Subsequently, Liaquat Ali’s involvement in political affairs escalated. He also established contact with Muhammad Ali Jinnah, who was already a highly respected figure in the field of national politics. It is said that in 1924, Liaquat hosted a dinner party for Jinnah’s wife Rattenbai in Simla. This was his first step towards forging an association with the man who would become his political mentor.
Liaquat Ali was elected to the UP Legislative Council as an independent candidate in 1926 from Muzaffarnagar, a reserved seat for Muslims, which was part of his family estate.
The day Irene first set eyes on him, his fiery speech in the assembly swayed the vote against the Simon Commission. He was already a hero to the young students of Lucknow University. His palpable sincerity and fervour touched a deep chord in the young woman and the impression was strong and lasting. To quote from an interview she gave much later in life: ‘He was very distinguished and he spoke very well. There were many people in the assembly who were bought but he was not.’13
In another interview, she shares an account of their first meeting: ‘There were floods in Bihar in those days, so we students started social work and arranged a play to collect funds for the flood victims. We had gone to sell tickets for the play in the assembly, and by chance the door I knocked on was opened by Liaquat Ali Khan. He bought one ticket, but I asked him to buy another one, and he did. Then I invited him to the play.’14 This interview was actually taken in 1987 but published only after her death.
A more detailed account states that when Liaquat Ali, somewhat wary of causes, seemed reluctant, ‘Miss Pant argued her case, with bright eyes and much fervour upon which Liaquat Ali Khan bought one ticket, at which Miss Pant ruefully said, “At least buy two,” adding mischievously, “bring someone to see the show with you.” He demurred; he did not know anyone he could bring. “I promise I will find a companion for you; if not I’ll sit with you myself,” his lady-to-be nobly offered. She was a girl of exceptional beauty, charm and wit, and a susceptible male would have bought the lot.’15
That evening a dinner was hosted by the governor of the province to which all the members of the Legislative Council were invited. This meant that Liaquat Ali was not present when Irene performed the popular song ‘Pale Hands I Loved beside the Shalimar’, written by Laurence Hope, a pseudonym for Adela Florence Nicolson, infusing it with much emotion. But she noticed that he arrived in the interval, accompanied by his friend Mustafa Raza. Overjoyed, she thanked him profusely later.
This was the first episode of a romance that contributed so much to future political events in the subcontinent.
Irene was indeed fond of music. The fact that she performed on stage indicates she must have been an accomplished singer. Her nephew Jitendra Pant has said, ‘Begum Ra’ana as a small girl was very fond of two hymns. One was, “How Great Thou Art” in praise of the Almighty and the other one which she sang with great gusto was “This world is not my home, I am just passing by, my treasure is laid up, somewhere beyond the blue sky.”’
Irene was pursuing her studies with a purpose and she intended to take up a career. The year after she completed her MA, she entered the Diocesan College in Calcutta for the Graduate Teachers’ Training Course. Here too, she stood first in both the theory and practice of teaching in the Licentiate of Teaching Examination of the Calcutta University.
Her dear friend from Lucknow, Kay Miles, was in Calcutta as well, heading St. Thomas School at Kidderpore at that time. Irene had a place to visit at weekends, and the two would engage in impassioned discussions about matters ranging from the cultural renaissance of Bengal, the paintings of Jamini Roy and the economic plight of farmers.16 The last was in keeping with her concern for the agriculturists of the country, which had been apparent in her MA thesis.
After passing the bachelor of teaching (BT) exam, she found a job at the Gokhale Memorial School in Calcutta, where she taught for a little over six months. This was a girls’ school founded by Sarala Ray in 1920, the well-known Brahmo social reformer and educationist. It was named after Gopal Krishna Gokhale, to commemorate his statement, ‘A wide diffusion of female education in all its branches is a factor of the highest value in the true well-being of every nation’.17 But the humid climate of Calcutta did not suit Irene, though she was impressed by the students, many of whom hailed from the progressive, cultured and enlightened Brahmo Samaj community. One day, as a diversion, a group of young teachers decided to visit a palmist, who predicted that soon Irene would go north. She had a good laugh. To her surprise, not long after, a newspaper cutting arrived in the post from her older sister, Shanti, who was married to Devaki Prasad Sinha, an eminent barrister from Patna. He was in Meerut at the time, fighting the Meerut Conspiracy case.
A post of professor of economics had become vacant in Indraprastha College for Women, Delhi, and her sister had urged her to try for it. Irene applied and was interviewed by Leonora G’meiner, the Australian woman who was the principal then. After some correspondence, she was accepted.
Indraprastha College was the oldest women’s college in Delhi, and had begun as a school founded in 1904 by a group of theosophists, led by Lala Jugal Kishore, in response to a call from Annie Besant. Leonora G’meiner too was deeply influenced by theosophist Lilian Edgar and left her home in western Australia at the age of forty-seven years to work for the cause of education for Indian girls. She joined Indraprastha Hindu Girls’ High School in September 1905, and guided the destiny of this path-breaking institution for over thirty years.
In May 1924, the college introduced the first arts (FA) or intermediate course, and received recognition as a constituent college of the newly established Delhi University (1922). This meant it followed the university’s curriculum and pattern of exams. Degree classes were introduced in 1930.
The correspondence regarding this post, meticulously preserved in the Indraprastha College Museum Archives, makes for interesting reading. Higher education for women was a crying need, but in those pioneering days it was a challenge to locate qualified Indian teachers. Leonora had a prolonged discussion with Lala Jagdish Prasad, Lala Jugal Kishore’s son, regarding the merits of ‘Miss I. M. Pant’ as opposed to those of a certain ‘Miss Sen Gupta’. In a letter dated 17 September 1930, Lala writes, ‘There is no comparison between Miss Sen Gupta and Miss Pant.’18 Earlier he had argued that she had an MA in economics, was a trained teacher and highly recommended by her professors. ‘Miss Sen Gupta’ in contrast had only completed one year of her MA.
Irene’s correspondence with Lala Jagdish Prasad and Leonora clearly demonstrates her confidence and self-belief. She was well aware that she was a highly desirable candidate for the post, not a supplicant seeking a favour. In a typewritten letter sent from ‘Shanti Cottage’, Almora, dated 18 September 1930, she wrote:
Dear Madam,
I am in a position now to accept the post you offered me on a salary of Rs. 200/-per month and would be obliged if you could come to a definite settlement as soon as possible.
I am leaving Almora on the 27th of September and my address will be,
c/o Rev. J. N. Mukand
Nazr Bagh
Lucknow
Yours faithfully,
Sd (Miss) I. M. Pant19
Irene was appointed on a salary of Rs 200 per month of which Rs 25 was the house rent allowance, and was requested to join on 7 October when the school reopened. This was an excellent salary for the time, considering that government school teachers received an emolument of Rs 250 in the early 1960s.
It was a wonderful opportunity for Irene, and her qualifications made her most suitable for the job. There had been some concern about the lodging arrangements for a single young woman and Leonora’s letters confirm that she tried to find place for Irene in the YWCA. However, Irene was finally accommodated at the Girls’ Friendly Society Hostel. This was a Christian but non-sectarian society that had been formed in the UK in 1875 to provide support to girls and women in the form of recreational and residential fa
cilities, and had opened branches throughout the world. At that time, few middle-class Indian girls took up jobs, leave alone positions in cities far from their homes. For this reason, most of the young women staying there were Europeans or Anglo-Indians.
Irene, however, was not one to find herself at a loss in any situation. If you consider the fact that girls could not even venture out of their homes unescorted, it was groundbreaking for a twenty-five-year-old to take up a job in a distant city and live on her own. Perhaps this early experience of fending for herself stood Irene in good stead during the most trying period of her life, after her husband’s assassination.
Leonora was delighted to get such an efficient and highly qualified teacher for her college. However, there is a note of dissatisfaction in one of her later letters to Lala Jugal Kishore, dated 9 September 1931, when she complained that ‘Miss Pant’ had asked for a raise. She wrote , ‘ . . . she only takes one lesson a day in the school and two periods in the college . . . she dresses expensively and lives well so requires a large salary to keep up her style . . . ’ At the same time in another letter, presumably after ‘Miss Pant’ left, she said, ‘With all her faults I would rather have kept little Irene longer because she is not really bad.’20
This interchange paints a picture of a young woman with a strong sense of self-worth who did not hesitate to demand her dues. At the same time, it is reported that with her friendly, lively ways, Irene earned much popularity with both her fellow staff members and students.
She was to teach at Indraprastha College for only one and a half years because a chance event brought her in contact with Liaquat Ali Khan again. There are two versions of how this happened. One states that a colleague, to whom Irene had once mentioned that she had met Liaquat Ali in Lucknow, noticed a news item in the paper. She read it out to Irene—he had been elected deputy president of the UP Legislative Assembly. Delighted with this progress in his career, Irene immediately wrote and congratulated him. The other version is that a friend from her university days wrote to her mentioning the news and suggested she congratulate him.21
‘He wrote back saying it was a delightful surprise to know that she was in Delhi, because it was close to Karnal, his home town, and since he passed it on his way to Lucknow, he hoped she would have tea with him at Wenger’s Restaurant.’22
New Delhi was a city in the making then, and the famous shopping centre of Connaught Place was still in the process of construction. The kikar trees where jackals and wild boar once lurked had been cleared to make way for a Georgian-style complex of buildings arranged in semi circles, and the area was no longer a popular spot for shooting partridge. The ancient Hanuman Temple, the Jain Temple and the Jantar Mantar had been spared, but the villages that stretched out from what we know as Old Delhi had been demolished to make place for the fashionable new business centre named after the Duke of Connaught, the third son of Queen Victoria.
Wenger’s, which has retained its position as a leading bakery to this day, was the brainchild of a young Swiss couple and very new in 1933. This elegant restaurant, with its pillared ballroom, was a posh hangout for socialites, frequented mostly by British and foreign officials and affluent Indians.
It was the right venue for a rendezvous between two individuals who would make an outstanding contribution to the history of the subcontinent. Irene was a sparkling conversationalist and Liaquat Ali had been her hero since she first set eyes on him. In turn, he was irresistibly drawn to the exceptional combination of charm and intellect that she exhibited. Most likely, he had never encountered a woman like her. It was just a matter of time before he proposed marriage.
In December 1932, Irene resigned from IP College and moved into Maidens Hotel. This heritage hotel had been established by the two Maiden brothers. In 1903, the Maiden Metropolitan Hotel moved to Alipur Road and enjoyed the reputation of being the best in Delhi. It would be the venue for their wedding ceremony.
The decision to marry could not have been an impulsive one. He was a Muslim, she a Christian. Though inter-caste and inter-community marriages were happening, they were a rarity and encountered opposition from relatives and society in general. Liaquat Ali’s idol, Muhammad Ali Jinnah had courted much controversy when he married the much younger Parsee woman, Rattenbai ‘Ruttie’ Petit.
Liaquat Ali was not a bachelor—he had married his cousin Jehanara Begum at a young age and was the father of a son named Wilayat Ali Khan. The two had been childhood playmates and said to be deeply devoted to each other in their early married life. But for some reason, they had grown apart and begun to live separately in 1928.23 Thus, Irene entered Liaquat Ali’s life at a time when there was an emotional vacuum that he needed to fill. Islam permitted a second marriage, so there was no hindrance on religious grounds. In addition, he had made more than adequate financial arrangements for his first wife before he wed Irene.
According to a conversation reported by Suleiman Jan, a relative from Muzaffarnagar, Liaquat Ali gave the following explanation when asked about his support for his estranged wife, ‘I do not take a penny from the Karnal Estates. All that is for Wilayat and his mother, the revenue that comes from Muzaffarnagar that too I give to the Begum and I keep only five hundred rupees for myself.’24
Historical opinion seems to be divided on whether Liaquat Ali divorced his first wife before marrying Irene. Historian Roger Long says, ‘Liaquat had a son with his first wife but then divorced her causing a great deal of dissension in the family.’25 But another biographer, Mohammad Reza Kazimi, claims that he did not. The fact that his family members attended the wedding means that his close relatives accepted that Irene was very important to him.
Perhaps Liaquat Ali had instinctively sensed that in Irene, he had discovered the helpmate he needed for the challenging goal he had chosen to pursue. A rare woman for the time—highly educated, outgoing and fearlessly outspoken.
With her quick mind, her joie de vivre and striking appearance, Irene would indeed prove to be a great asset to her husband. Many years later, on the threshold of independence, Viceroy Lord Wavell was quite impressed when he met her, as he noted, ‘Earlier we had a luncheon party to which Liaquat Ali Khan and his wife, a woman of considerable intelligence and character, came. There is no doubt that the Congress gains a considerable international advantage by the social qualities of their womenfolk who are usually intelligent and attractive compared to those of the Muslims who are usually in Purdah.’26
6
An Untraditional Marriage
Irene Pant and Liaquat Ali Khan were married on 16 April 1933 at the Maidens Hotel in Delhi. She converted to Islam and adopted the name Gul-i-Ra’ana. Later, she would be addressed by the shortened form, Ra’ana. The imam of the Jama Masjid performed the nikah, and Liaquat Ali Khan’s elder brother, Nawab Sajjad Ali Khan, graced the occasion as the head of the family. He also organized the reception that followed, which was attended by the elite of the city, which included Sir Maneckji Dadabhoy, president of the Council of State in Delhi. Ra’ana’s closest friend, Kay Miles, was there too.1 The lovely bride glowed with happiness and was elegant in her favourite outfit—a Lucknowi gharara-kurta—her head demurely draped with a diaphanous gold-bordered dupatta.
An old friend of the couple has corroborated the fact that the couple shared a very close relationship, which endured the passage of time. Many years after her death, when her biography was launched in July 2007, Ambassador Jamsheed Marker paid a great tribute to the brilliance of her personality: ‘When she walked into a room, the place would suddenly light up.’ Remarking on a picture in the book, he said that ‘Begum Sahiba and Quaid-e-Millat Liaquat Ali Khan carried much love and admiration for each other’.2
Comparing and contrasting the personalities of M.A. Jinnah and Liaquat Ali Khan and their marital relationships in particular, Roger Long states: ‘Both married a modern second wife from a different faith who converted to Islam upon marriage . . . Of the two men, Liaquat’s marriage was the longest and happiest. Jinnah d
ominated his wife and was the more guilty party upon marriage in the estrangement between he and his wife; Liaquat was highly solicitous to Ra’ana and they exchanged almost daily letters and telegrams when he was on his travels. It would not be entirely inaccurate to say that Liaquat was an uxorious husband.’3
Ra’ana mentioned once with characteristic candour in an interview: ‘It was an untraditional marriage for those days as it was a love marriage.’4
There is always a price, however, for breaking with tradition. As far as we know, Irene never visited Almora again after she got married. It is obvious that her parents were not pleased. It could not have been easy for the devout Christians to accept that their daughter was marrying into another religion and surrendering her old identity, her old beliefs. Daniel Pant has scrupulously recorded the dates of the baptism of each of his children in the family Bible, as well as the place and the pastor’s name. This indicates how important the ceremony was for him. They had, however, brought Irene up to make her own decisions and resigned themselves to accepting her choice. After all, Irene was not a flighty teenager but a mature woman who could judge what was best for her.
The Begum Page 7