Rattanbai Petit and Mohammad Ali Jinnah: An Interfaith Marriage That Went Down in History
Excerpted with permission from Ruttie Jinnah: The Woman who stood defiant by Dr Saad S. Khan, published by Penguin Random House.
A digitised image of Ruttie and Mohammed Ali Jinnah superimposed on their Bombay home South Point. Photo: Special arrangement
History21/Jan/2021
The marriage between Rattanbai Petit and Mohammad Ali Jinnah, in 1918, was nothing short of a box-office thriller. It indeed was âthe marriage that shook Indiaâ, as Sheela Reddyâs aptly titled book suggests. Given the high status that Jinnah enjoyed at the time in the eyes of the British government, within the Congress and the Muslim League and before both the factions of the Home Rule League (led by Bal Gangadhar Tilak and Annie Besant, respectively), Jinnah had many enemies who were jealous of his success. Ruttie, the jewel of Bombay, had so many suitors that she had rejected that it would be impractical