Ramesh Inder Singh, popularly known as R.I. Singh, is a distinguished civil servant of the Punjab cadre. He was awarded the Padma Shri in 1986, at the age of thirty-six, for his notable contributions in the field of public administration. He was district magistrate, Amritsar, from 1984 to 1987, and dealt with the turbulence in Punjab from close quarters.

The various army operations against militancy, including Operation Blue Star, Operation Woodrose and Operation Black Thunder I, were conducted during this period. During his long career of forty years in public life, he has held many crucial appointments.

He was principal secretary to the chief minister of Punjab for five years; chief secretary of Punjab for over two years; and from that position, he took premature retirement from the IAS in 2009 to serve for five years as chief information commissioner, the transparency watchdog under the Right to Information Act. Before joining the IAS, he taught political science in a constituent college of Delhi University. He has an MA in Political Science and topped Panjab University, and is a law graduate (LLB) from Delhi University. He has also worked with the World Bank as a consultant. He is currently retired.