Vijaya Lakshmi Pandit was the first female President of United Nations General Assembly. She was an Indian diplomat and politician. She was India`s first woman Cabinet Minister and the first woman to lead a delegation to U.N. She was the world`s first woman ambassador who served three prized ambassadorial posts at Moscow, Washington and London. She considered Indian National Congress as her own family as she was born into it. According to her, politics is a means of social and economic reform, which strengthens human rights and empowers women. She was against monopoly of power by one family. Born on August 18, 1900 in Allahabad, she was the daughter of Motilal Nehru, a wealthy and aristocratic nationalist leader, and sister of Jawaharlal Nehru, the first prime minister of independent India. In 1921, after receiving a private education in India and abroad, she married Ranjit Sitaram Pandit (d. 1944), a fellow Congress worker. (In accordance with conservative Hindu custom, her name was wholly changed upon her marriage, to reflect her husband’s clan.) In her family’s tradition, she became an active worker in the Indian nationalist movement and was imprisoned three times by the British authorities in India. She entered municipal government in Allahabad (western India) before entering the legislative assembly of the United Provinces (later Uttar Pradesh) and becoming minister for local self-government and public health (1937–39), the first Indian woman to hold a cabinet portfolio. In her mid thirties, she was elected to the Allahabad Municipal Board. She was arrested and sentenced to eighteen months imprisonment for presiding over a crowded public meeting where the Independence pledge was taken. This was the first of her three imprisonments. When the Indian National Congress took part in provincial elections she and her husband, Ranjit S. Pandit, were elected to the U.P. Assembly. Vijayalakshmi was appointed as the Minister for Health and Local Self-Government. For two continuous years she was the President of the All-India Women`s Conference. Tragedy struck her with the death of her husband after his last imprisonment in 1944. As he had left no will, she was left virtually penniless, as Hindu widows had no inheritance rights. His brother claimed all his investments and earning and made everything in his custody. Shaken by her grief and without knowledge of future and with no source of support from her brother, as he was imprisoned she left for Bengal to work, where cholera had spread in the wake of famine, and to set up a Save the Children Fund. During this time, Gandhiji was released from jail and he asked her to go to America to speak about actual conditions in India. This became possible when Sir Tej Bahadur Sapru(President of the Indian Council for World Affairs) included her in an Indian delegation to the Pacific Relations Conference to be held in Virginia. She became the member of the Constituent Assembly that drafted the Constitution. After Independence she was twice elected to Parliament and she led India`s first Goodwill Mission to China and served as Governor of Maharashtra. She resigned her post to stand for election to Parliament from the constituency of Phulpur that was vacated as a result of Jawaharlal Nehru`s death. Four years later, she resigned from the Lok Sabha as it was difficult for her to serve her party under Indira Gandhi. During the Emergency, she stepped out of retirement to speak out against dictatorship and dynasty. She collected more than eight honorary degrees from the world universities besides those offered to her in India. This great personality breathed her last on 1 December 1990 at Dehra Dun.
