BERHAMPUR: Arati Devi who was elected the country’s youngest sarpanch in 2012 from Dhunkapada village in Polasara block of Ganjam, is all set to participate in a parliamentary outreach programme and address a panel discussion at Srinagar on August 31.
Invited by Dr Seema Kaul, director of Parliamentary Research and Training Institute for Democracies (PRIDE), Arati will be speaking on ‘Leadership of panchayat: Social change, economic development and empowerment of women in rural areas’ . The outreach programme, initiated by Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla aims at fueling the aspirations of grassroots level leaders. Arati said she will use the platform to present ways in which rural women can march forward and influence opinion makers.
Arati, who left her lucrative bank job in 2012 to bring about a change in her village, champions the causes of women and children, protection of village environment and fights for a just and equal society. In 2014, she grabbed headlines for representing India at the International Leadership Programme on State and Local Governments, held in the US where she got the opportunity to meet the then US president Barack Obama and other world dignitaries.