Heptulla is chief of IPU council

NEW DELHI, Oct 16 (UNI) — Rajya Sabha Deputy Chairperson and the distinguished human development ambassador of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), Dr Najma Heptulla, was elected unanimously as the President of the Inter-Parliamentary Council of the 138-nation Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) in Berlin today.

The IPU is the representative body of national parliaments. Dr Heptulla is the first woman in the 110-year history of the IPU to be elected to the highest office of the IPU.

Dr Heptulla has been active for years in different committees and bodies of the IPU, including as vice-president and member of the executive committee. Her eminent standing as parliamentarian and human development ambassador recently led to an invitation to her to address the newly elected members of the Indonesian Parliament on parliamentary ethics and code of conduct.

Dr Heptulla has regularly and from various fora, both within the country and abroad, been called upon by parliamentarians to provide guidance on issues of human development for an effective and concerted action on the ground.

Addressing a meeting of global parliamentarians during her current visit to Germany for the session to elect the IPU President, Dr Heptulla said the UNDP-coordinated parliamentarians’ forum for human development in India under her leadership had taken a lead in orchestrating attention on issues of human development among members of Parliament. This had led to interest among many states in India for state-level human development reports.

Dr Heptulla said some large states such as Madhya Pradesh and Karnataka had already released their respective state HDRs while Rajasthan and Gujarat were in the process of releasing their reports.