Shobha Nehru, commonly known as Fori Nehru and Auntie Fori (born Magdolna Friedmann; 5 December 1908 – 25 April 2017) was a Hungarian-born Indian

social worker Social work is an academic discipline and practice-based profession concerned with meeting the basic needs of individuals, families, groups, communities, and society as a whole to enhance their individual and collective well-being. Social work ...

and the wife of the Indian civil servant

Braj Kumar Nehru Braj Kumar Nehru MBE, ICS (4 September 1909 – 31 October 2001) was an Indian diplomat and Ambassador of India to the United States (1961–1968). He was the son of Brijlal Nehru and Rameshwari Nehru and first cousin once removed of India' ...

of the

Nehru family Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru (; ; ; 14 November 1889 – 27 May 1964) was an Indian Anti-colonial nationalism, anti-colonial nationalist, secular humanist, social democrat— * * * * and author who was a central figure in India du ...

. In 1947, following the

partition of India The Partition of British India in 1947 was the Partition (politics), change of political borders and the division of other assets that accompanied the dissolution of the British Raj in South Asia and the creation of two independent dominions: ...

, she was on the Emergency Committee, to assist in the protection and transport of Muslims in Delhi who had sought refuge in the camps at

Purana Qila Purana Qila () is one of the oldest forts in Delhi, India. Built by the second Mughal Emperor Humayun and Surid Sultan Sher Shah Suri, it is thought by many to be located on the site of the ancient city of Indraprastha. The fort formed the inn ...

and

Humayun's Tomb Humayun's tomb (Persian language, Persian: ''Maqbara-i Humayun'') is the tomb of the Mughal Emperor Humayun in Delhi, India. The tomb was commissioned by Humayun's first wife and chief consort, Empress Bega Begum under her patronage in 1558, an ...

. She co-founded an employment campaign to sell stitched and embroidered works made by refugee women. Later she became a member of the

All India Handicrafts Board The All India Handicrafts Board (AIHB), was an organisation in India established in 1952, which aimed to advise the Ministry of Textiles on development programmes for handicrafts. It's early key figures included Pupul Jayakar, Kamaladevi Chattopad ...

and for several years worked voluntarily at the Central Cottage Industries Emporium in Delhi, promoting crafts made in India. She accompanied her husband on his travels during his civil service career and between 1958 and 1968, she was present with him when he was appointed India's ambassador to the United States, was in London when he became high commissioner there, and is mentioned in several memoirs as a hostess. When her husband was appointed governor of Assam in the late 1960s, she contributed to the supervision of refugees in Bengal during the 1971 war. In 1976, she was one of a very few close to the then Prime Minister of India,

Indira Gandhi Indira Priyadarshini Gandhi (; Given name, ''née'' Nehru; 19 November 1917 – 31 October 1984) was an Indian politician and a central figure of the Indian National Congress. She was elected as third prime minister of India in 1966 ...

, that confronted her about the forces used during the Emergency. Nehru was noted to speak a high standard of Hindi and for always wearing a saree. In 1989, she moved to Kasauli with her husband, where they lived their remaining lives. In 1998, after asking her son's university friend and

Winston Churchill Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill (30 November 187424 January 1965) was a British statesman, soldier, and writer who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom twice, from 1940 to 1945 Winston Churchill in the Second World War, dur ...

's official biographer,

Sir Martin Gilbert Sir Martin John Gilbert (25 October 1936 – 3 February 2015) was a British historian and honorary Fellow of Merton College, Oxford. He was the author of eighty-eight books, including works on Winston Churchill, the 20th century, and Jewish h ...

, to recommend a book about the

history of the Jews Jewish history is the history of the Jews, and their nation, religion, and culture, as it developed and interacted with other peoples, religions, and cultures. Although Judaism as a religion first appears in Greek records during the Hellenisti ...

, he responded by writing her a letter every week for 140 weeks, each addressed "Dear Auntie Fori". The letters were published in a collection titled ''Letters to Auntie Fori'' (2002), in which he traced 5,000 years of

Jewish history Jewish history is the history of the Jews, and their nation, religion, and culture, as it developed and interacted with other peoples, religions, and cultures. Although Judaism as a religion first appears in Greek records during the Hellenisti ...

Early life and education

Fori Nehru, sometimes spelled Fory, and also known as Auntie Fori, was born Magdolna Friedmann on 5 December 1908 in Budapest, then part of the

Austro-Hungarian Empire Austria-Hungary, often referred to as the Austro-Hungarian Empire,, the Dual Monarchy, or Austria, was a constitutional monarchy and great power in Central Europe between 1867 and 1918. It was formed with the Austro-Hungarian Compromise of ...

. Her father, Armin Friedmann, had a seat somewhere between row three and five at the

Dohány Street Synagogue The Dohány Street Synagogue ( hu, Dohány utcai zsinagóga / nagy zsinagóga; he, בית הכנסת הגדול של בודפשט, ''Bet ha-Knesset ha-Gadol shel Budapesht''), also known as the ''Great Synagogue'' or ''Tabakgasse Synagogue'', ...

and her mother Regina, née Hirshfeld, was a member of the notable wealthy Bettelheim family, who made toys and earned the right to use the prefix ''

von The term ''von'' () is used in German language surnames either as a nobiliary particle indicating a noble patrilineality, or as a simple preposition used by commoners that means ''of'' or ''from''. Nobility directories like the ''Almanach de Go ...

''. Her father also owned a house on

Lake Balaton Lake Balaton () is a freshwater lake in the Transdanubian region of Hungary. It is the largest lake in Central Europe, and one of the region's foremost tourist destinations. The Zala River provides the largest inflow of water to the lake, and th ...

. As a child, she was affectionately known as "Dundi", meaning a little fat girl according to Nehru. The treatment of Jews in Hungary at the time, led to the family changing their name to Forbath, which in turn led to the nickname of 'Fori' at school. After laws changed requiring a change back to Friedman, she remained 'Fori' to those around her. She was still a young school girl when the Red Revolution broke out in Hungary in 1919, following which she recalled that her father was on a committee, guarded the streets and regularly travelled to villages. At the time, one of her troubling memories was of seeing people hanged from trees. In 1928 at the age of 20, she was refused a place at

Budapest University Budapest (, ; ) is the capital and most populous city of Hungary. It is the ninth-largest city in the European Union by population within city limits and the second-largest city on the Danube river; the city has an estimated population of ...

due to the

Jewish quota A Jewish quota was a discriminatory racial quota designed to limit or deny access for Jews to various institutions. Such quotas were widespread in the 19th and 20th centuries in developed countries and frequently present in higher education, of ...

which restricted the number of Jews who could enrol, so her parents sent her to study at first in France and then at the

London School of Economics , mottoeng = To understand the causes of things , established = , type = Public research university , endowment = £240.8 million (2021) , budget = £391.1 millio ...

(LSE) in the United Kingdom. In 1930 in the LSE history library she met and fell in love with B. K. Nehru, a

Kashmiri Pandit The Kashmiri Pandits (also known as Kashmiri Brahmins) are a group of Kashmiri Hindus and a part of the larger Saraswat Brahmin community of India. They belong to the Pancha Gauda Brahmin group from the Kashmir Valley, a mountainous region ...

of the

, who was studying for the

Indian Civil Service The Indian Civil Service (ICS), officially known as the Imperial Civil Service, was the higher civil service of the British Empire in India during British rule in the period between 1858 and 1947. Its members ruled over more than 300 million ...

exams. Nehru, B.K. ''Nice guys finish second: memoirs ''. pp.117–128

Early years in India

In 1932, both sets of parents met in Budapest. Two years later, in January 1934, she travelled to India for a trial period with the Nehru family. It was agreed that should she not fit in in India, she would be allowed to return to Hungary. After taking Hindi lessons from at first B. K. Nehru and then Indologist

Ervin Baktay Ervin Baktay (1890–1963; born Ervin Gottesmann) was an author noted for popularizing Indian culture in Hungary.Lloyd Triestino Lloyd Triestino was a major shipping company, created in 1919 when the city of Trieste became part of Italy in the settlement after the First World War. It ran passenger services on ocean liners around the world. Seriously harmed by Second World W ...

'' in February 1934, before taking a train to Lahore. The year with the Nehru family was a success and according to later recollections "the Nehru family fell in love with her". In

Allahabad Allahabad (), officially known as Prayagraj, also known as Ilahabad, is a metropolis in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh.The other five cities were: Agra, Kanpur (Cawnpore), Lucknow, Meerut, and Varanasi (Benares). It is the administrat ...

she was welcomed at

Anand Bhavan The Anand Bhavan is a historic house museum in Prayagraj, India, focusing on the Nehru family. It was bought by Indian political leader Motilal Nehru in the 1930s to serve as the residence of the Nehru family when the original mansion Swaraj Bh ...

, the family home, by

Swarup Rani Nehru Swarup Rani Nehru (''née'' Thussu, 1868 – 10 January 1938) was the wife of the barrister and Indian National Congress leader Motilal Nehru and mother of India's first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru.She played a prominent role in India's ...

, who was by this time quite frail and elderly. When she visited

Jawaharlal Nehru Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru (; ; ; 14 November 1889 – 27 May 1964) was an Indian anti-colonial nationalist, secular humanist, social democrat— * * * * and author who was a central figure in India during the middle of the 20t ...

in prison, he affectionately welcomed her, telling her not to cry at his situation "In this family we keep

stiff upper lip A person who is said to have a stiff upper lip displays Courage, fortitude and stoicism in the face of adversity, or exercises great self control, self-restraint in the expression of emotion. She married B. K. Nehru in

Lahore Lahore ( ; pnb, ; ur, ) is the second most populous city in Pakistan after Karachi and 26th most populous city in the world, with a population of over 13 million. It is the capital of the province of Punjab where it is the largest city. ...

on 25 January 1935 and was re-named Shobha. According to her husband, to ensure the marriage was widely known about, photographs of the wedding were featured in several newspapers. Subsequently she was also referred to as Mrs. B. K. Nehru. During these years

Mahatma Gandhi Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (; ; 2 October 1869 – 30 January 1948), popularly known as Mahatma Gandhi, was an Indian lawyer, anti-colonial nationalist Quote: "... marks Gandhi as a hybrid cosmopolitan figure who transformed ... anti- ...

inspired her to learn about Indian handicrafts. She later recalled that when she first came to India, wealthy women wore French chiffons, "there was hardly anything made in India. Isn't it strange that at that time no Indian craft was considered beautiful – only things imported from England and Paris". During the

interwar years In the history of the 20th century, the interwar period lasted from 11 November 1918 to 1 September 1939 (20 years, 9 months, 21 days), the end of the First World War to the beginning of the Second World War. The interwar period was relativel ...

and subsequent years, she lost many friends in

the Holocaust The Holocaust, also known as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe; a ...

. All her immediate family survived. Her father survived with the help of his German housekeeper. Her mother escaped from the Nazis, travelled to India the day before

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

broke out, and lived with Nehru in India throughout the war. One of her maternal uncles emigrated to British Mandatory Palestine, the younger uncle, a philatelist and poet, moved to Tangier, and her younger sister emigrated to Australia. Her brother Joseph was an officer in the Hungarian army and survived with the assistance of his unit Captain. He later escaped from Hungary by swimming across the Danube to Czechoslovakia. From her early years in India, Nehru also became acquainted with other Hungarian women in India, including the wife of Umrao Singh Sher-Gil Majithia,

Marie Antoinette Marie Antoinette Josèphe Jeanne (; ; née Maria Antonia Josepha Johanna; 2 November 1755 – 16 October 1793) was the last queen of France before the French Revolution. She was born an archduchess of Austria, and was the penultimate child a ...

, who she first met when living in

Simla Shimla (; ; also known as Simla, the official name until 1972) is the capital and the largest city of the northern Indian state of Himachal Pradesh. In 1864, Shimla was declared as the summer capital of British India. After independence, the ...

in 1935–36. Later, she would salvage some of the paintings by Antoinette's daughter,

Amrita Sher-Gil Amrita Sher-Gil (30 January 1913 – 5 December 1941) was a Hungarian-Indian painter. She has been called "one of the greatest avant-garde women artists of the early 20th century" and a pioneer in modern Indian art. Drawn to painting from an ear ...

. By the time of India's independence, she had lived in several Indian cities including Allahabad, Delhi, Hissar,

Ambala Ambala () is a city and a municipal corporation in Ambala district in the state of Haryana, India, located on the border with the Indian state of Punjab and in proximity to both states capital Chandigarh. Politically, Ambala has two sub-area ...

and Lahore.

Early post-independence years

In 1947, following the

, she took to social work. She was appointed to the Emergency Committee to assist in the protection and transport of Muslims in Delhi who had sought refuge in the camps at

and

. When one of the trains that she helped board with families were all dragged off and killed, she couldn't face sending another for several days, she recalled. Along with

Kitty Shiva Rao Kitty Shiva Rao (born 1903 – died after 1974), was a Montessori teacher and theosophist from Austria who, by India's independence, had led a committee of women to draft an ''Indian Women's Charter of Rights and Duties'' for the new constituti ...

and Prem Bery, she began an employment campaign, 'Refugee Handicrafts', for the purpose of supplementing the income of refugee families. Nehru, B.K. ''Nice guys finish second: memoirs ''. p.211 The three housewives took materials to the refugee women, who used their skills in embroidery, needlework, sewing and cutting. Patel Brothers in Connaught Place lent them one of their counters. They later moved to a shop on

Barakhamba Road Barakhamba, also known as Barakhamba Monument, is a 14th-century tomb building from the Tughlaq period that is located in New Delhi, India. Barakhamba means '12 Pillars' in Urdu and Hindi languages. The name has also been used for an upscale mo ...

, which continued to operate until 1952, when it moved to

Janpath Janpath (meaning People's Path, formerly known as Queensway), is one of the main roads in New Delhi. It starts out as Radial Road 1 in Connaught Place, adjacent to Palika Bazaar, and runs north–south perpendicular to, and past Rajpath ...

and merged with the Central Cottage Industries Emporium.The 1947 Partition Archive
Stanford Libraries (24 September 2013) That year, Nehru became a member of the

(AIHB) at the request of

Kamaladevi Chattopadhyay Kamaladevi Chattopadhyay (3 April 1903 – 29 October 1988) was an Indian social reformer and freedom activist. She was most remembered for her contribution to the Indian independence movement; for being the driving force behind the renaissance ...

. Thousands of displaced women in the Delhi camps had contributed to producing the handicrafts, including the one at Kingsway. The Indian artist

Anjolie Ela Menon Anjolie Ela Menon (born 17 July 1940) is one of India's leading contemporary artists. Her paintings are in several major collections, including the NGMA, the Chandigarh Museum and the Peabody Essex Museum. In 2006, her triptych work "Yatra" w ...

recalled that post independence, Nehru was one of a small group of women "who took it upon themselves to preserve and develop handicrafts and the handloom industry, without any remuneration". In 1948, she was asked by Jawaharlal Nehru to take care of the foreign diplomats at the funeral of Mahatma Gandhi. The following year she left Refugee Handcrafts to move to Washington with her husband. In the same year, she took her three sons to visit Hungary. Her son Ashok, recalled her tears ..."She used to go out every day, to meet her friends...many of them had disappeared". She later said "I have a feeling of guilt," ... "I wasn't there. I was safe. The guilt feeling is still with me. Why should I not have suffered?" Nehru visited Delhi in 1952 and was back in the US in 1953, using her time and influence there to promote Indian handicrafts. Her samples included art from the Heritage crafts village

Raghurajpur Raghurajpur is a heritage crafts village out of Puri district, India, known for its master Pattachitra painters, an art form which dates back to 5 BC in the region and Gotipua dance troupes, the precursor to the Indian classical dance form of ...

. The founders of

Fabindia Fabindia is an Indian chain store retailing garments, furnishings, fabrics and ethnic products Handicraft, handmade by craftspeople across rural India. Established in 1960 by John Bissell, an American working for the Ford Foundation, New Delhi, ...

, became interested after seeing some samples of the Indian work when Nehru met one of them in 1953, but any further progression in promoting them was hampered by the 90% import duty on embroidered crafts at the time in the US. In 1954, she returned to India, where she remained until 1958. During this time she worked as a volunteer at the Emporium. In 1958 she resigned from the AIHB as her husband was posted to Washington as India's Ambassador, upon which she was appointed chairman of the Cottage Industries Export Committee of the Ministry of Commerce, Government of India. She subsequently persuaded

Lord & Taylor Lord & Taylor was the oldest brick and mortar department store in the United States, in business from 1826 to 2020. The brand was purchased during former owner Le Tote's 2020 liquidation bankruptcy and relaunched by new owner, Saadia Group, as ...

Macy's Macy's (originally R. H. Macy & Co.) is an American chain of high-end department stores founded in 1858 by Rowland Hussey Macy. It became a division of the Cincinnati-based Federated Department Stores in 1994, through which it is affiliated wi ...

and

Neiman Marcus Neiman Marcus Group, Inc. is an American integrated luxury retailer headquartered in Dallas, Texas, which owns Neiman Marcus, Bergdorf Goodman, Horchow, and Last Call. Since September 2021, NMG has been owned by a group of investment compani ...

to take interest in India's cottage industries.

Wife of an Indian official

Throughout her husband's career, she accompanied him in his posts as governor of several parts of East India including

Assam Assam (; ) is a state in northeastern India, south of the eastern Himalayas along the Brahmaputra and Barak River valleys. Assam covers an area of . The state is bordered by Bhutan and Arunachal Pradesh to the north; Nagaland and Manipur ...

Nagaland Nagaland () is a landlocked state in the northeastern region of India. It is bordered by the Indian states of Arunachal Pradesh to the north, Assam to the west, Manipur to the south and the Sagaing Region of Myanmar to the east. Its capital cit ...

Manipur Manipur () ( mni, Kangleipak) is a state in Northeast India, with the city of Imphal as its capital. It is bounded by the Indian states of Nagaland to the north, Mizoram to the south and Assam to the west. It also borders two regions of Myanm ...

Tripura Tripura (, Bengali: ) is a state in Northeast India. The third-smallest state in the country, it covers ; and the seventh-least populous state with a population of 36.71 lakh ( 3.67 million). It is bordered by Assam and Mizoram to the east a ...

and

Meghalaya Meghalaya (, or , meaning "abode of clouds"; from Sanskrit , "cloud" + , "abode") is a states and union territories of India, state in northeastern India. Meghalaya was formed on 21 January 1972 by carving out two districts from the state of As ...

. After time in London as high commissioner there, he was appointed governor of

Jammu and Kashmir Jammu and Kashmir may refer to: * Kashmir, the northernmost geographical region of the Indian subcontinent * Jammu and Kashmir (union territory), a region administered by India as a union territory * Jammu and Kashmir (state), a region administered ...

and then

Gujarat Gujarat (, ) is a state along the western coast of India. Its coastline of about is the longest in the country, most of which lies on the Kathiawar peninsula. Gujarat is the fifth-largest Indian state by area, covering some ; and the ninth ...

, and later worked with the

United Nations The United Nations (UN) is an intergovernmental organization whose stated purposes are to maintain international peace and international security, security, develop friendly relations among nations, achieve international cooperation, and be ...

. An advocate of the

rhythm method Calendar-based methods are various methods of estimating a woman's likelihood of fertility, based on a record of the length of previous menstrual cycles. Various methods are known as the Knaus–Ogino method and the rhythm method. The standard days ...

of contraception, she approached

Margaret Sanger Margaret Higgins Sanger (born Margaret Louise Higgins; September 14, 1879September 6, 1966), also known as Margaret Sanger Slee, was an American birth control activist, sex educator, writer, and nurse. Sanger popularized the term "birth control ...

in 1952, to ask for assistance to the

Family Planning Association of India The Family Planning Association of India (FPA India) is a registered charity in India. Established in 1949 by Dhanvanthi Rama Rau and Avabai Bomanji Wadia, the organisation has 40 local branches across the country that promote sexual health and ...

. On 22 March 1965, after Sanger's death, she addressed an audience of 1,000 at a ceremonial dinner in her honour, describing Sanger as "single-handedly carried the torch of responsible motherhood". Between 1958 and 1968, as the wife of India's ambassador to the US, Nehru would act as hostess. In one memoir,

Marian Cannon Schlesinger Marian Cannon Schlesinger (September 13, 1912 – October 14, 2017) was an American artist and author. She published two volumes of her memoir, ''Snatched from Oblivion: A Cambridge Memoir'' and ''I Remember: A Life of Politics, Painting and Peo ...

called her more Indian than the Indians. She was noted to speak a high standard of Hindi and for always wearing a saree.

Lady Bird Johnson Claudia Alta "Lady Bird" Johnson (''née'' Taylor; December 22, 1912 – July 11, 2007) was First Lady of the United States from 1963 to 1969 as the wife of President Lyndon B. Johnson. She previously served as Second Lady from 1961 to 1963 when ...

noted in her diaries that when she accompanied President

Lyndon B. Johnson Lyndon Baines Johnson (; August 27, 1908January 22, 1973), often referred to by his initials LBJ, was an American politician who served as the 36th president of the United States from 1963 to 1969. He had previously served as the 37th vice ...

, Nehru and her husband to a memorial for Jawaharlal Nehru at the

Washington National Cathedral The Cathedral Church of Saint Peter and Saint Paul in the City and Diocese of Washington, commonly known as Washington National Cathedral, is an American cathedral of the Episcopal Church. The cathedral is located in Washington, D.C., the cap ...

in the summer of 1964, she was most moved by the grief expressed by Nehru, "not Indian at all, Hungarian". In 1966, she hosted a dinner "that would break the ice" between then Prime Minister of India, Indira Gandhi, and US President Johnson. When her husband was posted as governor of Assam, she contributed to assisting with the supervision of refugees in Bengal during the 1971 war. In his autobiography, Jayanta Bagchi, who was awarded the

Padma Sri Padma Shri ( IAST: ''padma śrī''), also spelled Padma Shree, is the fourth-highest civilian award of the Republic of India, after the Bharat Ratna, the Padma Vibhushan and the Padma Bhushan. Instituted on 2 January 1954, the award is conferr ...

for his services in the relief effort of Bengali refugees said that Nehru "helped me a lot in relief matters and also civil defence matters and whenever I had a problem, I went to her". According to him, the story of the efforts in the relief operations is incomplete without mentioning her. When in Kashmir, she led the province's family planning association and in setting up schools for Buddhist children. File:Dinner in Honor of President John F. Kennedy Given by Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru (1).jpg, Dinner in Honor of President John F. Kennedy given by Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru. Fori Nehru (first left) (1961) File:Group Greets First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy upon her Return from India.jpg, Nehru greeting Jaqueline Kennedy upon her return from goodwill tour of India (1962) File:Guests of a State Dinner for President Dr. Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan of India.jpg, Guests of a State Dinner for President Dr. Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan. Fori Nehru (middle of second row) (1963) File:Visits from Ambassador Nehru of India and Senator Gore (7365767876).jpg, Visits from Ambassador Nehru of India and Senator Gore. Fori Nehru (third from left) (1963) File:President John F. Kennedy and President Dr. Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan of India Depart White House.jpg, President John F. Kennedy and President Dr. Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan. Fori Nehru in blue saree (1963)

Later life

In 1976, Nehru was one of a very few close to India's Prime Minister

that confronted her about the forces used during the Emergency. The story of how she presented Gandhi with a list of names of men who had been forcibly sterilised is told in Nehru's husband's memoirs. In 1989, Nehru and her husband moved to Kasauli, where he died in 2002.

''Letters to Auntie Fori'' (2002)

In 1958 Nehru met

Martin Gilbert Sir Martin John Gilbert (25 October 1936 – 3 February 2015) was a British historian and honorary Fellow of Merton College, Oxford. He was the author of eighty-eight books, including works on Winston Churchill, the 20th century, and Jewish h ...

, a friend of her son Ashok from university days and later historian and official biographer of

. When he arrived at the Nehru home that year he was unwell, and he later recounted that she successfully nursed him to recovery with rice and yoghurt. Gilbert visited her in Washington in the 1960s, and later in London when her husband was Indian High Commissioner there. They continued to correspond but did not see each other again until 1998. He referred to the Nehru's as Auntie Fori and Uncle Birju, and until 1998 had no idea she was from Budapest's Jewish community. She asked him to recommend a book about the history of Jews. In response, he wrote her one letter every week for 140 weeks, each addressed "Dear Auntie Fori", tracing the course of Jewish history over 5,000 years. The letters were collectively published in a book titled '' Letters to Auntie Fori'' (2002).

Death and legacy

Nehru died in

Kasauli Kasauli is a town and cantonment, located in Solan district in the Indian state of Himachal Pradesh. The cantonment was established by the British Raj in 1842 as a Colonial hill station,Sharma, Ambika"Architecture of Kasauli churches" ''The Trib ...

on 25 April 2017, at the age of 108. She is often mentioned as a friend in biographies of

, and in her husband's autobiography, ''Nice Guys Finish Second '', as "a wife who gives direction and stability". Gilbert's ''Letters to Auntie Fori'' (2002) are dedicated to her. Mahatma Gandhi's grandson,

Gopalkrishna Gandhi Gopalkrishna Devadas Gandhi (born 22 April 1945) is a former administrator and diplomat who served as the 22nd Governor of West Bengal serving from 2004 to 2009. He is the grandson of Mahatma Gandhi and C. Rajagopalachari (Rajaji). As a former ...

, dedicates his book on 20 key figures throughout the Gandhi-Nehru years, ''Of a Certain Age: Twenty life sketches'' (2011) to Nehru; she likely knew many of them he explains. Some of her experiences and contributions to the lives of those displaced in the Delhi camps after partition are included in ''Development Retold: Voices from the field '' (1999). Her oral history (2013) of partition is held in the 1947 Partition Archives at

Stanford Libraries The Stanford University Libraries (SUL), formerly known as "Stanford University Libraries and Academic Information Resources" ("SULAIR"), is the library system of Stanford University in California. It encompasses more than 24 libraries in all. Sev ...

Footnotes

References

Bibliography

External links

* * {{Authority control 1908 births 2017 deaths Nehru–Gandhi family Hungarian Jews People from Budapest Alumni of the London School of Economics Social workers from Delhi Gandhians Partition of India 1947 in Indian politics Handloom industry in India Women in World War II Indian Jews