Independent Charge), Environment and Forests

• Jan.-April 1990 - Union Minister of State (Independent Charge), Programme Implementation

• 1996 - Re-elected to 11th Lok Sabha (2nd term) From Pilibhit parliamentary constituency

• 1996-97 - Member, Committee on Science and Technology, Environment and Forests

• 1998 - Re-elected to 12th Lok Sabha (3rd term) From Pilibhit parliamentary constituency

• 1998-99 - Union Minister of State (Independent Charge) Social Justice and Empowerment

• 1999 - Re-elected to 13th Lok Sabha (4th term) From Pilibhit parliamentary constituency

• 13 October 1999- 1 September 2001- Union Minister of State, Social Justice and Empowerment (Independent Charge)

• 1 September 2001- 18 November 2001 - Union Minister of State, Culture with additional charge of Animal Care (Independent Charge) Programme Implementation and Statistics with additional charge of Animal Care (Independent Charge)

• 18 Nov.2001- 30 June 2002 - Union Minister of State, Programme Implementation and Statistics with additional charge of Animal Care (Independent Charge)

• 2002-2004 - Member, Committee on External Affairs

• 2004 - Re-elected to 14th Lok Sabha ( 5th term), Member, Committee on Health & Family Welfare, Member, Consultative Committee, Ministry of Environment and Forests From Pilibhit parliamentary constituency

• 5 August 2007 - onwards Member, Committee on Health & Family Welfare

• 16 May 2009 - Re-elected to 15th Lok Sabha (6th term) From Aonla parliamentary constituency