Jawaharlal Nehru was born on November 14, 1889, in Allahabad, India. He was the son of Swaroop Rani and Motilal Nehru, a wealthy lawyer and a prominent leader of the Indian independence movement. The Nehru family belonged to the saraswat Brahmin caste. Nehru graduated from Trinity College, Cambridge University and came back to India in 1912. In 1916, by his parents' arrangement, he married 17-year-old Kamala from a Kashmiri business family in Delhi. He became the top political leader of the Indian National Congress Party along with his mentor, Mohandas K. Gandhi.

Nehru and his family made transformations in their upper class lifestyle. They followed Gandhi and abandoned fashionable British clothes and expensive possessions. Nehru and his family adopted the native language of Hindu, or Hindustani for their common use. Nehru also wore a khadi kurta and a Gandhi cap as an Indian nationalist uniform. When Nehru's father joined the Swaraj Party in opposition to Gandhi, Jawaharlal stayed with Gandhi. Together they led the nation of India to independence in 1947.

Nehru signed the first constitution of independent India in 1949. He was an outstanding public speaker. He served as the first Prime Minister of India from 1947 until May 27, 1964, the day he died. He was one of the founders of the international non-aligned movement.