Pupul Jayakar - Early Life and Education

Early Life and Education

Jayakar was born in 1915 at Etawah, in the state of United Provinces (Uttar Pradesh). Her father was a liberal intellectual and senior officer in the Indian Civil Service, while mother came from a Gujarati Brahmin family from Surat, where Pupul spent her yearly summer breaks. She had a brother, Kumaril Mehta and 4 sisters, Purnima, Premlata, Amarganga and Nandini Mehta. Her father's work took the family to many parts of India, where she got the opportunity to absorb local crafts and traditions early on in life.

At the age of eleven, she went to Banaras (Varanasi), where she studied in a school started by Annie Besant, theosophist, who was also active in Indian freedom movement. Subsequently her father got posted to Allahabad, where she first came in contact with Nehru family at age fifteen, as her father was a friend of Motilal Nehru. Later, she became friends with daughter of Jawaharlal Nehru, Indira Priyadarshini(later, Indira Gandhi).

She attended Bedford College in London before graduating from the London School of Economics in 1936. On returning home she married Manmohan Jayakar, a barrister, and settled down in Bombay (now Mumbai).