A Tamil Brahmin Indian girl the world and the people of India forgot.
Every English speaking Jesuit educated Indian know the story of Florence Nightingale but history has no record of Padmavathi Iyer.
In the year 1917, a Tamil Indian girl was born in a middle-class family in Rangoon, Burma, where her father had gone for a living. He named her Sivaramakrishna Iyer Padmavathi.
At a time when women were traditionally confined to the kitchen/illiterate, the middle-class girl did MBBS from Rangoon Medical College.
When the Japanese invaded Burma, they briefly returned to their traditional home in Coimbatore.
In 1949, she went to London to do an FRCP, then unimaginable for a Female Indian doctor. She was selected to study further at Johns Hopkins University, US, where she trained under the legendary cardiologist Helen Taussig.
Thereafter, she moved to Harvard University, where she trained under the Father of Cardiology- Paul Dudley White.
When a glorious cardiology career awaited her in the US, she was firm in returning to India & serving Indians. She joined Lady Hardinge Medical College in 1953, to become India's First Lady Cardiologist.
S.I.Padmavathi started India's first Cathlab & exclusive Cardiac Clinic. Started India's first DM Cardiology course. She founded the All India Heart Foundation (AIHF) in 1962, to serve the poor & needy. She joined Maulana Azad Medical College in 1967, by which time her fame had spread. The Indian Govt under Indira Gandhi honoured her with the Padma Bhushan, that year.
She was the cardiologist & administrator of 3 great colleges at the same time- MAMC, G.B.Pant Hospital & Lok Nayak Hospital. She retired as Director, of MAMC in 1978.
She set up the National Heart Institute (NIH) in 1981, in Delhi. At age 90, Padmavathi became a fellow of The European Society of Cardiology in 2007.
Till age 95, (the year 2015), Padmavathi worked 12 hours a day, five days a week, to serve poor and needy Indians, with state-of-the-art Cardiac Care. She retired from active practice, that year. The Government of India bestowed India's second highest Civilian Award, the Padma Vibushan on S.I.Padmavathi in 1992.
Both Padmavathi and her sister Janaki(neurologist) remained single and started the Janaki-Padmavathi trust, pouring in their entire earnings to start a trust to provide poor people with money for life-saving Heart Surgeries.
After dedicating her entire life to serving the poor in the field of Cardiology, S.I.Padmavathi passed away in 2020, at age 103 from Corona.
Imagine the steely resolve, vision, brilliance and sheer determination of this iron- lady to shatter the glass ceiling in achieving all these, serving poor Indians with quality cardiac care, and finally giving away all her wealth to her fellow citizens.
Here is an inspiring story of the first female cardiologist of India 🙏
*[As received]*
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