Global InformationFori Nehru information
Fori Nehru | |
|---|---|
 Fori Nehru (1935) | |
| Born | Magdolna Friedmann 5 December 1908 Budapest, Austro-Hungarian Empire |
| Died | 5 April 2017 (aged 108) Kasauli, India |
| Nationality | Indian |
| Other names | Auntie Fori, Mrs. B.K. Nehru |
| Education | London School of Economics |
| Known for | Social work Promoting Indian handicrafts |
| Board member of | Delhi Emergency Committee (1947) All India Handicrafts Board |
| Spouse | Braj Kumar Nehru |
| Children | 3 |
| Parents |
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| Family | See Nehru family |
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 and the wife of the Indian civil servant Braj Kumar Nehru of the Nehru family.
In 1947, following the partition of India, Nehru was the only female member 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 and Humayun's Tomb. 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 and for several years worked voluntarily at the Central Cottage Industries Emporium in Delhi, promoting crafts made in India.
Nehru 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, 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's official biographer, Sir Martin Gilbert, to recommend a book about the history of the Jews, he responded by writing Nehru 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.