Begum Zaffar Ali: Difference between revisions

Begum Ali was born in 1901 to Khan Bahadur Aga Syed Hussain Thakur, Home and Judicial Minister during Maharaja [[Hari Singh]]'s rule.<ref name="libasapp.pakkapapita.com/?p=5452">[libasapp.pakkapapita.com/?p=5452]</ref> She began her career as a teacher in 1925 at the Girls' Mission High School(present day [[Mallinson Girls School]]). A staunch believer in women’s rights, she went door to door to raise awareness regarding girls’ education in the Valley and persevered to empower them through education. Her speeches at Public events inspired adulation among the women who started sending their girls to schools.<ref name="› History"/> Begum was married to Agha Zaffar Ali Qizilbash, a scion of an aristocratic [[Afghan]] family settled in [[kashmir]].<ref>{{cite web | url=https://aghafamilyofsrinagarkashmir.wordpress.com/ | title=Agha Family of Srinagar Kashmir}}</ref> The couple had three sons, Agha Nasir Ali-IAS, a civil servant who retired as  Labour Secretary of India in 1977, [[Agha Shaukat Ali]], who joined civil services of [[Pakistan]] during the partition of [[India]] in 1947. Begum's youngest son is Agha Ashraf Ali, an academician who retired as Commissioner of Higher Education in [[Jammu and Kashmir (state)|Jammu and Kashmir]]<ref name="ReferenceA"/> ''The Veiled Suite: The Collected Poem'', an anthology written by her grandson [[Agha Shahid Ali]], a noted Kashmiri-American poet, features a poem in memory of her.<ref name="The Veiled Suite: The Collected Poems">{{cite book | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=IL08ok9T8jcC&q=Begum+Zafar+Ali&pg=PA41 | title=The Veiled Suite: The Collected Poems | publisher=Penguin Books India | author=Shahid Ali Agha | year=2009 | pages=393 | isbn=9780393068047}}</ref> The [[Government of India]] awarded her the fourth highest civilian honour of [[Padma Shri]] in 1987.<ref name="Padma Awards">{{cite web |url=http://mha.nic.in/sites/upload_files/mha/files/LST-PDAWD-2013.pdf |title=Padma Awards |publisher=Ministry of Home Affairs, Government of India |date=2015 |access-date=21 July 2015 |url-status=dead|archive-url=https://www.webcitation.org/6U68ulwpb?url=http://mha.nic.in/sites/upload_files/mha/files/LST-PDAWD-2013.pdf |archive-date=15 November 2014 |df=dmy }}</ref> Later in a [[Doordarshan]] interview, she announced to return the award in protest against the undemocratic policies of the Government.<ref name="libasapp.pakkapapita.com/?p=5452"/> She moved to the United States in the 1990s and lived there with her son [[Agha Shaukat Ali]] until her death in 1999.<ref name="kashmirlife.net"/>