20 Facts About Nusrat Bhutto

Begum Nusrat Bhutto was an Iranian-born Pakistani public figure who served as the First Lady of Pakistan from 1971 to 1977, as the wife of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, who served as the President and Prime Minister of Pakistan.

Nusrat Bhutto served as a senior member of the federal cabinet between 1988 and 1990, under her daughter Benazir Bhutto's government.

Nusrat Bhutto was born in Isfahan to a wealthy merchant family of Kurdish heritage and her family had settled in Bombay before moving to Karachi after the Partition of British India.

Nusrat Bhutto moved to Oxfordshire with her husband who then was pursuing his legal education.

Nusrat Bhutto returned to Pakistan alongside Bhutto who went on to serve as the Foreign Minister.

Nusrat Bhutto remained in the cabinet until Benazir's government was dismissed in 1990.

Nusrat Bhutto Ispahani was born on 23 March 1929 in Isfahan, Persia.

Nusrat Bhutto's father was a businessman who came from the wealthy Persian Hariri family in Isfahan.

Nusrat Bhutto grew up with Iranian traditions at her home but adapted to Indian Muslim culture outside.

Alongside her daughter Benazir Nusrat Bhutto, she was arrested numerous times and placed under house arrest and in prison in Sihala.

Nusrat Bhutto was attacked by police with batons while attending a cricket match at Gaddafi Stadium in Lahore, when the crowd began to raise pro Bhutto slogans.

In 1982, ill with cancer, she was given permission to leave the country by the military government of General Zia-ul-Haq for medical treatment in London at which point her daughter, Benazir Nusrat Bhutto, became acting leader of the party, and, by 1984, the party chairman.

Nusrat Bhutto lived the last few years of her life with her daughter's family in Dubai, United Arab Emirates and later suffered from the combined effects of a stroke and Alzheimer's disease.

Besides her native Persian, Nusrat Bhutto was fluent in Urdu and Sindhi.

Nusrat Bhutto was Zulfikar Ali Bhutto's second wife, and they had four children together: Benazir, Murtaza, Sanam and Shahnawaz.

Nusrat Bhutto was suspected of cancer in 1982, and hence, allowed to leave Pakistan for medical treatment.

Nusrat Bhutto withdrew from public life particularly after her son Murtuza's death in 1996, which some suggest coincides with her onset of Alzheimer's disease.

Nusrat Bhutto died at the age of 82 in the Iranian Hospital Dubai on 23 October 2011.

Nusrat Bhutto's body was laid to rest at Garhi Khuda Bakhsh in the Larkana District the next day.

Nusrat Bhutto was buried next to her husband and children in the Bhutto family mausoleum at a ceremony attended by thousands of mourners.