page_title: Shareefa Hamid Ali
section_title: Personal life
hierarchical_section_title: Shareefa Hamid Ali / Personal life
caption_attribution_description: English: Baroda state in 1909
context_page_description: Shareefa Hamid Ali, also known as Begum Hamid Ali, was an Indian feminist, nationalist, advocate, and political figure. She was the President of the All India Women’s Conference in 1935, and one of the founding members of the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women in 1947.
context_section_description: Begum Shareefa Hamid Ali was born on December 12, 1883 to a progressive Muslim family in Baroda (now known as Vadodara), Gujarat, the administrative center of colonial British India. She was the daughter of Ameena Tyabji and Abbas J. Tyabji, the nephew of the Indian activist and politician Badruddin Tyabji. Her father, Abbas J. Tyabji, was the Chief Justice of Baroda State and a follower of Mahatma Gandhi. Her mother Ameena was one of the first prominent Muslim women to disavow purdah. Ali followed her mother’s example and supported the movement against this restrictive law, as she saw it as a symbol of social division and gendered oppression. In fact, her parents had supported her and her sisters’ education by sending them to school despite purdah restrictions. Begum Hamid Ali learned to speak six languages, Urdu, Gujarati, Persian, Marathi, English and French. She also devoted her time to painting, drawing and music. At the age of twenty-five she married Hamid Ali, her cousin and an Indian Civil Service Officer. After their marriage, they moved to the province of the Bombay Presidency in India. She remained involved in social work and continued to cultivate her interests.
caption: Baroda State in 1909
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