[7] Nilüfer Hanımsultan was born on 4 January 1916 at the Göztepe Palace in Istanbul, at a time when her mother's family was ruling the Ottoman Empire.

[5] At the exile of the imperial family in March 1924, she and her mother settled in France, taking up residence in the Mediterranean city of Nice.

[8] In 1931, Caliph Abdulmejid II arranged marriage of his only daughter, Dürrüşehvar Sultan to Azam Jah, elder son and heir to Mir Osman Ali Khan, Nizam of Hyderabad, and Mahpeyker Hanımsultan, daughter of Naciye Sultan and Enver Pasha to Moazzam Jah, second son of the Nizam.

Unhappy with the high mahr demanded by her family, he finally settled for a second Ottoman bride to be included in the deal.

[9] A day before the wedding, the princes arrived in Nice from London by express train,[11] and stayed at the Hotel Negresco.

[13] After the religious ceremony, the newly weds went to the British consulate to complete their civil marriage, and validate their prenuptial agreement, according to which, in the event of divorce or death of the husband, Niloufer would receive 75,000 dollars in compensation.

[14] Following the festivities in Nice, the princesses and their husbands set sail from Venice on 12 December 1931[15] to the court of Niloufer's father-in-law in Hyderabad, India.

Mahatma Gandhi had boarded the ship after attending the Second Round Table Conference in London in 1931, and was travelling back to India.

As no other lady of the Hyderabad royal family had ever moved about unveiled or attended cocktail parties or even official public events, Niloufer came to be regarded as a torch-bearer for women's advancement.

Her beauty and active public life received mention in the press, and she was featured on the cover pages of magazines.

Niloufer for a long time was the President of the Hyderabad Chapter of Indian Women Conference (IWC) a national body founded by Margaret E. Cousins.

[19] In 1949, one of the princess' maids, named Rafatunnisa Begum, died during childbirth due to lack of medical facilities.

[7][24] Her step-grandson Himayat Ali Mirza helps patients and families coming to the hospital by providing food and financial assistance.

[22][19] In 1948, seventeen years after his marriage to Niloufer, her husband Moazzam Jah took a second wife, Razia Begum,[26] who soon gave birth to their first child, a daughter.

Niloufer called one of her friends, Malik Ghulam Muhammad, a former official in the Nizam's Government, who was at that time the Governor-General of Pakistan.

Evelyn, second wife to Edward Pope, continued to honor Princess Niloufer's legacy through donations and museum exhibitions from her collections.