Home and Hearth

Abstract

The bedrock of Akbar Jehan’s and Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah’s marriage was a proclivity to challenge and productively debate each other’s opinions. I learned early in life that people like Akbar Jehan and the Sheikh, who were in public service, were dangerously vulnerable in their public life and lived in glass houses. This was and remains especially true for women. Te quickest and easiest way, even in the twenty-first century, to alleviate the angst caused by a politically influential woman is to slander her. One such libelous story was of Akbar Jehan’s betrothal or marriage to Lawrence of Arabia.