Her name is Ummul Kher.
She was born with a condition called brittle bone disease. Through her childhood, her bones broke again and again. The smallest fall was enough to cause a fracture.
By the time she reached adulthood, she had suffered sixteen fractures and undergone eight surgeries.
Her family had moved to Delhi from Rajasthan when she was around five years old. Her father sold clothes as a street vendor near the Nizamuddin shrine, and the family lived in a nearby slum.
Then the slum was demolished to make way for a flyover.
The family decided to return to Rajasthan.
Ummul, then around fourteen, refused to go.
She wanted to continue her education. Her parents believed a disabled girl had studied enough and should not spend her life chasing books.
They left. She stayed behind in Delhi alone.
A fourteen-year-old girl with bones that broke at a touch, no family around her and almost no money decided she would educate herself anyway.
She rented a tiny room and survived by tutoring children from nearby slums. She earned a little from the families who could afford to pay and continued studying with whatever resources she could find.
She scored ninety-one percent in Class 12.
She earned admission to Gargi College at Delhi University. From there, she went on to complete a master’s degree, an M.Phil and a Ph.D at Jawaharlal Nehru University.
Along the way, she was awarded a national research fellowship.
In 2016, she appeared for the Civil Services Examination, one of the most competitive examinations in the country.
She cleared it on her first attempt.
She became an officer of the Indian Administrative Service.
Her parents left her behind at fourteen because they believed a girl with broken bones had no future worth investing in.
She built one of the hardest futures this country has to offer, entirely on her own.
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@FFT1776 So you forgot to compare the photos before and after at the same age when they had surgery and thata important. Comparing photos at 20s or 30s with surgery at 60s doesn't make sense
@PointsPro Check construction or renovation work at hotel as well. I booked private cottage at a 4star resort and found ongoing work right next to room. Hotels don't change rooms during such time citing unavailability. After insistance they showed at least 4 to 5 available rooms.
@ShefVaidya Instagram took away the beauty of those places by sending influencers, random dancing people, making all indians wear weird clothes, irresponsible tourism, making all places basically worse like goan beaches which were pristine with less tourists
GAURIE DWIVEDI: How many books have you read on Indian democracy?
HELLE LYNG: I love Indian food, yoga
GAURIE 🔥 : Enjoying Indian curries and doing yoga doesn't qualify as knowing India. Have you been in India? You are a commentator, not a journalist.
Her name was Maharani Gayatri Devi.
She was born on May 23, 1919, in London. Her father was the Maharaja of Cooch Behar in Bengal. She grew up riding horses, playing polo, and studying in England and Switzerland.
At 12 years old, she met the Maharaja of Jaipur, Sawai Man Singh II. He already had two wives. After an eight-year courtship, she married him on May 9, 1940, and became the third Maharani of Jaipur.
Gayatri Devi refused to observe purdah. At a time when royal women were expected to remain behind veils, she appeared in public confidently and unapologetically. She later founded Jaipur’s first modern school for girls. Vogue magazine also named her among the ten most beautiful women in the world.
In 1962, she joined the Swatantra Party and contested the Lok Sabha election from Jaipur. Out of 246,516 votes cast, she received 192,909 votes, nearly 78 percent of the total.
It was recorded in the Guinness Book of World Records as the largest electoral majority ever won by any candidate in a democratic election at the time.
When she visited the United States, President John F. Kennedy introduced her publicly as “the woman with the most staggering majority that anyone has ever earned in any election in the world.”
She won the Jaipur seat again in 1967 and once more in 1971, each time defeating the Congress.
Then came the Emergency.
In June 1975, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi declared Emergency across India. One month later, Gayatri Devi was arrested on charges of tax evasion.
She was 56 years old and spent five and a half months inside Tihar Jail.
After the Emergency ended, she gradually withdrew from politics. Her husband had died in 1970, and her only son died in 1977. She spent the rest of her life quietly in Jaipur until her death on July 29, 2009.
She was 90 years old.
A queen who won the world’s largest election majority.
A woman jailed by the very Prime Minister she had spent years opposing.
Her school for girls still stands in Jaipur today.
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