The Last Princesses of Punjab at Kensington Palace
Portrait of Jind Kaur by George Richmond, 1863. © Historic Royal Palaces / Courtesy of the Kapany Collection, The Sikh Foundation
An exhibition currently on display at Kensington Palace utilises portraiture to explore the life of Punjabi princess and suffragette icon, Sophia Duleep Singh, alongside the women who inspired her. Paintings and photographic portraits narrate the extraordinary lives and achievements of Sophia and her sisters Catherine and Bamba, her mother Bamba Müller and her grandmother Jind Kaur: women of a royal dynasty whose destinies were profoundly and violently transformed by the British empire.
Sophia Duleep Singh was the daughter of Maharajah Duleep Singh, the last Sikh ruler of the Punjab, and the goddaughter of Queen Victoria. She became a pioneering figure in the British women’s suffrage movement, using her royal status and public visibility to champion the cause of women’s rights in the early 20th century. A member of the Women’s Social and Political Union (WSPU) and the Women’s Tax Resistance League, whose slogan was ‘no taxation without representation’, Sophia was tried on several occasions for refusing to pay tax. An iconic image of Sophia selling copies of The Suffragette newspaper by the gate of Hampton Court Palace in 1913 caused widespread scandal and remains one of the most striking images of women’s resistance in the period.
A highlight of this exhibition is the portrait of Sophia’s grandmother, Jind Kaur, a Maharani who acted as regent of the Sikh Empire on behalf of her young son, Maharaja Duleep Singh. The portrait was painted by British artist George Richmond in 1863 and exhibited at the Royal Academy in London in 1865. As Adam Eaker explains in his lecture The Body of the Maharani: Portraiture, Gender and Empire at the Royal Academy 1791–1865, which took place at the Paul Mellon Centre in 2024, this portrait plays a significant role in narrating the experience of elite Indian women within the colonial context, with its reception reflecting imperial anxieties around race, global encounter and gender.
2028 marks the centenary of the Equal Franchise Act, which granted women the right to vote on the exact same terms as men and established universal adult suffrage by lowering the voting age for women from 30 to 21. Visit this page to read about current plans for a UK-wide touring exhibition which will celebrate the achievements of Suffragettes like Sophia Duleep Singh.
The Last Princesses of Punjab is on display at Kensington Palace until 8 November 2026.
