Pakistani novelist, playwright and spiritualist Bano Qudsia wrote novels, dramas plays and short stories in Urdu and wrote for television and stage inUrdu and Punjabi languages. She is best recognized for her novel Raja Gidh and her critically acclaimed play Aadhi Baat.
Piper’s distinctly confrontational ability to address pertinent topics around racial segregation and stereotyping have established her voice as one which is fearless, powerful, and hugely influential.
Radha Poonoosamy was a Mauritian politician who served as the country’s first female cabinet minister and was a member of the executive committee of the African National Congress (ANC). She was also an activist, campaigning for women’s rights and against apartheid and anti-Indian discrimination in her home country of South Africa. She continued her activism after moving to Mauritius in 1952, and was elected as a Member of Parliament in 1975. She was appointed the inaugural minister in charge of the newly formed Ministry of Women’s Affairs, a role in which she helped passed laws against gender discrimination.
Pritilata Waddedar was a Bengali revolutionary nationalist who was influential in the Indian independence movement.She graduated from Bethune College in Kolkata with a degree in philosophy with distinction and became a teacher.
Pritilata joined a revolutionary group headed by Surya Sen and is known for leading 15 revolutionaries in the 1932 armed attack on the Pahartali European Club, during which one person was killed and 11 injured. The revolutionaries set the club on fire and were later caught by British police. To avoid arrest, Pritilata committed suicide by cyanide poisoning.
Joanna Nobilis Sombre began her career as a Nautch (dancing) girl in 1700s India, and eventually became the ruler of Sardhana, a small principality near Meerut.
Shyamala “Shya” Chitaley was an Indian-American paleobotanist.
Aparna Nancherla is an American comedian and actor.
Lakshmi Puri is a former Assistant Secretary-General at the United Nations and the former Deputy Executive Director of UN Women.
Jhalkaribai was a soldier who served in the Rani Lakshmibai of Jhansi’s women’s army and eventually rose to a position of a prominent advisor to the queen herself, including analysing and strategising battle tactics.
Her Highness Nawab Sikander Begum Sahiba, Nawab Begum of Dar ul-Iqbal-i-Bhopal, GCSI ruled as the the Nawab of Bhopal from 1860 until her death in 1868.