Early Life and Family
Dr. Zohra Begum Kazi, was born on October 15, 1912, at Ranjangaon, Madhya Pradesh. Dr. Kazi has been called the Florence Nightingale of Dhaka.
Dr. Kazi came from the well-educated and influential Kazi family of Gopalpur in the Madaripur District in what was then Bengal. Her father, was also a physician and a politician.
At the age of 32, Dr. Zohra Kazi married a prominent law-maker, the only son of the Zamindar of Hiatirdia in Monohardi of Narsingdhi district. She was widowed in 1963 and chose not to remarry. Although she did not have any children of her own, Dr. Kazi adopted and educated many children from impoverished families throughout Bangladesh.
Her eldest brother Prof. Kazi Ashraf Mahmud was a Hindi poet. He retired as a Professor of Botany, Dhaka University. Prof. Mahmud is most noted for a controversial book of correspondence between Mahatma Gandhi and himself, published privately immediately after the partition of India. Dr. Kazi's family was closely tied to Mahatma Gandhi and several prominent Indian and later Pakistani politicians of that era. (see Quit India) Prof. Ashraf Kazi served as the secretary general of All India Students Federation when Kazi Nazrul Islam was the organizations president.
Her youngest sister Dr. Shirin Kazi was also a physician, and a poet. She was noted as being the first Bengali female doctor to obtain a DRCOG degree in 1951. Dr. Shirin Kazi later specialized in paediatrics. She was also known for having adopted and raised several children from less fortunate families.
All three siblings once lived in Sevagram, the ashram established by Mahatma Gandhi in Nagpur, India. Dr. Zohra Kazi also volunteered at Mahatma Gandhi's Sevashram, (which later gave birth to the Mahatma Gandhi Institute of Medical Sciences) providing free medical care for the poor. She also served as an honorary secretary of the Kasturba Gandhi Hospital. Letters written by the Mahatma to the young Zohra Kazi, indicate that he treated her as his own daughter.
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