Google honours India’s first female physician Kadambini with doodle

Kadambini Bose was born in Bhagalpur British India, now Bangladesh, on July 18, 1861. Although women’s education then was not supported by her upper-caste Bengali community, her father

Hyderabad: Google Doodle celebrates India’s first female physician Kadambini Ganguly’s 160th birthday with an illustration today. Illustrated by a Bengaluru-based guest artist Oddrija, the doodle features a sketch of Kadambini Ganguly in the backdrop of the Medical College Hospital.

Kadambini Bose was born in Bhagalpur British India, now Bangladesh, on July 18, 1861. Although women’s education then was not supported by her upper-caste Bengali community, her father, a co-founder of India’s first women’s rights organisation, took the courage and enrolled her in Banga Mahila Vidyalaya.

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She also studied at Bethune School and became the first woman to join the University of Calcutta. And in 1883, Kadambini Ganguly and her peer Chandramukhi Basu became the first women to graduate college in Indian history.

Soon after graduating, Kadambini Bose married professor and activist Dwarkanath Ganguly, who encouraged her to pursue a degree in medicine. In 1886, she graduated from the Calcutta Medical College, and, thus, made history as the first woman to become an Indian-educated doctor.

Soon, Kadambini studied and worked in the United Kingdom, earning three additional doctoral certifications with a specialisation in gynaecology. She then returned to India to begin private practice in the 1890s.

“Kadambini Ganguly sought to uplift other women in India through both medical service and activism in India’s women’s rights movement. Among many other campaigns, Ganguly joined six others to form the first all-women delegation of the 1889 Indian National Congress,” the Google Doodle page says. (https://www.google.com/doodles/kadambini-gangulys-160th-birthday)

Kadambini Ganguly died on October 3, 1923, at the age of 62, in Kolkata.

The 2020 ‘Prothoma Kadambini’ biographical television series based on Ganguly’s life reinvigorated her legacy by telling her inspirational story to a new generation.