Toh Puan Umasundari Sambanthan

Toh Puan Umasundari Sambanthan, the wife of the late Tun V.T.Sambanthan, the former Malayan Labour Minister, President of the Malaysian Indian Congress (MIC) and regarded as one of the founding fathers of Malaysia.

She was born in Bruas, Perak to O.M.Subramaniam, a senior officer at Public Works Department and his wife Jayalakshmi Swaminathan Sastrigal. Toh Puan studied at the Anglo Chinese School in Sungai Siput, Perak, where she won the Best Indian Student of the Year Scholarship in 1942. However, her education was interrupted by the Japanese Occupation from 1942 to 1945.

After the war, she was sent to India to study Science at the University of Madras. She majored in Chemistry and Graduated with First Class Honors’. She then continued her Master’s Degree at the Presidency College, Chennai in India. After returning home, she taught for three years in Singapore but later gave up her teaching career and returned to Malaya in 1956, the same year she married the late Tun Sambanthan. She was 27 years old during the proclamation of independence of August 31, 1957. “It was so symbolic, a sign that we were free of the colonial regime, free to think for ourselves, free to lead our own country,” she said.

Toh Puan was always known for her charity work and her work to raise the status of women and children, especially in rural areas. She actively took part in many women’s organizations and was one of the founders of the National Council of Women’s Organizations (NCWO). In between 1960 to 1972, she was involved in the Children’s International Art class which was committed to encourage young children to have hobbies. She was also the chairman and director of the National Land Finance Co-operative Society (NLFC) from 1980 to 1995 which was established by her husband to prevent the fragmentation of estates in the early 1960’s. Today, she still keeps herself busy and helps out with the Sri Ramakrishna Sarada Society’s early childhood development programme. She is an activist, social worker and leading figure of the cooperative movement in Malaysia.