Princess Durrusehvar Sultan’s Selfless Struggle for Uplifting the Social Status of Hyderabadi Women

Abstract

Durrushehvar Sultan, the daughter of the last caliph Abdulmajid, had to go abroad in 1924 when she was around ten years old. The financial support that provided relief to the members of the dynasty who were struggling with financial difficulties while in abroad, came from the Nizam of Hyderabad. After a simple wedding ceremony in Nice in 1931 with Azam Jah, the eldest son of the Nizam of Hyderabad, Princess arrived to Hyderabad, where she carried out a series of activities in order to increase both the accessibility of health facilities and the education level of the local people. Princess of Berar in particular struggled to strengthen the status of women in the society. In this article, it is aimed to focus on her encouragement of women to discover their strengths and her establishment of women’s volunteers movement by benefiting from the main sources and observations obtained as a result of research field made in Hyderabad.