Queen Camilla
The Royal Air Force (RAF) Club in London has presented a new painting of Noor Inayat Khan, an Indian-origin spy and descendant of Tipu Sultan, to honor her sacrifice as an undercover operative for Britain’s Special Operations Executive (SOE) during World War II.
The 76-year-old senior royal also formally christened a room at the RAF Club ‘Noor Inayat Khan Room’ on Tuesday, where the image sits opposite a stained-glass window commemorating women in the RAF that was unveiled by her late mother-in-law Queen Elizabeth II in 2018.
When she was recruited to the SOE in 1942, Noor was a member of the RAF’s Women’s Auxiliary Air Force (WAAF). She went on to become one of only two WAAF members to be awarded the George Cross (GC) – the highest award bestowed for acts of the greatest heroism or the most conspicuous courage in circumstances of extreme danger.
“It was a proud moment to have the Queen unveil Noor Inayat Khan’s portrait at the RAF Club”, said British Indian author Shrabani Basu, who handed the Queen with a copy of her book of Noor, ‘Spy Princess: The Life of Noor Inayat Khan’, at the unveiling ceremony.
“For me, it has been a privilege to tell her story. This wonderful portrait will now be seen by many young men and women for generations. Noor’s story will never be forgotten”, Basu continued.
Noor-un-Nisa Inayat Khan was born in Moscow in 1914 to an Indian Sufi saint father and an American mother. At an early age, she traveled to London before settling in Paris for her education. Following the collapse of France during WWII, she fled to England and joined the WAAF.
She was recruited into the SOE in late 1942, which was formed to perform espionage, sabotage, and reconnaissance in occupied regions during the war.
Her new portrait was unveiled at the RAF Club in front of her relatives, including her 95-year-old cousin Shaikh Mahmood and nephew Pir Zia Inayat Khan.
The image was painted by Paul Brason, a prominent British artist and former President of the Society of Portrait Painters. He based the layout on the few photos of Noor Inayat Khan that were accessible in order to represent her steely resolve as an undercover agent who refused to crack under cruel Nazi interrogation before being executed by the Gestapo at Dachau concentration camp in Germany in 1944 with the word liberty on her lips.
In a statement, the RAF Club stated, “Noor was the first woman SOE operator to be infiltrated into France, and was landed by Lysander aircraft on 16 June 1943. During the following weeks, the Gestapo arrested most of the Paris Resistance Group in which she worked”.
“Despite the danger, Noor refused to return to England because she did not wish to leave her French comrades without communications and she hoped also to rebuild the Group”, the statement reads.
“The Gestapo had a full description of Noor, who they knew only by her code name ‘Madeleine’, and in October 1943 she was captured by them. Despite brutal interrogation, she refused to give any information, either as to her work or her colleagues”, the statement continued.
“She was imprisoned in Gestapo HQ, during which time she made two unsuccessful attempts at escape, and was then sent to Germany for so-called ‘safe custody’. She was considered to be a particularly dangerous and uncooperative prisoner”, the statement added.
Noor received the GC posthumously for exhibiting the most notable bravery—both moral and physical—over the course of more than a year.
The RAF Club, founded in 1918, is a private Members’ Club and registered charity that serves as a home away from home for officers of the Royal Air Force and their families. Around 24,000 officers and former officers of the Royal Air Force, as well as their families, are members of the Club.
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