India to chair international communication body
25 Mar 2010
India will, for the first time, chair the Inter-Governmental Council of the International Programme for Development of Communication (IPDC).
Raghu Menon, secretary in the ministry of information and broadcasting, was elected chairman of the Inter-Governmental Council of the IPDC, a government release said today.
This is for the first time in the history of IPDC that a developing country heads the organisation. Since its inception, the chairmanship had always remained with developed countries.
India's candidature, endorsed by the Asia Pacific regional group and supported by countries from Africa, Arab and Lain American region, won the election with 23 out of 37 votes against 14 polled by Switzerland.
The Inter-Governmental Council of the IPDC was established in 1980 and implements national, regional and inter-regional projects in the areas of promotion of freedom of expression and media pluralism, development of community media, capacity building and promotion of international partnership.
In his acceptance speech, Raghu Menon thanked the members of the Inter-Governmental Council for reposing faith in his leadership and assured his full commitment for strengthening programme implementation under IPDC's mandates.
