New £50 note could feature Muslim war heroine

The new £50 note could become the first to feature someone from an ethnic minority.

Campaigners are backing Noor Inayat Khan, a British Muslim Second World War heroine, to be the face of £50 note, which will be reissued in plastic from 2020.

The campaign, started by activist Zehra Zaidi, has the backing of  historian and BBC presenter Dan Snow, Tom Tugendhat MP and Baroness Sayeeda Warsi among others.

Pushing for Khan to be the face of the new £50 note, Zaidi told The Telegraph that “Noor Inayat Khan was an inspirational and complex woman who was a Brit, a soldier, a writer, a Muslim, an Indian independence supporter, a Sufi, a fighter against fascism and a heroine to all. She navigated complex identities and has so much resonance in the world we live in today.”

Although Khan began her career as a children’s writer living in Paris, her life took a turn after she fled the country to Britain following the fall of France. Following her training for the Women’s Auxiliary Airforce, Khan was recruited as a secret agent for the Special Operations Executive.

At the age of 29, Khan, born to an American mother and a father of Indian royal descent, became the first female radio operator sent into Nazi-occupied France in 1943. She ran the Prosper network of resistance communications in Paris, which was commissioned by Winston Churchill to "set Europe ablaze".

Her life as a spy did not last long. Khan was shot and killed by the SS at Dachau concentration camp after being betrayed by a French woman. She suffered 10 months of starvation and torture at the hands of the Gestapo and for her bravery she was posthumously awarded the George Cross in 1949.

Supporting the campaign, minister Nusrat Ghani tweeted: "Let’s get #NoorInayatKhan on £50 note. First female radio operator in occupied France, betrayed to the Nazis and endured interrogation & torture."

Baroness Warsi told The Telegraph: “Often what's been spoken about is the forgotten heroes of the First and Second World Wars, many people from around the world who served in the British Army including the British Indian Army, as both my grandfathers did."

Britain seems to be fractured along the lines of racial differences, but Khan is "someone who symbolises everything great about Britain - a young Muslim woman who gave up her life for her country," said Baroness Warsi.

"What could be better than putting a woman of colour who paid the ultimate sacrifice for our nation, who gave up her life for our nation, on the £50 note?"

Tom Tugendhat MP described Khan as a national hero and said, "She must be pretty unusual if not absolutely unique - it's nothing to do with her race, religion or sex - this is a woman who had everything, who came from a life of great privilege.

"Her heritage would have made it very easy for her not to step up to the call of duty. She could have lived a very comfortable life, but put everything on the line before being murdered in Dachau.”