NEW DELHI: Among the host of high profile personalities to meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi during his New York visit will be a U.S. politician of especial interest - Tulsi Gabbard, the first Hindu American in the U.S. Congress and a strong supporter of Modi.

Gabbard, a 33-year-old U.S. Democrat Congresswoman from Hawaii, is also an Iraq war veteran.

Gabbard, the first practicing Hindu American in the Congress who took her oath on the Bhagwad Gita, had spoken to Modi after his victory in the general election and congratulated him and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

She has been involved in the planning of Modi's US visit and had last month met two BJP leaders -- Vijay Jolly and MP Rajyavardhan Rathore -- in that connection.

Gabbard has always maintained that it was a "great blunder" by the US government to have denied a visa to Modi in the wake of the 2002 Gujarat riots.

She is to attend the Sep 28 speech by Modi at Madison Square Garden, New York, where he will address thousands of Indian Americans.

The event has been organized by the Indian American Community Foundation.

According to her website, "Tulsi was born in 1981 in Leloaloa, American Samoa, the fourth of five children born to Carol and State Senator Mike Gabbard."

Besides being the first member of the Hindu faith to be elected to the Congress, she is also one of just two female combat veterans ever to hold a seat.

She joined the Hawaii Army National Guard after college and was deployed to Iraq in 2004 and in Kuwait in 2009.
Source: PTI