Google marks India's first woman lawyer Sorabji's 151st b'day: Who was she?

Cornelia was the first female graduate from Bombay University, first woman to read law at Oxford University and the first Indian national to study at any British university

Google on Wednesday paid its tributes to Cornelia Sorabji, India's first woman lawyer, through a dedicated doodle on the occasion of her 151st birth anniversary.

A woman with many accolades to her kitty, Cornelia was the first female graduate from Bombay University, the first woman to read law at Oxford University and the first Indian national to study at any British university, the first female advocate in India, and the first woman to practise law in India and Britain. |Today's Paper

Cornelia was born in Nashik as one among nine children to Reverend Sorabji Karsedji and his wife, Francina Ford, who had been adopted and raised by a British couple. She enrolled in Deccan College, and claims to have topped the Presidency in her final degree examination, which would have entitled her to a government scholarship to study further in England.

However, according to Sorabji, she was denied the scholarship, and instead took up a temporary position as a professor of English at a men's college in Gujarat. After becoming the first female graduate of Bombay University, Sorabji wrote in 1888 to the National Indian Association for assistance in completing her education. This was championed by Mary Hobhouse (whose husband Arthur was a member of the Council of India) and Adelaide Manning, who contributed funds, as did Frabji thus arrived in England in 1889 and stayed with Manning and Hobhouse. In 1892, she was givlorence Nightingale, Sir William Wedderburn and others.

Soen special permission by Congregational Decree, due in large part to the petitions of her English friends, to take the Bachelor of Civil Laws exam at Somerville College, Oxford, thereby becoming the first woman to ever do so.

Upon completing her education and returning to India in 1894, Sorabji was involved in social and advisory work on behalf of the purdahnashins or women, who, according to Hindu law, were forbidden to communicate with the outside male world.

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