Quote · Empire: World History
369. The First British Indians: The Suffragette Princess (Ep 1)
Where this was said
Lala Lajpat Rai and Political Awakening
At 34:55 · chapter starts 34:50
Amid the emotional turmoil of the Delhi Durbar, Sophia is introduced to Lala Lajpat Rai — not a famous name in Britain but a leading figure of early Indian nationalism, closely associated with what would become the Indian National Congress. Rai treats Sophia with a warmth and respect she has never known from a father figure, showing her what her people are actually experiencing under British rule. Anand describes Rai 'like a father to her, like the father she really didn't have in her own father.' When Rai is later caught in a lathi charge — the colonial police's brutal method of beating protesters with long wooden sticks — and killed, Sophia writes in her diary with open hatred of the British for the first time. She returns to England a woman transformed, abandoning her socialite existence to fundraise for lascars and abandoned ayahs — and eventually to hear the suffragette cry that echoes the political demand she heard in India.
Back from India, Sophia abandoned her life as an Edwardian socialite and began fundraising for lascars and abandoned ayahs. When she heard the suffragette cry, she recognised it immediately as the same demand for justice she'd encountered in India — and drove press carriages through London to provoke press fights outside music halls.
