Aastha - Week 3


Aastha Bhardwaj
Reflection Paper 3
February 18th, 2020
Seeking Begumpura by Gail Omvedut

Jyotiba Phule and Ramabai:
Chapter 4 of the text delves into the life of Jyotiba Phule and his involvement in the struggle of education for women. He was on the first feminist figures that India saw, who empowered his wife to not only educate herself but also to teach other young women and girls around them, not just regional but English education. He broke societal norms and standards of acceptance of the time when he chose not to divorce his wife on the grounds of her not being able to bear children.
Around a similar time-period came Ramabai who was also known as ‘pandita’ owing to her knowledge of the ancient Brahmin texts whose study was motivated by Keshab Chandra Sen. However, dissatisfied with the same, she moved towards Christianity in a time when Christianity was looked upon as something of English (British) association and non-traditional as per Indian norms. Owing to the ever prevalent class divide in India, even conversions held different notions for differing social classes. Even advocates of equality such a Gandhi and Ambedkar has their versions of reservations about conversion to Christianity.
Nevertheless, she was unfazed by this and her orthodox companion and spent her life as a feminist activist. Despite the conversion, she could not shed herself of her status of being an “upper” class female and thus she had more to write about the struggles the women rather than the intersectionality of caste and gender. Her legacy mainly being the ‘Mukti-Sadans’ she had set up wherein women were trained to be self-sufficient beings who had shed their caste and worked towards developing an anti-caste and anti-class land for women.


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