Cornelia Sorabji (English: Cornelia Sorabji, born 15 November 1866, Nashik; died 6 July 1954, London) was India’s first woman barrister. Apart from being a social reformer, she was also a writer. Cornelia Sorabjee became a barrister at a time when women in this field did not have the right to practice law. Due to her talent, she started giving legal advice to women and raised the demand of opening the profession of advocacy for women.
Cornelia Sorabji was born on 15 November 1866 in Nashik, Maharashtra. In 1892, she went abroad to study civil law and returned to India in 1894. When Cornelia returned to India, at that time women were not vocal in the society nor did women have the right to advocate. Due to her talent, she started giving legal advice to women and raised the demand of opening the profession of advocacy for women.
Cornelia Sorabji studied law at Oxford University in 1892 but did not get a degree. At that time women were not given degrees from Oxford University. Women began to receive degrees at Oxford University in 1922. For this reason she could not practice law in Britain. After this, she came to India and became a legal advisor and fought for the rights of women in purdah. Such women were given nursing training so that they could work outside the home. She was also the first woman to join the Allahabad High Court Bar. Cornelia Sorabjee also completed her law studies from Bombay University and fought many cases in Bihar, Bengal and Odisha.
As a result of Cornelia Sorabji’s efforts, finally after 1907, Cornelia Sorabji was given the post of assistant female lawyer in the courts of Bengal, Bihar, Orissa and Assam. After a long struggle, in 1924, the law barring women from practicing law was relaxed and this profession was opened to them also. In 1929, Cornelia retired as a senior advocate of the High Court, but after that there was so much awareness among women that they started vocalizing their voice by adopting advocacy as a profession.
Although Cornelia Sorabjee died on July 6, 1954, while she was in London, her name still stands as a foundation for women in the complex and prestigious profession of law.
Google honored with doodle
Internet search engine Google also paid tribute to India’s first woman lawyer Cornelia Sorabjee by making a doodle on her 151st birth anniversary on November 15, 2017.
