Mrinalini Sen

Mrs N. C. Sen

Mrinalini Devi Sen

India

Mrinalini Sen, born Mrinalini Luddhi, was married to Nirmal Chunder Sen (born 1869), son of the reformer Keshub Chunder Sen, in 1905. He was her second husband and they had four children. Although they were called Srilata, Arati, Anjali and Nirmal, the children were known as Violet (born c.1906), Pansy (born c.1908), Rosie (born c. 1909) and George (born 11 November 1911). George, also known as Nirmalya Chunder Sen, boarded at Clifton College in Bristol from 1926 to 1929. In 1928 Frank Owen Salisbury painted a picture of the three daughters, known as The Sen Sisters. The painting was kept at the Museum of Modern Art in New York from 1954 following Salisbury’s death but sold at private auction for £96,000 in 2005.

In December 1910 Mrinalini Sen was reported to be the first Indian woman to fly a plane in India. In 1915 her husband, N. C. Sen, was appointed as an assistant to the Indian student advisory committee based in London for Indian students at UK universities, and the couple moved to London. N. C. Sen was soon promoted to advisor to Indian students and the Sens' house in London was a popular meeting-place for Indian university students in Britain. As prominent Indians in London they were invited to a range of social and government events to welcome Indians from a range of backgrounds.

Mrinalini Sen was actively acquainted and involved with women’s organizations in London too. She was a member of the National Indian Association, attended East India Association events to talk about women and also engaged in discussions and debates to promote Indian women’s suffrage with the British Dominions Women's Suffrage Union. She attended the Geneva conference of the International Alliance of Women for Suffrage in 1920, alongside other Indian delegates including Herabai Tata. From 1921 she was also Vice-President of the Bengali women’s society, the Bangiya Nari Samaj, which campaigned for women’s suffrage.

In 1927 Sen, alongside others, was vocal in her criticism of Katherine Mayo’s Mother India. In June 1930 Sen presided over a meeting of Indian women held at Friends’ House in Euston urging the release of Gandhi and other political prisoners in India and highlighting the role of women in the Indian nationalist movement. In 1930 she met the writer H. G. Wells in Geneva.

Sen was also a poet. Her books of verse include Pratiddhani (1894), Nirjharini (1895), Kollolini, and Monoveena (1899). She became a member of the Indian Institute of Aeronautics and Electronics in 1955. She died in India in 1972.