Farrokhroo Parsa, dying standing

Farrokhroo Parsa was the voice of a woman who refused to remain silent in the face of injustice. Her courage lit the darkness and transformed fear into a silent yet unshakable strength. Her story still resonates as a timeless echo, a call to freedom and dignity that transcends generations. 

Farrokhroo Parsa was born in 1922 in Qom, a city of clerics and silence, the beating heart of a religious Iran where tradition weighs like an immutable law. The daughter of an activist for women's education, she grew up in the shadow of a double inheritance: that of an ancient country and that of a personal rebellion against the limits imposed on girls. Early on, she understood that obedience is not a virtue when it stifles intelligence. She chose science and care: she would become a doctor. But healing bodies, she soon discovered, is not enough when minds remain shackled and rights denied. Her vocation overflowed the clinic: her struggle would be for women, for their voice and their freedom. 

In Iran of the 1950s and 1960s, torn between tradition and modernity, Farrokhroo Parsa witnessed a society undergoing uneven change. Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi launched sweeping reforms, the "White Revolution," promising literacy, women's suffrage, and state modernization. Parsa then made a strategic and risky choice: to act from within. She engaged politically alongside the sovereign, convinced that the state apparatus, despite its contradictions, could open a lasting breach in the patriarchal order. This proximity to imperial power offered unprecedented means of action; it also exposed her to enduring hatred, fueled by conservative and religious forces who saw in her an embodied transgression. 

In 1963, when Iranian women finally gained the right to vote, Farrokhroo Parsa entered Parliament. As a deputy, she brought a new, firm, and instructive voice. She advocated for civic equality, girls' access to education, and recognition of their intellectual autonomy. For her, school was not merely a place of learning: it was an act of liberation, a bulwark against obscurantism. She defended coeducation, teacher training, and the dissemination of scientific knowledge, convinced that dignity begins with knowledge. 

In 1968, the Shah appointed her Minister of Education. For the first time in Iranian history, a woman sat in the government. The symbol was immense; the task even greater. Parsa undertook multiple initiatives: opening schools, reforming curricula, promoting literacy for girls in rural areas. She knew that every classroom opened was a fragile victory, every student a promise. But she also knew that top-down modernization provoked deep resistance. As public space opened to women, opposition became radicalized.

Then history turned. The Islamic Revolution of 1979 swept away the old order, and with it those who had dared to break free. Women, who had so much to lose, were among the first to be struck. Farrokhroo Parsa, living symbol of the Shah's reforms and state feminism, became a target. Arrested, judged without justice, accused of fabricated moral crimes, she was condemned not for her acts, but for what she represented: a free, educated, visible, irreducible woman. 

In 1980, she was executed

Before dying, she wrote to her children a letter that resonates as a moral testament:

"I am a doctor, I am not afraid of death. I would rather die with open arms than live in the forced shame of wearing the chador." 

These words are neither a farewell nor a complaint. They are a refusal. Refusal to submit, refusal to erase oneself, refusal to live a life amputated of its truth. Farrokhroo Parsa died standing, faithful to herself until the last moment. Her death did not extinguish her struggle: it crystallized it.

Even today, her name remains both hidden and incandescent in Iranian memory. She embodies the tragedy of unfinished reforms and the light of uncompromising struggles. A figure of courage and dignity, Farrokhroo Parsa reminds us that education is a peaceful weapon, that freedom has a price, and that some lives, even broken, continue to stand tall in history.

SWSP

(Translated from French)