Kamala Nehru was a freedom fighter and the wife of Jawaharlal Nehru (the leader of the Indian National Congress and later the first Prime Minister of India). Her daughter Indira also served later as Prime Minister of India.⁣
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Kamala was born on 1 August 1899 to Rajpati and Jawahar Mull Atal-Kaul who were from a Kashmiri Pandit family of Old Delhi. She was homeschooled under the guidance of a pandit and a Maulvi.⁣
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Kamala married Jawaharlal Nehru at the age of 16. Kamala gave birth to a girl child in November 1917, Indira Priyadarshini, who later succeeded her father as prime minister and head of the Congress party. ⁣
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She has been a pivot along with the Nehrus in the national movement. Being in the forefront in the Non-Cooperation movement of 1921, she organized groups of women in Allahabad and picketed shops selling foreign cloth and liquor.⁣
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When her husband was arrested while delivering a “seditious” public speech, she went in his place to read it out. The British soon realized the threat that Kamala Nehru emerged as. Hence, she was arrested on two occasions for involvement in Independence struggle activities, along with Sarojini Naidu, Nehru’s mother and other women in the Indian freedom struggle.⁣
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During this period she started a dispensary in her house Swaraj Bhawan, converting few rooms into a Congress Dispensary to treat wounded freedom fighters, their families, and other residents of Allahabad. ⁣
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In early 1935, as Kamala’s health again deteriorated, she was taken to Badenweiler (Southern Germany) by Subhash Chandra Bose and admitted to a sanatorium for treatment. Jawaharlal Nehru was in prison in India at that time. ⁣
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Nehru was released from prison and rushed to Germany in October 1935. While Kamala’s health improved initially, it started to deteriorate again in 1936, and she died in February. ⁣
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After her death, Mahatma Gandhi with the help of other prominent leaders converted her dispensary into a proper hospital known as Kamla Nehru Memorial Hospital in her memory.⁣
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A number of institutions in India are named after her. In Pakistan, Karachi has a road named after Kamla Nehru.⁣