Usha Narayanan

New Delhi, Jan 24 (PTI): Former President K.R. Narayanan’s widow Usha, who carved a niche for herself as a champion of social and women’s issues, died today in a city hospital. She had been ailing for some time.

Usha, 86, the only person of foreign origin to have become the country’s first lady, breathed her last at 5.30pm at Gangaram Hospital in Delhi.

She was rushed to the hospital on December 31 for blood transfusion following a severe drop in haemoglobin level.

K.R. Narayananan served as President from July 25, 1997, to July 25, 2002. He died on November 9, 2005.

A prolific writer, Usha was fiercely independent and always believed that women could be the determining force in taking sustainable development to a new high.