Sophia: Princess, Suffragette, Revolutionary

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Sophia's contributions to the Suffrage movement were extensive, part of Emmeline Pankhurst's inner circle - and she used her elevated status to work towards the cause. I knew literally nothing about the Maharaja Duleep Singh, Sophia and her siblings, and this book was an absorbing biographical insight into their lives.

Her broadcasting career began in the newsroom of satellite channel Zee and she won the Nazia Hassain Award in the Upcoming Television Broadcaster category in 2005. She has since presented several news and current affairs programmes for BBC radio and television, notably on Radio 5 Live and currently Radio 4’s Any Answers. On BBC2 she has co-hosted The Daily Politics show and presented Newsnight. This is an exceptional book highlighting parts of British social, political and economic history through the life of Sophia Duleep Singh. Eager to tell more South Asian stories, I began screenwriting a few years ago and am working on my first series. Trying to repurpose obstacles into vaulting poles has become my new strategy, and this is exactly what the subject of my upcoming writing project, Princess Sophia Duleep Singh, did 100 years ago. As the daughter of the last Maharajah of Punjab, and goddaughter of Queen Victoria, Sophia’s life was nothing short of extraordinary: her actions so bold and anarchic that the press were urged to keep them under wraps lest it cause a royal scandal and tarnish the British crown.One might have understood their need for positive optics after refusing to return the north Indian kingdom to its Punjabi king. The East India Company had been circling Punjab for decades, and, on the death of Sophia’s grandfather, King Ranjit, it had seized its opportunity. It posed as a friend, offering to help protect the young King Duleep from external threats, and then forced him and his mother, the formidable Jindan Kaur, into exile in Britain, separating him from everything he knew. Sophia and her family cannot be understood without understanding the context of developments in the British Empire in this period. Giving details on the development of Sikh traditions, revolutionary ferment in the Indian subcontinent, the British suffrage movement, the First World War, and the partition of India and Pakistan, Anand presents a comprehensive and valuable historical biography. Anand has gone into key archives at Windsor, the Museum of London and elsewhere to uncover the official records and surviving correspondence about Sophia, enriched by photographs and her own interviews. This is a necessary biography, drawing attention to the broader facets of the British suffragette movement and the depth of connections between the Indian subcontinent and Britain in the Victorian and Edwardian eras * The Times *

John Kampfner is author of The Rich, From Slaves to Super Yachts, a 2,000-Year History, published by Little Brown.Real entertainment. Shannon has continued to build on this imagined world with intricacy, and Paige's voice comes through to deliver a suspenseful story * Washington Post * Whenever I go to vote, I cry. The thought of the women who came before me and fought for what I have now, moves me to tears. Reading the legacy of Princess Sophia Duleep Singh and her place in the fight, brought it all the more close to my heart.

Miss Anand writes extremely well. Whilst it is clear that she respects and admires her subject, her writing does not appear to me to be sycophantic; certainly, Sophia is not presented as a paragon of virtue but as committed, caring but sometimes a little eccentric and irascible individual seeking a role in life in a country determined to deny her one. Spruce up your springtime reading list with six brand-new recommendations for series six of Between the Covers. Six thrilling new book releases M.S. Merian - R. Tagore International Centre of Advanced Studies in the Humanities and Social Sciences: Metamorphoses of the Political (ICAS:MP), New Delhi, India

What do you do if you are the daughter of an estranged Indian royal family marooned in the heart of late-Victorian and Edwardian London? You join the ranks of the various revolutionaries and other assorted malcontents, while maintaining social proprieties to the very end. A fascinating biography of a historical figure who, along with her family, deserves to be better known. Sophia Duleep Singh was the daughter of the last Maharajah of the Sikh Empire and raised in Britain, with Queen Victoria as her godmother. Her father presented the Koh-I-Noor diamond to the Queen. Anand married science writer Simon Singh in 2007. The couple have two sons and live in Richmond, London. [17] [18]