Get To Know Saeeda Bano, India's First Woman Radio Newsreader

On August 13, 1947, Saeeda Bano became the first woman radio newsreader in India. As we celebrate World Radio Day today, it is only apt that we remember and cherish the glass ceiling broken by Bano, who witnessed not only India's Independence but also the horrors of partition all the while dealing with a broken marriage and raising two sons on her own.

The working woman of independent India

The doyenne of Urdu broadcasting, Bano left her husband, to whom she was married at the age of 17, and carved her space as a working woman in the newly independent India. Growing up in Bhopal, Bano was married to Abbas Raza, a judge from Lucknow, while still in her teens. The marriage, however, did not work out, and Saeeda Bano moved to Delhi after securing a job at All India Radio as an Urdu newsreader.

She led her own life, ate her own meals, drove (till she could, then had a driver), lived alone, entertained like a queen: Shahana Raza on her grandmother Saeeda Bano.

In her 1994 Urdu memoir Dagar Se Hat Kar, which was later translated to English by her granddaughter Shahana Raza, Bano recalls her long time relationship with a much-married barrister Nuruddin Ahmed, who served as the mayor of Delhi and was also awarded Padma Bhushan. After over two decades of romance, the two finally tied the knot in 1970s.

A trailblazer feminist

In an interview Raza recalls that her grandmother didn’t need male approval or support. "She led her own life, ate her own meals, drove (till she could, then had a driver), lived alone, entertained like a queen!"

In a separate interview, Raza said, "Did Saeeda Bano consider herself a feminist? I don’t know that for sure, but she most definitely knew she was ahead of her times..."