Prof. R.S. Singh was born at village Gagaha in Gorakhpur district on 1st March, 1927. He did his matriculation in 1942 and was enrolled at the Govern­ment Agricultural College, Kanpur for his Post Graduation. In 1948 he obtained Masters Degree in plant pathology with distinction. He continued as a Research Assistant and became lecturer in plant pathology in 1951. He was awarded degree of Doctor of Philosophy by Agra University in 1956. 

Dr. Singh has served at Government Agricultural College, Kanpur (1948-56), Ranchi Agricultural Col­lege, Bihar (1956-61), Bihar Agricultural College, Sabour (1961-63) and at the Department of Plant Pathology, G.B. Pant University of Agriculture and Technology as Professor till June 1989. He continued his association with plant pathology after his retirement and published books. As a research scientist, he published nearly 200 papers in national and international journals. His widely read books include-Plant Diseases, Principles of Plant Pathology and Diseases of Vegetable Crops. His latest contributions are Diseases of Fruit Crops (2000) and Plant Disease Management (2001). He was Co-Editor of Conceptual and Experimental Plant Pathology (with U.S. Singh, W.M. Hess and D.J. Weber) and A Handbook of Economic Nema­tology (with K. Sitaramaiah). 

Dr. Singh did his post-doctoral research at the Uni­versity of Wisconsin (Madison) in 1960 and visited that country on a lecture tour in 1971. He also visited Russia and Sri Lanka as FAO consultant. He was Presi­dent of the Indian Phytopathological Society in 1980 and Indian Society of Mycology and Plant Pathology in 1982.