| Nusrat Bhutto | |
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| Born | September 21 1929 Kurdistan Province, Iran |
| Political party | Pakistan Peoples Party |
| Religious stance | Shia Islam |
| Spouse | Zulfikar Ali Bhutto |
| Children | Benazir Bhutto (1953-2007) Murtaza Bhutto (1954-1996) Sanam Bhutto (1957) Shahnawaz Bhutto (1958-1985) |
Begum Nusrat Bhutto (Sindhi: بیگم نصرت ڀھٽو, Urdu: بیگم نصرت بھٹو) (born September 21, 1929) is the former First Lady and Deputy Prime Minister of Pakistan,[1] widow of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto and his successor as Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) chairman (1979-1983), she is the mother of the late PPP chairman and former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto.
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Background
Begum Nusrat Ispahani is Kurdish Iranian from Kurdistan Province, Iran by heritage,[1] and daughter of a wealthy Iranian businessman who settled in Karachi, Pakistan before its partition.[1] Nusrat met Zulfikar Ali Bhutto in Karachi where they got married on September 8, 1951.[2] She was Zulfikar Ali Bhutto's second marriage, and they had four children together.
Family and career
As first lady from 1973-1977,[1] Nusrat Bhutto functioned as a political hostess and accompanied her husband on a number of overseas visits. In 1979, after the trial and execution of her husband, she succeeded her husband as leader of the Pakistan Peoples Party as chairman for life and she and her daughters were imprisoned and put under house arrest by the new regime of Zia-ul-Haq. In 1982, ill with cancer, she was given permission to leave the country for medical treatment in London at which point her daughter, Benazir Bhutto, became acting leader of the party and by 1984 Benazir was being referred to as party chairman.[3][4] After returning to Pakistan in the late 1980s, she served several terms as a Member of Parliament to the National Assembly from the family constituency of Larkana in Sindh. Also, during the administrations of her daughter Benazir, she became a cabinet minister and Deputy Prime Minister. In the 1990s, she and Benazir became estranged when Nusrat took the side of her son Murtaza during a family dispute, but later reconciled after Murtaza's murder. She currently resides with her daughter's family in Dubai, and suffers from the combined effects of a stroke and Alzheimer's Disease.[1]
See also
References
- ^ a b c d e Begum Nusrat Bhutto
- ^ About Bhutto Bhutto.org
- ^ "Miss Benazir Bhutto, the daughter of the former Prime Minister, Zulfikar Blutto, and chairman of the Pakistan People's Party has been released from detention and has gone to Paris to be with her cancer-stricken mother", Financial Times, January 11, 1984
- ^ Hall, Carla, "The April of Her Freedom Five Years Later, Benazir Bhutto's Plea for Pakistan", Washington Post, April 4, 1984
