India Post News Service
NEW YORK: Three Indian American community leaders have been elected to the standing committees of the 2008 Democratic National Convention. Democratic Party Chairman Howard Dean and the DNC Executive Committee nominated and elected Smita Shah, founder and president of Spaan Technologies; Kamala Harris, District Attorney of San Francisco; and Sunita Leeds, who is currently Chair of the DNC Indo-American Leadership Council Advisory Board.
The election of the three Indian Americans to the DNC Convention is a very important step in ensuring that the community is seen and heard at the Convention in Denver this August, according to Gautam Raghavan, Executive director of DNC's Indo-American Leadership Council. "But it's just the first step," he says. Smita Shah, who won the prestigious Ellis Medal of Honor in New York last year, is founder of Spaan Technologies, a Chicago-based company that specializes in engineering, construction management, facility and technology services.
She is a member of the Society of Women Engineers and served on President Bill Clinton's Millennium Council to Save America's Treasures. Shah is a graduate of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Northwestern University, and she serves on the Loyola University Board of Regents. Kamala Harris made history when she became the first woman District Attorney in San Francisco in 2003. With that she also became the first African American to be elected to this post in California, and the first Indian American to be elected to this position in the United States.
As a former Deputy District Attorney in San Francisco and Alameda County, Harris has dedicated her career to prosecuting violent crime, combating the sexual exploitation of children and working to improve the quality of life in her community. She has been honored by the National Urban League as a "Woman of Power" and received the Thurgood Marshall Award from the National Black Prosecutors Association in 2005.
Sunita Leeds has been involved in Democratic politics for years. A software developer by training, she is now deeply involved with progressive non-profit causes particularly focused on education, is on three advisory boards related to education, and Co-Chairs the Enfranchisement Foundation, which funds charities that act as catalysts in breaking the cycle of poverty and ignorance, and charities that specialize in women's issues.
As Chair of the DNC Indo-American Leadership Council Advisory Board, Leeds coordinates a network of Indian-American activists, community leaders, elected officials, and celebrities to support the fundraising and outreach work of the Council.
Comments (0)
Print
Tell friend
Top
