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IPT Ramabai - notes
Indian Political Thought-II (6.2)
University of Delhi
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Pandita Ramabai: Gender
- How through her life choices and writings Pandita Ramabai emphasized the need to improve the conditions of women in India
Introduction: Pandita Ramabai was the first women feminist of modern India. She lived an extraordinary life. It is very rare for a political thinker to have life choices which completely reflect for what he/she stood for and what were his/her thoughts. In case of Ramabai what she was is equally important as what she thought and what she did to improve upon the conditions of women in India. Through her life choices, she clearly showed how Indian women can become independent and self-reliant by acquiring right education
Women in her time were prohibited by socio-religious norms from studying Sanskrit and Hindu Shastra. Despite this, not only her parents taught her Sanskrit and ‘Shastras’ but also trained her to earn a living out of those educational skills. She married late at the age of 22 when the normal age of marriage for Brahmin Marathi girl was 8 to 10 years in her time. Not only that, she married by her own choice and that’s too to a lower caste man. After the early death of her husband, she refused to live life of a condemned Hindu widow. Rather she embarked upon one of the most ambitious and remarkable phase of our life wherein she stablished societies for women’s development, visited England, USA Japan, Hong Kong and many other countries, raised enough funds to setup Sharda Sadan for providing home, Support, and dignity to women, participated in public affairs, and became a well-known social reformer and author
She wrote several books to highlight the miserable condition of women in India and her suggestions to improve upon women’s condition. Her ’ high caste Hindu women’ which was published in USA in 1887 contained most important of her thoughts on gender issues and her suggestions to improve upon women’s conditions. This book became an unofficial Indian Feminist Manifesto. In this book, Ramabai presented in graphic detail of the miserable condition of high caste Hindu women in India, particularly in Maharashtra. To her, the root cause of women's misery was social norms sanctioned by religious texts which deny them education, independence, and self-Reliance. They are even denied salvation without being married. Their salvation was linked to service to their husbands. To her, three Strategies should be adopted for women’ development. First, they should be made self-reliant; second, women should be given equal right to education and third, women themselves should teach other women. She also advocated women doctors treating women. This was her message of self-help.
Her Motto was self-reliance which denoted economic independence, professional career, property and inheritance right, and living with dignity by choosing her own conception of good life. Through her life choices, she
has proved these thoughts. She got quality education despite social opposition to her father and family. Being educated and skilled, she gained economic independence and became self-reliant. This was a clear message to women as well as to their families as to what they needed to do to improve upon the condition of women in India
Her life choices and through those how she conveyed her message for Women’s plight and need for their Development:
Her parents gave her equal right to education, vocational training (in lecturing and narrating Puranic stories). But for this, her father was criticized, ridiculed, and was outcasted. Her family had to live away from the community. This fact of her childhood taught her many aspects of gender norms affecting women’s conditions.
In those times girl child was not supposed to be given formal education of language and religious texts. In fact, learning Sanskrit and ‘Shastras’ were considered sin for the women! Such irrational social customs were sanctioned by religion. Anyone, especially parents, going against these social norms were derided( heavily criticized) and socially ostracised.
Thus, by faulty socio-religious conventions and norms, women were denied right to education. Once illiterate and without any property rights, they were entirely dependent on their husband/son/father for living. In view of Pandita Ramabai, denial of ‘self-reliance’ and independent existence to women was the root cause of miserable condition of women.
Her Life choices in marriage was another message she gave on gender issues. She married late (22 years), wherein in those days average age of marriage for Hindu Marathi girl was 8-10 years! Also, she married by her own choice, to a man of a different (low) caste. These life choices gave the message loud and clear that women should independently take crucial decisions in life. But for being able to take independent decision they should be self-reliant.
Her husband died barely two years after marriage. Instead of living conventional widow and single mother’s life, she did remarkable things in public life during her widowhood! She travelled across India, around the globe, garnered support and raised funds for helping women of her country. She undertook lecture tours, wrote books, founded societies in India and abroad. In USA, a society was founded in Boston in her name to raise funds for improving the condition of Indian Women!
Her above life choice showed that widowhood is not a curse or sin. Widows can lead dignified and fulfilled life. But for that women need to be economically independent, well educated, and self-reliant
Indian man
--- Women’s subjection degraded Indian nation
- De-based nature of Indian male. By remaining in the company of their uneducated, ignorant, and slave like wives they became lazy, slavery- loving, and dependent.
- Weak/oppressed mother would produce weak next generation.
Conclusion: It is very rare for any political thinker to convey her entire ranges of thoughts and messages through his/her life choices. But in case of Pandita Ramabai this became more than true. Her thoughts reflected and took shape in her life choices. Her life itself became the mirror of her thoughts. Her life choices and events in her life clearly depicted the gender issues of her time. They also clearly showed how despite all odds Indian women can live an independent, self-reliant, and dignified life.
Through her life, she conveyed that quality education was the single most important asset for women. She achieved everything in life due to education she received. Having an independent existence was equally important. For that woman need to fight against all established norms and deep entrenched Institutions, such as patriarchy. She should be ready to face the consequences of such fight. Women need to help other women. They should not expect help from men.
These thoughts were reinforced through her writings. In her ‘high caste Hindu women’, she not only revealed the root causes of women's misery in India but also suggested the strategies to improve upon their condition. For her, the root cause of women's deplorable condition was denial of rights and liberty to women which were sanctioned by socio-religious norms and institution of patriarchy. Child marriage, enforced widowhood, and denial of education and property rights to women were symptoms of the social ailment on gender. To her the solution was Self-Reliance, Education, and self-help- women teachers teaching women, women doctors treating women.
Not only she spoke and wrote on gender issues, but also, through her resolve, vision, extraordinary organisational skills, she established multiple societies to realise her vision of women's development. Her ‘Sharda Sadan’ and ‘Mukti mission’ became the model societies for improving upon the conditions of women in India. Clearly, through her life choices and writings Pandita Ramabai emphasized the need to improve the conditions of women in India.
- Contribution of Pandita Ramabai on gender issues in 19th century India
Introduction Pandita Ramabai was the first women feminist of modern India. Her thoughts on gender issues were radical and much ahead of her time.
Equally radical was her extraordinary life choices. She lived a very unconventional and modern life breaking the boundaries of both patriarchy and prevailing socio-cultural norms. Her contribution on gender issues were multi-dimensional.
She raised the gender issues and misery of Indian women through lecture tours, debates, publishing pamphlets, essays, articles, books, writing letters, petitions & evidences, etc. In 1882, she gave evidence before the ‘Hunter Commission’ on education. Before the commission she pleaded for women’s education and women as teachers, doctors, and school inspectors. Same year she wrote ‘Stree Dharma Niti’ – suggesting moral development of women. In the book she also linked women’s status to national development. In her most important and influential book ‘The High-Caste Hindu Woman’, she provided the graphic details of women’s misery, their root causes, and offered her solutions
Not only she spoke and wrote about gender issues, but also founded many societies for realizing her thoughts. First society she founded in 1882 was ‘Arya Mahila Samaj’ which provided a forum for raising women’s issues, such as child marriage, education, enforced widowhood. From the funds raised from her lecture tour to USA, in 1889, she established ‘Sharda Sadan’ to provide shelter, education, vocational training to high caste Hindu widows so that they live with dignity. In 1898, she founded Set up ‘Mukti Mission’ at Kedgaon, near Pune. The mission provided support and education to widows, unmarried women and girls, abandoned wives, and victims of the terrible famine and epidemics like plague.
Her life itself was biggest message for what she stood for. Her life choices and events in her life clearly depicted the gender issues of her time. They also clearly showed how despite all odds Indian women can live an independent, self-reliant, and dignified life. She achieved everything in life without any support from men in her personal life. This she could achieve only because her parents, despite facing social opposition, gave her quality education and vocational training to earn her living. She married late, by the standard of social norms, by her own choice and to a man of lower caste. She became widow just in two years of marriage. But instead of leading the confined and condemned life of high caste Hindu widow, she marched on her journey of life travelling, writing, lecturing, participating in public affairs, setting up societies, and helping her country women. She even didn’t hesitate to exercise her right to freedom of religion, when she felt that Christianity was giving her better spiritual sustenance and life opportunities. Like a modern woman, she successfully fulfilled her twin responsibilities-her public role as feminist and social reformer and mother’s role in bringing up her child. Indeed, her life itself contributed significantly towards raising the gender issues in her time
Her Contribution on Gender Issues:
- Helped women, widows, orphan children, single mothers through her organizations: --- Arya Mahila Sabha:
- A forum to make women aware of their rights and fight for them. The Sabha raised gender issues such as child marriage, education, enforced widowhood.
- The Sabha gave platform to women to talk about their issues. Women inculcated skills of public speaking, and thereby gained confidence to participate in public affairs.
--- Sharda Sadan:
- To provide shelter, education, vocational training to high caste Hindu widows to let live them with dignity.
- Through the vocational training in teaching, sewing, midwives, nursing, horticulture, and many other skills, the widows were able to become self- reliant.
---- Mukti Mission
- Provided support and education to widows, unmarried women and girls, abandoned wives, and victims of the terrible famine and plague.
- The Mukti, later on, became the umbrella organization in which all other societies were merged as its units.
A critical assessment of her contribution on gender issues: In her time, she was criticized on many counts; Tilak and Vivekananda were some of the most famous of her critics. Some of criticisms levelled against her were:
- Adopting Christianity, taking help of Christian women of western world for her org.
- For converting Hindu widows to Christianity in ‘Sharda Sadan’
- For her frontal attack on sacred texts of Hinduism and prevailing social norms & institutions.
- For her unconventional and rebellious life choices.
- For not using her talents for political participation, raising national consciousness, and not participating in national independence movement.
- For exposing worst part of Indian social traditions to western Christian world, boosting their claim of ‘civilizational mission
- Ambivalence in criticism of Caste System; helping mostly high caste Hindu Women.
Discussion & Conclusion: Most of the above criticism were unduly harsh and unjustified. She had every right to live life as per her choice. To raise voice of her country women, she broke the norms of both prevailing social customs and patriarchy. She challenged anti-women thoughts in ‘Hinduism’, Patriarchy, and hypocrisies and pretentions of the male liberals. For such frontal and direct attack on established socio-religious doctrines, she generated many critics. Powerful among them ensured that she was erased from the history for a long time. Her contribution was forgotten.
As per Professor Meera Kosambi, one who perhaps did maximum research on Pandita Ramabai, she lived in a world more backward than her visions. Gauri Viswanathan, professor in Colombia university, who also did extensive research on Pandita Ramabai, summed up her criticism beautifully in these words. “she and her works were not understood by her own generation, to whom it appeared confusing, inconsistent and even contradictory”.
Indeed, she was much ahead of her time. What she was, and what she did, both need re-assessment and re-positioning. Many of her thoughts are still very relevant and may help in improving the conditions of women of contemporary India. All Indian, especially Indian women should know the extraordinary life of Pandita Ramabai , who defied all conservative, irrational, and unjust socio-cultural norms to lead one of the most extraordinary and fulfilled life, that’s too without support of any men in her personal life!
- Pandita Ramabai’s critique of caste and gender in Hindu Society (Many of the points are common in this answer to the above answers)
Pandita Ramabai was the first and foremost women feminist in modern India. She raised gender issues, throughout her life, through multiple methods. She took lecture tours across India and abroad, wrote letters, petitions, evidences, published pamphlets, books, etc. to explain people how irrational and unjust social customs had been for women.
She linked women’s condition to national development. She asserted that poor condition of women reflects the status of Indian nation. Weak and oppressed mother would produce weak and dependent next generation. Even the nature of Indian men were also de-based due to companion of illiterate and ignorant female companion. She criticized Hindu ‘Dharma Shastras’ such as Manu Smriti for presenting women as bad and evil. These Shastras denied even ‘Samskara’ or purification rites to women, as they were available only to ‘dvij’ or ‘double born’ castes. Women could not get ‘Moksha’ or Salvation through her own efforts. Only by doing service to her husbands could she get salvation.
To her, irrational and unjust social customs backed by religious belief had made women’s condition miserable. They were denied their due rights and liberty. Through the custom of child marriage, women were married in the age of her physical and mental growth. In marriage, she was denied property and inheritence rights. She was placed lowest in the hierarchy of joint patriarchal family. She was denied education and awareness to her environment. She was confined and condemned to the domestic chores. By misfortune if her husband died, her life as widow would have become worse than death. As widow they were expected to shave their heads,
she raised in her book ‘the high caste Hindu women’ by intersecting the caste with gender to give it a new dimension
IPT Ramabai - notes
Course: Indian Political Thought-II (6.2)
University: University of Delhi
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