Kumari Vimla Verma (1 July 1929 – 17 May 2019) was an Indian politician and social worker. She was a

Member of Parliament A member of parliament (MP) is the representative in parliament of the people who live in their electoral district. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, this term refers only to members of the lower house since upper house members of ...

, having been elected from the

Seoni Seoni is a city and a municipality in Seoni district in the Indian state of Madhya Pradesh. This tribal household dominated district was formed in the year 1956. Rudyard Kipling used the forests in the vicinity of Seoni, or as was spelled dur ...

constituency in the state of

Madhya Pradesh Madhya Pradesh (, ; meaning 'central province') is a state in central India. Its capital is Bhopal, and the largest city is Indore, with Jabalpur, Ujjain, Gwalior, Sagar, and Rewa being the other major cities. Madhya Pradesh is the seco ...

as an

Indian National Congress The Indian National Congress (INC), colloquially the Congress Party but often simply the Congress, is a political party in India with widespread roots. Founded in 1885, it was the first modern nationalist movement to emerge in the British Em ...

candidate.

Life and career

Vimla Verma was born in

Nagpur Nagpur (pronunciation: Help:IPA/Marathi, aːɡpuːɾ is the third largest city and the winter capital of the Indian state of Maharashtra. It is the 13th largest city in India by population and according to an Oxford's Economics report, Nag ...

Maharashtra Maharashtra (; , abbr. MH or Maha) is a states and union territories of India, state in the western India, western peninsular region of India occupying a substantial portion of the Deccan Plateau. Maharashtra is the List of states and union te ...

on 1 July 1929. She held an

M.A A Master of Arts ( la, Magister Artium or ''Artium Magister''; abbreviated MA, M.A., AM, or A.M.) is the holder of a master's degree awarded by universities in many countries. The degree is usually contrasted with that of Master of Science. Tho ...

and was educated at

Allahabad University , mottoeng = "As Many Branches So Many Trees" , established = , type = Public , chancellor = Ashish Chauhan , vice_chancellor = Sangita Srivastava , head_label ...

, Allahabad. Verma was a founder-member of the Education Committee of

, the Arts College of Seoni, and the Madhya Pradesh State Social Welfare Board. From 1963 onwards, Verma served as a Member of the

All India Congress Committee The All India Congress Committee (AICC) is the presidium or the central decision-making assembly of the Indian National Congress. It is composed of members elected from state-level Pradesh Congress Committees and can have as many as a thousan ...

(A.I.C.C.). She was elected to the 10th

Lok Sabha The Lok Sabha, constitutionally the House of the People, is the lower house of India's bicameral Parliament, with the upper house being the Rajya Sabha. Members of the Lok Sabha are elected by an adult universal suffrage and a first-past ...

in 1991. In 1998, she was re-elected to 12th Lok Sabha. Verma worked as an honorary lecturer for two years. She was also an agriculturist, teacher and educationist. Verma enjoyed literature and politics. Vimla was the President of the Hindi Sahitya Samiti,

for several years. Her favorite pastimes included listening to music and studying art. Her passion was to work for the welfare of the society and development of women and children. Vimla Verma died on 17 May 2019, at the age of 89.

Notable achievements in Indian politics

* Verma was imprisoned for demonstrating against ill treatment meted out to Smt.

Indira Gandhi Indira Priyadarshini Gandhi (; Given name, ''née'' Nehru; 19 November 1917 – 31 October 1984) was an Indian politician and a central figure of the Indian National Congress. She was elected as third prime minister of India in 1966 ...

during Janata regime, 1977–79 * Appointed Observer for Lok Sabha elections in Rajasthan and assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu by A.I.C.C. * Appointed Observer for assessing political situation in five constituencies of Lok Sabha by Late Shri

Rajiv Gandhi Rajiv Gandhi (; 20 August 1944 – 21 May 1991) was an Indian politician who served as the sixth prime minister of India from 1984 to 1989. He took office after the 1984 assassination of his mother, then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, to beco ...

* Verma was conferred the Vidhan Kirti award by the Madhya Pradesh Legislative Assembly for being the most distinguished legislator and for significant contribution to the legislative business of the House. * Verma was Chairman, Project implementing Committee, Central Social Welfare Board; General-Secretary, Bharat Yuvak Samaj, Madhya Pradesh; Vice-President, Bharatiya Gramin Mahila Sangh; and Member, Madhya Pradesh Sewa Dal Board;

Positions held

* 1963-67 - District Convenor, Mahila Wing, Congress, Madhya Pradesh; President, District Congress Committee (D.C.C.), Madhya Pradesh * 1963 onwards - Member, All India Congress Committee (A.I.C.C.) * 1967-90 - Member, Madhya Pradesh Legislative Assembly * 1967-68 - Member, Public Accounts Committee * 1967-69 - General-Secretary, Pradesh Congress Committee (P.C.C.), Madhya Pradesh * 1969-72 - Minister of State, Irrigation and Power, Madhya Pradesh * 1972-75 - Minister of State for Health, Madhya Pradesh * 1977-80 - General-Secretary, P.C.C., Madhya Pradesh (2nd term) * 1979-80 - Member, Committee on Public Undertakings * 1980-85 - Cabinet Minister, Public Work Department, Irrigation, Rural Development and Transport, Madhya Pradesh * 1982-90 - Member, Business Advisory Committee * 1987-88 - Member, General Purposes Committee * 1987-89 - Member, Women and Children Welfare Committee * 1988-89 - Cabinet Minister, Labour and Human Resource Development, Madhya Pradesh * 1989-90 - Cabinet Minister, Food and Civil Supplies and Co-operation, Irrigation, Narmada Development and Public Health Engineering * 1991 - Elected to 10th Lok Sabha * 1991-95 - Chairperson, Committee on Communications; Member, Committee on the Welfare of Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes * 1995-96 - Union Minister of State in the Ministry of Human Resource Development (Department of Women and Child Development) * 1998 - Re-elected to 12th Lok Sabha (2nd term) * 1998-99 - Chairperson, Committee on Absence of Members from the sittings of the House; Member, Committee on Agriculture; Member, General Purposes Committee Member, Consultative Committee, Ministry of Environment and Forests

References

External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:Verma, Vimla 1929 births 2019 deaths India MPs 1998–1999 India MPs 1991–1996 Women in Madhya Pradesh politics Articles created or expanded during Women's History Month (India) - 2014 University of Allahabad alumni Indian National Congress politicians from Madhya Pradesh 20th-century Indian women politicians 20th-century Indian politicians Politicians from Nagpur Lok Sabha members from Madhya Pradesh