Sudha Murthy is an Indian educator, author, entrepreneur and philanthropist. Sudha Murthy was born in a Brahmin family on 19 August 1951 to R. H Kulkarni, a surgeon, and Vimala Kulkarni, a school teacher. She is a graduate of Electrical and Electronics Engineering from the B.V.B College of Engineering and Technology and completed her post-graduation in Computer Science from the Indian Institute of Science.
She is the chairperson of Infosys Foundation and married to the co-founder of Infosys N.R. Narayana Murthy. The couple has two children Rohan Murthy and Akshata Murthy, who is married to the current Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Rishi Sunak.
She started her professional career as a computer scientist and engineer. She was the first female engineer hired at India’s largest manufacturer TELCO. She wrote a postcard to the then Chairman of TELCO and complained about the gender bias in the company. After this, she was interviewed and hired immediately. She has always been an advocate of women’s rights and a pioneer in the development of education. She joined the company as a development engineer in Pune and then worked in Pune and Jamshedpur.
In 1996 she started Infosys Foundation, which is a public charitable trust and has been the Trustee of Infosys Foundation till date. The Trust has so far built 2,300 houses in the flood-affected areas. She also has a vision of a library for each school and has so far set up 70,000 libraries. Her organisation has so far built 16000 public toilets. She is also a member of public healthcare initiatives of the Gates Foundation. She also established the Murthy Classical Library of India at Harvard University.
She has founded several orphanages and also contributes to rural development. She even supported the movement to provide all Karnataka government schools with computer and library facilities and taught computer science.
Sudha Murthy is best known for her social work and her contribution to Literature and has written and published many books which include novels, non-fiction, travelogues and memoirs. Some of her famous writings are:
- How I Taught my Grandmother to Read
- Grandma’s Bag of Stories
- Three Thousand Stitches
- Dollar Bahu, etc.
- The Mother I Never Knew
- The Man From The Egg
- Wise And Otherwise
Awards
- 1995: Best Teacher Award from Rotary Club of Karnataka.
- 2000: Karnataka Rajyotsava State Award for achievement in the field of art and literature.
- 2001: Ojaswini Award for excellent social work for the year 2000.
- 2004: Raja-Lakshmi Award by Sri Raja-Lakshmi Foundation in Chennai.
- 2006: India’s Fourth highest civilian award Padma Shri.
- 2006: She received the R.K. Narayan’s Award for Literature.
- 2010: Daana Chintamani Attimabbe Award by Karnataka Government.
- 2011: Murthy was conferred an Honorary LL.D degree for her contribution to promoting formal legal education and scholarship in India.
- 2013: Basava Shree-2013 Award for contribution to society.
- 2018: Murthy received a lifetime achievement award at the Crossword Book Award in the popular non-fiction category.
- 2019: IIT Kanpur awarded her the Honorary Degree of Doctor of Science
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