Kumudini Basu

Kumudini Basu (, 1873–1942) was a Bengali writer, social reformer, freedom fighter and women's rights activist in British India.

Early and personal life Basu was born in 1873 in Calcutta, West Bengal, India, and was the eldest daughter of the Indian nationalist Krishna Kumar Mitra. She had a sister named Basanti Chakravorty .

Basu married the businessman Sarat Chandra Basu-Mullik.

Basu worked as a writer and edited the publications Suprabhat (1907–14), which she also founded, and Bangalakshmi (1925-27). She published several books and poems, including the book Sikher Balidan (The Sacrifice of the Sikh).

She served as secretary of the Bharat Stree Mahamandal (The Great Circle of Indian Women), which aimed to promote female education. Basu campaigned for women's right to vote and was one of the leaders, along with Kamini Roy and Mrinalini Sen, of the Nigil Bangiya Nari Votadhikar Samiti (All Bengali Women's Franchise Association) which fought for women's suffrage. On 16 August 1925, the Bengal Legislative Council passed a women's franchise resolution by majority vote, granting some Bengali women to exercise their right for the first time in the 1926 Indian general election.

Despite her advocacy for women's voting rights, Basu feared that voting might force respectable women to mix with or perhaps be confused with "undesirable women," such as a prostitutes.

Death She died in 1942 in Calcutta, West Bengal, India.