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Feminism and in , 1917-1947 Aparna Basu

Journal of Women's History, Volume 7, Number 4, Winter 1995, pp. 95-107 (Article)

Published by Johns Hopkins University Press DOI: https://doi.org/10.1353/jowh.2010.0459

For additional information about this article https://muse.jhu.edu/article/363729/summary

[ This content has been declared free to read by the pubisher during the COVID-19 pandemic. ] Feminism and Nationalism in India, 1917-1947

Aparna Basu

Ferninism incorporates a doctrine of equal rights for women, an organ- ized movement to attain these rights, and an ideology of social trans- formation aimed at creating a world for women beyond simple social equality. It is broadly the ideology of women's liberation, since intrinsic to it is the belief that women suffer injustice because of their gender. In recent years the definition of feminism has gone beyond simply meaning move- ments for equality and emancipation which agitate for equal rights and legal reforms to redress the prevailing discrimination against women. The word has now been expanded to mean an awareness of women's oppres- sion and exploitation within the family, at work, and in society, and conscious action by women to change this. However, in the first phase of feminism in India (1917-1947) with which this essay deals, the women's movement was primarily concerned with demanding equal political, social, and economic rights and for the removal of all forms of discrimina- tory procedures against women Although feminism was a middle-class ideology, it presupposed the idea of women as a distinct group, who despite their differences of class, caste, religion, and ethnicity, shared certain common physical and psychological characteristics and mani- fested certain common problems. Nationalism is a broad concept which includes many values but is basically a belief that a group of people sharing a common territory, culture, and history, and often, also a common language and religion, possess a common national identity and therefore are entitled to a nation state. This claim did not negate the fact that there were indigenous differ- ences of class, caste, and gender; but people were able to launch struggles which blurred these divisions and stressed the commonality of a national identity against the foreign enemy. A national movement in India can be said to have begun with the foundation of the in 1885. The process of nation- building and the creation of a national identity was paralleled, in fact, preceded by the growth of social reform movements focusing on women's issues. Since the status of women in society was the popular barometer of "civilization," many reformers had agitated for legislation that would improve their situation. By the second decade of the nineteenth century, social reformers began deploring the condition of women. Under British rule, with its new agrarian and commercial relations and the introduction of English educa- tion, law courts, and an expanding administrative structure, an urban

© 1995 Journal of Women's History, Vol. 7 No. 4 (Winter) 96 Journal of Women's History Winter intelligentsia which took up women's issues began to emerge in Calcutta, Bombay, and later Madras. The first man to publicly speak out against the injustices perpetrated against women was Rammohan Roy, who in the early nineteenth century condemned sati, kulin polygamy, and spoke in favor of women's property rights. Roy held the condition of women as one of the factors responsible for the degraded state of Indian society. Thereafter, improving the position of women became the first tenet of the Indian social reform movement. Women's inferior status, enforced seclu- sion, early marriage, the prohibition of widow remarriage, and lack of education were facts documented by reformers throughout the country. These reformers were influenced by Christian missionaries such as Wil- liam Ward and Alexander Duff, 's officers such as Charles Grant and James Mill, and travelers such as Tavernier, Barbosa, and Cranford, who were all critical of the position of women in Indian society. The Indian intelligentsia, therefore, focused its attention on women's issues. Inspired by Western Orientalists like Sir William Jones, H. T. Colebrook, H. H. Wilson, Max Müller, and others, they created the notion of a golden age in ancient India where women held a high position which subsequently declined. From a sense of humiliation as a subject people, they tended to glorify the past. Every measure of reform demanded for women was justified on the ground that it was sanctioned by religious texts. There was a link between these reformers and British officials and non-officials, because the former depended on the latter for enacting laws prohibiting sati, raising the age of marriage, or permitting widow remar- riage. Thus, the colonial government was perceived by the reformers as an ally in its fight against tradition. By the end of the nineteenth century a few women emerged in the reform movement to form their own organizations. Swamakumari Devi of the Tagore family in Calcutta founded a Ladies Theosophical Society in 1882 and four years later the Sakhi Samiti, "so that women of respectable families should have the opportunity of mixing with each other and devoting themselves to the cause of social welfare___"l At the same time, Saraswati formed the Arva Mahila Soma) in Poona, and in 1889 she started a home-cum-school for widows in Bombay named Sharda Sudan. Women in Calcutta, Bombay, Madras, and even in smaller towns like Poona and Allahabad, formed associations whose members were drawn from among a small group of urban educated families. These associations aimed at bringing women out of their homes and encourag- ing them to take interest in public affairs. Some of these were practical social reform organizations, while others were discussion platforms for women. 1995 INTERNAnONALTRENDS=APARNABASU 97

From the very beginning membership of the Indian National Con- gress was open to women. At its first session, Allan Octavian Hume asked political reformers of all shades of opinion never to forget that "unless the elevation of the female element of the nation proceeds pari passu (with an equal pace) with their work, all their labor for the political enfranchise- ment of the country will prove vain."2 The report of the 1889 session of the Indian National Congress in Bombay notes "that no less than ten lady delegates graced the assembly." Among them were Europeans, Christians, one Parsi, one orthodox Hindu, and three Brahmins. Panita Ramabai Saraswati was one of the delegates.3 In fact, the participation of women in this Congress appears to have been mainly Ramabai's doing. Charles Bradlaugh, a member of Parliament in Britain, suggested to her and many others that women delegates should join the Congress from this time forward, so that their concerns would be represented when the Congress constituted free India's parliament.4 Though the women delegates were allowed to sit on the platform, they were not allowed to speak or vote.5 According to some, women first spoke at the Congress sessions in 1890.6 Another writer puts the date ten years later when Kadambini Ganguli, the first woman graduate of , moved the customary vote of thanks to President at the sixteenth Congress session in 1900 at Calcutta.7 Sarala Debi Ghosal (Chaudurani, 1872-1946), daughter of Swamakumari Debi, composed a song urging people of different provinces of the country to join the free- dom struggle and trained a group of over fifty girls to sing it at the 1901 session. The proceedings of the Congress at in 1902 com- menced with the singing of the national anthem by Vidya Gauri Nilkanth and Sharda Mehta, two sisters who were the first two women graduates of .8 Respectable young women singing in public was itself a new thing as singing before men was associated with courtesans. Prostitution was one of the first women's issues to be referred to by the Congress, and their remarks shed some light on early nationalist attitudes toward the question. At the 1888 session, the Congress resolved to cooperate with English "well wishers" of India in their attempt for "the total abrogation of laws and rules relating to the regulation of prostitution by the state in India" and this was reiterated in 1892.9 First steps to regulate prostitution had been taken by the British in India at the turn of the eighteenth century to deal with venereal diseases which British soldiers were thought to have caught from prostitutes. In 1864, the Contagious Diseases Act was passed making registration and medical examination of prostitutes compulsory. Missionaries, evangelicals, and nonconformists in opposed the Act on the grounds that it legalized prostitution instead of eradicating 98 Journal of Women's History Winter it. This argument was taken up in India in the 1870s, but it was only one of the arguments against the Act. It was also argued by the nationalists that this gave the police the power to harass all classes of Indian women mdiscriminately. In 1895, a government bill to expand the scope of police surveillance over prostitutes was opposed by , a nationalist leader, on the grounds that it threatened individual liberty by giving the police unchecked power.10 In the 1890s, the handling of plague operations by British soldiers in Poona was criticized by nationalists on the grounds that women were being dragged out in public and inspected before being taken to hospitals. By the end of the nineteenth century, the issue of rape and racism were interlinked, and this was used by the nationalists as a weapon against British rule. Cries for the protection of "our" women against sexual attacks by British soldiers abounded, especially in Bengal. Sarala Debi Ghosal, a militant nationalist who edited Bharati, urged young men to become physically strong to defend their women from molestation by British soldiers.11 Nationalists were using rape as an example of imperialist bar- barism, but they saw it as a violation of national honor rather than as an act of violence against women. This became evident when they kept silent in the case of the death of Phulmoni Debi, an eleven-year-old child bride, killed in 1893 when raped by her adult husband. The partition of Bengal by Lord Curzon in 1905 infused a new spirit of patriotism and was the beginning of women's participation in the nationalist movement on a larger scale. The poet announced his plan for observing rakhi-bandhan (tieing threads on wrists of brothers) on "Partition Day" and women took part in it. Another rite observed by women on this day was arandhan or not lighting the stove for cooking. Protest meetings were held by women and about 500 of them watched the laying of the foundation stone of the Federation Hall at Calcutta on October 16, 1905—"Partition Day." Women organized swadeshi melas and opened shops which sold only indigenous goods. We read of women giving up use of foreign cloth and smashing their foreign bangles.12 Various revolutionary societies such as the Swadesh Bandhab, Anustlan, Dawn, and others, sprang up during these years in Bengal and women helped in circulating revolutionary leaflets and literature and maintained liaisons between these groups. They contributed jewelry as well as money to these societies. (Margaret Noble), one of 's most ardent disciples, inspired many young men and women. When Vivekananda's revolutionary brother, Phupendranath Dutta, was arrested, Sister Nivedita stood surety for him, a Ladies' meet- ing was held to honor him, an address of honor signed by 200 women was 1995 International Trends= AparnaBasu 99 presented to him and his mother, and contributions were made for his legal expenses. The was, however, largely confined to Bengal. In Bengal, goddess-centered nationalist rhetoric gained new ground. In the revolutionary terrorist groups which developed during the Swadeshi movement, anti-British feeling was imbued with a in which Kali, the goddess of strength, was repeatedly invoked to liberate Mother India and become a beacon for her nationalist sons. Worship of Kali, Durga, and Chandi became incumbent on many young nationalists on the grounds that the "mother" would ease the path to national liberation. For many the Mother Goddess was identified with Mother India, and poems and songs were written about the motherland whose image was worshiped in temples. Hindu worshipers of Shakti looked upon women as the embodiment of power, energy, and action. The harnessing of Shakti to nationalism was not only a way of making female power safer, by containing it, but also a way in which women could find a role in the nationalist struggles. As the rhetoric of nationalism grew mother-centered, more and more women became involved in nationalist activities. in her presidential address to the Indian National Congress described India as a "house," the Indian people as "children," and "members of a joint family," and the Indian woman as "mother." Women had to work hard to put the house in order. Bhikaji Cama (1861-1936), popularly known as Madame Cama, was involved in the revolutionary movement both in India and abroad. Among other activities she smuggled revolvers concealed in toys into India. In 1907 she attended the International Socialist Congress in Stutt- gart, where she unfurled the Indian National flag and persuaded the Congress to support Indian independence. In 1909, her group started a monthly journal, Bande Mataram, published from Geneva. She believed that nationalist movements all over the world were linked by their anti- imperialism. A staunch supporter of women's education, Madame Cama held that Indian liberation movements would fail without the support of Indian women. Statements to this effect were made by nationalists throughout India. Women's education was necessary, it was argued, for them to fulfill their roles as wives and mothers. "India needs nobly trained wives and mothers, wise and tender rulers of the household, educated teachers of the young___13 The power and strength of Indian mothers was asserted, rather than their weaknesses. Education was a birthright and those who denied it to women robbed themselves and the nation, for Indian women were mothers of the nation. Education was not only a birthright, it was what sons inherited from their mothers. The place of Indian women in national life was as mothers—"the hand that rocks the 100 Journal of Women's History Winter cradle rules the world." As Sarojini Naidu said, women all over the world were united by "the common divine quality of motherhood."14 Sur- endranath Banerjee echoed this sentiment when he appealed to all Indians "to sink their differences and unite under the banner of (the) religion of motherhood."15 In 1910 Sarala Debi Chaudhurani formed the Bharat Stri Mandai (Great Circle of Indian Women) with the object of bringing together women of all castes and creeds on the basis of their common interests in the moral and material progress of India.16 Between 1910 and 1920 the number of women's organizations grew rapidly. Called by various names—Mahila Samitis, Women's Clubs, Ladies' Societies—they emerged in the cities and towns of British India and native states. In 1917 the Women's Indian Association (WIA) was established by , Margaret Cousins, and Dorothy Jinarajadasa to start new branches as well as affiliate societies already in existence. These Irish exsuffragists took up the issue of votes for women, and when the Secretary of State for India, Lord Edwin Montagu, came to India to discuss the demand for political reforms, the WIA organized a delegation of Indian women to meet the Montagu Chelmsford Committee. A memorandum was presented, writ- ten largely by Margaret Cousins, asking that when the franchise was widened women should be given the right to vote under the same condi- tions as men. The Southborough Franchise Committee was initially reluc- tant to give the vote to women because it felt that this would be premature in a society which continued to enforce purdah and prohibit women's education. But because of the sustained campaign launched by women's organizations and the support given by the nationalists, it was finally left to the provincial legislatures to decide the matter. Madras was the first province to give voting rights to women in 1920, followed by Bombay in 1921. The franchise was extremely limited, and in the first elections held under the Montagu-Chelmsford Reforms less than one percent of the female population could exercise the right to vote. In the move- ment Indian women appealed to British suffragists for support. A delega- tion went to England, campaigning through newspapers and meetings for women's franchise. They met members of British Parliament and estab- lished links with women's groups in Britain. Thus feminists were building bridges across nations. In 1927, the All India Women's Conference was established at the initiative of Margaret Cousins to take up the problem of women's education. Women from different parts of the country as well as from different religious groups attended the first session at Poona which was a great success. The deliberations were in English, making clear that those in attendance were educated. They also had to travel at their own expense, marking them as members of well-to-do families. All India 1995 International Trends= AparnaBasu 101

Women's Conference's initial concern was education, but it soon took up issues such as child marriage and reform of Hindu law regarding divorce and property. These reforms were opposed vehemently by orthodox Hin- dus as posing serious threats to their religion but, of course, they chal- lenged patriarchy also. Women's organizations carried on a sustained campaign for these reforms.17 While women's organizations were fighting for women's political and economic rights and trying to improve their status by education and social reform, the women's struggle entered a new phase with the arrival in 1917 of on the Indian political scene. He claimed that women were better than men in waging nonviolent passive resistance because they had greater capacity for self-sacrifice and endurance, were less self-seeking, and had more moral courage. With his experience of South Africa behind him, Gandhi was aware of women's potentialities as passive resisters. As he experimented with his weapon of in India, he realized that women could be effective participants. At first Gandhi launched local demonstrations in Champaran (Bihar) against indigo planters in 1917, in Kheda (Gujarat) for nonpayment of revenue in 1918, and in the same year, in the Ahmedabad textile workers strike in which he was brought in by Anasuya Sarabhai, the sister of the textile magnate, Ambalal Sarabhai. The involvement of really large numbers of women in the nationalist movement began with the Khilafat and noncooperation movement in 1920s. Addressing public meetings in different parts of the country, Gan- dhi appealed to women to donate their jewelry for the national cause and help him collect money for the Tilak Fund. He compared British rule to Ravana-rajya and said that just as Sita did not cooperate with Ravana, so the Indians must not cooperate with the British.18 He told the women of India that he expected great things from them and that he had enormous faith in their capacity to sacrifice and endure suffering. Sushila Nayar, a close disciple of Gandhi, recalls a meeting at Rohtak where the hall was filled to capacity with women in lehanqas and rustic clothes and Gandhi, with outstretched hands, received money and jewelry for the Tilak fund.19 Women in different parts of the country were drawn to him by his magnetic personality, his unique naturalness, and trans- parent sincerity. During the noncooperation movement (1920-22) accom- panied her husband, Deshbandhu Chittaranjan , on his tours of Bengal and asked women to boycott foreign goods. Women volunteers solà (homespun cloth) on the streets of Calcutta. Kasturba Gandhi, wife of Mahatma Gandhi, presided over the Gujarat Provincial Conference and appealed to women to take up spinning and weaving khadi. In Allahabad, 102 Journal of Women's History Winter

Lahore, Bombay, Ahmedabad, and various parts of India women held meetings advocating swadeshi and use of khadi. In the satyagraha in Borsad, a rural district of Gujarat in 1923-24, women turned out in such large numbers that Gandhi remarked that he had never seen such huge gatherings of women. Women displayed greater courage than men when police confiscated their cows, buffaloes, and other property. In the of 1928, women soon outnumbered men in political gatherings. Singing patriotic songs, they thronged Sardar Patel's meetings. When the peasants refused to pay taxes to the government women supported them fully. Bardoli set a new example, as this was the first time that simple unsophisticated rural women participated in the freedom struggle, though most of them belonged to the more prosperous peasant groups. In February 1930, Gandhi announced that he would launch a satya- graha by marching from Sabarmati Ashram in Ahmedabad to Dandina coastal village in Gujarat, and illegally manufacture salt there. Originally no women had been included in the Dandhi March. Khurshedben Naoroji, granddaughter of , one of the founding fathers of the Congress, wrote angrily to Gandhi about their exclusion.20 Margaret Cous- ins protested in Sfri Dharma. Kamaladevi Chattopadhyaya went to meet Gandhi and asked him to make a special appeal to women. On the last day of the , Sarojini Naidu joined it at Dandi and was the first woman to be arrested. Women all over the country broke the salt law, organized processions and meetings, and picketed shops selling foreign cloth and liquor. This agitation marked a new level of participation by women in the nationalist movement. "Women, young and old, rich and poor, came tumbling out in their hundreds and thousands, shaking off the traditional shackles that had held them so long."21 Special women' s organizations were set up to mobilize and coordinate women's processions, picket prabhat pheris, and spinning. Women hawked khadi and engaged in publicity and propa- ganda. Over 80,000 persons were arrested during the Salt Satyagraha, more than 17,000 of whom were women.22 Thousands of women actively participated in the Quit India move- ment of 1942. As the news of the arrest of Gandhi and other Congress leaders spread, women spontaneously came out to hold demonstrations, organize strikes, and court imprisonment. Many went "underground," helping parallel governments and leading illegal activities in the course of which a few were even killed. While thousands of women joined the freedom movement in response to Gandhi's call, there were some who could not accept his creed 1995 International Trends: Aparna Basu 103 of nonviolence, preferring to join revolutionary or terrorist groups. Ideal- istic and highly emotional and impulsive, these young girls' hatred for the British was intense; their plan was to make attempts on European lives as widely as possible. They believed in individual acts of heroism, not in building up a mass movement. They were inspired by patriotism, not feminist ideas. Most women joined the freedom movement because, like men, they were inspired by nationalism and wanted to see the end of foreign rule. An important factor was family influence. Women from families such as those of Gandhi, Nehru, C. R. Das, Jamnalal Bajaj, and Lajpat Rai naturally wanted to participate. Where the atmosphere at home was nationalistic and fathers, husbands, or brothers were active, so usually were the women. Books played a part in inspiring the educated. Annie Besant's autobi- ography influenced Kamaladevi,·23 novels such as Saratchandra Chatterji's Father Dabi, or Bankimchandra's Anand Math and Debi Chaudharani inspired Bengali revolutionaries.24 Personalities were perhaps most important—Subhas Bose in Bengal, Saradar Patel in Gujarat, , and above all Mahatma Gandhi. Gandhi especially inspired confi- dence in women. His use of religious symbols and simple language appealed to ordinary unsophisticated women. His mode of struggle was one in which women could easily participate. Gandhi's letters to his women followers reveal that he understood their strength, ambition, and hopes. He asserted that women were true satyagrahis, and without them he could do nothing. The biographies and autobiographies of women in the national movement reveal the tremendous impact he had on them. Initially, political awakening among women was confined to the cities, and largely to those who came from middle-class professional and busi- ness families. By the 1930s, women from the working classes and peas- antry were also involved. What did this political participation mean for women and what were its consequences? Unfortunately, those who have written on women's participation in the nationalist movement have opted for one of two simplistic views. On the one hand, there is the widespread view that by their participation in the political movement, Indian women helped their own struggle for liberation, that in India, feminism and nationalism were closely inter- linked.25 The merging of the women's movement with the Indian National movement, it is argued, helped the cause of women and prevented the development of hostility between the genders which is a characteristic of Western feminist movements. Kamaladevi Chattopadhyaya believes that Indian women launched a struggle to fight not only for the country's freedom but also for their own.26 There is the view that women's partici- 104 Journal of Women's History Winter pation in the Gandhian movement was in a sense an extension of their role within the family.27 Women were traditionally supposed to sacrifice them- selves, and participation in politics was internalized as a special form of sacrifice in an essentially religious process. The language, imagery, and idiom of nationalist protest remained steeped in tradition and religion as self-conscious alternatives to alien Western norms. Many scholars, how- ever, argue that while such traditional moorings permitted the political involvement of thousands of women, it inhibited the extension of radical- ization to other spheres. Gandhi and Congress are condemned for manip- ulating women for political ends. These scholars ask whether the lack of hostility between the genders is desirable? Was it absent because men accepted gender equality or because women recognized male supremacy, satisfied with the removal of some of the excesses of the patriarchal system? The interaction between ferninism and nationalism was a complex phenomenon. The activities of women in both local and national organi- zations and the activities of thousands of women who joined the nation- alist movement together made up the women's movement. The freedom movement did not lead to a separate, autonomous women's movement since it was part of the anticolonial movement, but it did generate a sense of power among women who realized their own strength. While many women who picketed shops selling foreign cloth or liquor, who marched in processions, or went to jail did not question patriarchal values, political involvement for others did spur their ferninism and commitment to improving women's status. However, if patriarchal values had been chal- lenged, women's participation might not have been so widespread, because women could not go into the public sphere without the consent of the men in the house. In the period from 1917 to 1947, charitable, philanthropic, and social reform activities together with the nationalist movement constituted the primary sources of the women's movement. The organizations for women tried to remain apolitical but many of their members joined political parties, participated in the nationalist movement, and even went to jail. Sarojini Naidu, for instance, was involved in both movements. She was a founding member of WIA and AIWC and also a frequent member of the Congress Working Committee and its president in 1925. She urged women to petition on issues which affected women's status but remain apolitical in terms of party allegiance. The concern of women like her for women's status manifested itself in petitioning, urging more educational facilities, demanding legal changes in marriage laws, property rights, the franchise, and so on. They represented urban, upper-class English-speaking women. The nationalist movement also brought into its fold poor, illiterate rural 1995 International Trends: AparnaBasu 105 and urban women. The political movement stressed the importance of Swaraj. Women's organizations argued that uplifting women was neces- sary, because they are the mothers of future generations. While they were urged to come out and work for the nation, there was no rejection of the traditional role of mother and wife. In fact, it was stressed that if they were educated and widened their horizons, women would be good wives and mothers. Women's organizations began by concentrating on issues of social reform to "uplift" the status of women but with the rising tide of nationalism, the country's freedom was given priority. Thus, caste, class, and gender issues were not stressed in order to create solidarity against imperial rule. The women's organizations had been pressing for the reform of marriage and inheritance laws and a common civil code, but when the government in the 1940s appointed a committee under the chairmanship of Sir B. N. Rao to look into this matter, opinion among women was divided as to whether they should cooperate with this committee, because the Congress had launched the in 1942 and most nationalist leaders were in jail. Some women opposed giving evidence before the committee, whereas others argued that social equality was as important as political freedom. The former argued that the nation's free- dom could never oppose women's freedom. Women's active role in the freedom struggle together with their cour- age and organizing ability led the nationalist leaders to grant women political equality. At its session in Karachi in 1931, the Indian National Congress declared that in independent India women would have com- plete political freedom and equality. The National Planning Committee appointed by the Congress in 1937 had a subcommittee on women which made radical recommendations regarding women's equal status which were accepted by the Congress. Yet the majority of men in the Congress and others involved in the freedom struggle subscribed to patriarchal values and resented any challenge to male authority within or outside the family. Fighting for the country's freedom brought women out of their homes and made them politically conscious but it did not emancipate or improve the position or status of the vast majority. How else do we explain the fact that despite this long history of women's struggle, Indian women today are one of the most backward in the world with regard to literacy, female work participation, and sex ratios. Changing societal attitudes towards women and women's own self-perception which are deeply rooted in our psyche and social structure is not an easy task. The Indian women's movement thus has a long way to go in its struggle for bringing about new values, a new morality, and a new egalitarian relationship. 106 Journal of Women's History Winter

Notes 1 Usha Chakraborti, Condition of Bengali Women Around the Second Half of the Nineteenth Century (Calcutta, 1963), 148. 2 J. Murdoch, comp., Twelve Years of Indian Progress, The Resolutions of its Thirteenth Session (Madras, 1898), 36. 3 Meera Kosambi, "Women's Emancipation and Equality: Pandita Ramabai's Contribution to Women's Cause," Economic and Political Weekly 23 (October 1988): WS-48. 4 Sita Ram Singh, Nationalism and Social Reform in India: 1805-1920 (Delhi, 1967), 206. s Ibid. 6 Pattabhi Sitaramayya, History of the Indian National Congress vol. 1 (Delhi, 1969), 114. 7 Ibid., 51. 8 B. B. Mazumbar and B. P. Mazumbar, Congress and Congressmen in the Pre-Gandhian Era, 1885-1917 (Calcutta, 1967), 128. 9 Kenneth Balihatchet, Race, Sex and Class under the Raj (Delhi, n.d.), 12-39. io Ibid., 123-143. 11 Urna Chakravarti, "Whatever Happened to the Vedic Dasi? Orientalism, Nationalism and a Script for the Past," in Recasting Women, ed. Kumkum Sangari and Sudesh Vaid (Delhi, 1989), 62. i2 SumitSarkar, The Swadeshi Movement in Bengal, (, 1973), 287-288. 13 Sarojini Naidu, Speeches and Writings (Madras, 1904), 18. " Ibid., 100. 15 Surendranath Banerjee, Speeches vol. 1 (Calcutta, n.d.), 21 16 Sita Ram Singh, Nationalism and Social Reform, 190-191. 17 Aparna Basu and Bharati Ray, Women's Struggle: A History of the All India Women's Conference, 1927-1987 (New Delhi, 1991). 18 Apama Basu, "The Role of Women in the Indian Struggle for Freedom," in Indian Women from Purdah to Modernity, ed. B. R. Nanda (New Delhi, 1976), 20-21. 19 Ibid. 2° Ibid. 21 Kamaladevi Chattopadhyaya, Interview, NMML Oral History Section, 72-73. 22 P. J. Thomas, Indiana Women Through the Ages (Bombay, 1964), 331. 23 Kamaladevi Chattopadhyaya, Interview, NMML Oral History Section, 72-73. 1995 International Trends= Aparna Basu 107

24 Transcript of interview with Kamala Das Gupta, NMML Oral History Section. 25 Aparna Basu, "The Role of Women in Freedom Movement"; Lakshmi Menon, "Women and the National Movement," in Indian Women, ed. Devaki Jain (New Delhi, 1975). 26 Kamaladevi Chattopadhyaya, "The Women's Movement, Then and Now," in Indian Women. 27 Gail Minault, ed., The Extended Family: Women's Political Participation in India and Pakistan (New Delhi, 1981).