Born: 13 February 1879
Died: 02 March 1949
Smt. Sarojini Naidu was born on 13 February 1879, in a Bengali family in Hyderabad was a poet and a political activist. A supporter of civil rights, women’s liberation, and against imperialistic ideas, she was a prominent figure in India’s fight for independence from British rule. Her work as a poet was granted her title as ‘Bhartiya Kokila’ or ‘The Nightingale of India’ by Mahatma Gandhi because of her colorful, imaginative, and lyrical poetry. Naidu began writing at the age of 12. The Nizam of the Kingdom of Hyderabad was very impressed by the play, “Maher Muneer”, written by her in Persian. Her first collection of poems i.e, The Golden Threshold was published In 1905. Naidu’s poetry covers both children’s poems and content written on many serious themes which include patriotism, exoticism, and calamity.” In the Bazaars of Hyderabad” remains one of her most popular poems which was published in 1912.
Naidu passed her examination from the University of Madras at the age of 12 and took four years of discontinuity from her studies. The Nizam’s Charitable Trust founded by Mahbub Ali Khan (The 6th Nizam) offered to study in England. Accepting the offer she first studied at King’s College, London, and later at Girton College, Cambridge.
Following her time in England, she worked as a suffragist (a person who commend that the right to vote be reached to more people, principally to women), and was drawn to Indian National Congress’ movement for independence. Sarojini Naidu was one of the major frames/bodies to led ‘The Civil Disobedience Movement’ and ‘The Quit India Movement. In 1925, after becoming a part of the Indian nationalist movement she became a follower of Mahatma Gandhi and the poetic voice of swaraj, she was designated as the President of the Indian National Congress and later in 1947, as the Governor of the United Provinces. She was the first woman to hold the position of Governor in the Indian supremacy.
On 2nd March 1949, at 3:30 p.m. she died of a cardiac arrest in Lucknow (Government House) Naidu was also listed amid the “150 Leading Women” list by the University of London to mark the 150 years since women gained access to higher education in the United Kingdom in 2018. Swami Vivekanand Subharti University remembers the great voice of India on her Birth Anniversary.
