A Parsee from a privileged background, Bhicoo Batlivala was the daughter of Sorabji Batlivala who owned a woollen mill in Bombay then became manager of Empress Mills in Nagpur. Through her paternal aunt, she was related to Navroji Saklatvala, Managing Director of Tatas. Her sister Siloo worked for Tatas, and her brother Homi is described as ‘the adopted son of the late Sir Navroji Saklatvala’ (L/PJ/12/631, p. 21). Batlivala moved to Britain as a child and was educated at Cheltenham Ladies College before entering higher education and being called to the Bar. After her education, she returned to India for some years where she worked in the judicial and educational departments in Baroda. It is said she left her post as Inspector of Schools in Baroda because of ‘a scandal involving her moral character’ (ibid.).
In June 1938, Batlivala accompanied Nehru to Europe and then to London as his personal secretary, apparently breaking off her engagement to an Englishman to do so and causing considerable scandal in the process. Subsequently, Nehru was advised to avoid her company for fear that the association would bring his name into disrepute.
Eventually married to an Englishman, Guy Mansell, Batlivala was evidently a very active member of the India League and one of the most visible women in this organization; her attendance and participation is recorded at a number of meetings, both in London and in other cities, in the late 1930s and early 1940s, and she played a leading role in campaigning for the release of Nehru from prison. Clearly a highly articulate and charismatic speaker, in one government surveillance report she is described as one of the few Indians beyond Krishna Menon who had any influence on the policy of the India League (L/PJ/12/453, p. 125). In 1939 and 1940, she gave lecture tours ‘of an anti-British nature’ in the US, making a considerable impact on her audiences, with one newspaper report declaring that ‘no other speaker who has appeared at the Washington Athletic Club has carried the enchantment, the fascination, the brilliance and stimulation that 28-year-old Bhicco Batlivala does’ (L/PJ/12/631, p. 21, p. 68).
Evidence suggests Batlivala was also a talented sportswoman, playing on the first woman’s polo team in England and excelling at hunting, flying, tennis, squash and golf (ibid., pp. 68–9).
