Women’s Day special: The forgotten revolutionaries of Bengal
In the 1930s, revolutionary groups sprang up across the country, particularly in undivided Bengal, including those led by women. Dacca (now Dhaka), Comilla, Chittagong, and Calcutta were the seats of activity for these women-led groups and they were particularly associated with colleges. Young students were recruited by classmates and alumni, drawn by the cause of the freedom of the nation from British rule. Student associations in educational institutions served as semi-revolutionary groups and collectively trained women in weapons, combat and associated activities. They also served as secure spaces where women could gather to openly discuss issues related to women’s rights, liberation and freedom from British rule.
The history of women’s movements in the Indian subcontinent has an interesting trajectory and scholars have differing views on precisely when they started. There is some consensus, however, among scholars of the subject that the origins of these movements can be traced to the early 19th century where the focus was on social reform and the liberation of women from socio-cultural bondages in the subcontinent. Hence, although collectively women’s movements in India are close to two centuries old, they have consistently changed and altered in form, structure and agendas over the years, to address developing challenges and requirements.
Western liberal values that impacted male social reformers in the Indian subcontinent during the 19th century, percolated to the women living in their social peripheries. Social movements during the British occupation of the subcontinent that led to the outlawing of sati, widow burning, female infanticide, segregation of women, etc. paved the way for some of the earliest social reforms that occured in the interest of women—for instance, widow-remarriages.
These reforms in turn inspired women to participate in conversations, especially about socio-economic and socio-cultural issues that impacted their everyday lives, with men who had till then, been at the forefront, spearheading these changes. By the late 19th century, women’s participation in the freedom movement began in earnest with their involvement in the Indian National Congress.
The history of women’s movements in India, especially during the freedom struggle is unique in many ways because it served two purposes. One was to contribute to the cause of freedom from British rule, while the other was to impress upon their countrymen and upon the foreign government the urgent need for social, economic, legal and political reform to improve the lives of women in the subcontinent.
While discourse surrounding the freedom struggle has not entirely discounted the role of women, it has certainly not given enough recognition to the women in proportion to their integral roles in the war against the British. The women were not merely passive workers following in the footsteps of celebrated men; they were active revolutionaries, taking up arms, launching underground organisations, publishing anti-British literature, being subjected for years to torture and imprisonment. Many revolutionaries like Pritilata Waddedar and Matangani Hazra were wounded in battle and chose to end their lives for the cause of freedom than be captured by the British. Others like Bina Das and Labanya Prabha Ghosh fought for their nation, only to die in abject poverty, largely forgotten by the very homeland and the people they had liberated from centuries of occupation and oppression.
On Women’s Day, indianexpress.com brings to you the stories of Bengal’s most remarkable revolutionaries:
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Many of Bengal’s revolutionaries, including women, died in abject poverty post Independence, forgotten by the very people whose freedom they fought for. The life of Labanya Prabha Ghosh is one such story.
Not much is known about Ghosh’s early life, including the village she was born in. But available records do state that she was born in 1897 in Purulia district to Nibaran Chandra Dasgupta, a freedom fighter. According to records belonging to the Purulia district authorities, her father was arrested in 1921 for his participation in the non-cooperation movement launched by Mahatma Gandhi. It is not known for how long Dasgupta was imprisoned. After his release, he, along with Ghosh’s husband, founded an organisation called ‘Shilpasharam’ in Telkalpara, Purulia, that served as a meeting place for revolutionaries and members of the Indian National Congress in the region.
District government records show that in 1926, she was elected representative of the District Congress Committee from Manbhum district, which Purulia was then part of. When Gandhi launched the salt satyagraha in March 1930, its ripples were felt across the subcontinent. Ghosh helped organise similar marches locally, including a flag satyagraha in 1945 in Konapara in Purulia.
Born in a village named Hogla, near Tamluk, in 1869, Matangini Hazra was an unusual woman for her time. Not much information is publicly available for her early years, but according to research available in the West Bengal government archives, she was the daughter of a poor farmer who could not afford to provide her a formal education. With no means to raise a decent dowry, she found herself married at 12 to Trilochan Hazra, a 60-year-old man from Alinan village in Medinipur. By age 18, Matangini Hazra was widowed, without any children.
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Following her husband’s death, she began devoting herself to working for social causes. In the early 1900s, the Nationalist movement began gaining traction across the subcontinent and Gandhi travelled extensively across the length and breadth of the region, raising awareness for the freedom movement. According to state government archives, Hazra became so inspired by Gandhi’s beliefs that she became a devoted follower of the leader, earning herself the name, “Gandhi buri”.
Her anti-British activism earned her immediate arrest and she was sentenced to six months of hard labour, an incident that physically affected the woman, leaving her haggard and malnourished after release. Despite her physical state, this staunch follower of Gandhi, went back to her social work immediately after her release to help untouchables.
Suhasini Ganguly’s was a life dedicated entirely to the cause of her motherland’s freedom. Born on 3 February 1909 in Khulna, now in Bangladesh, Ganguly spent her teens in her hometown and in Dhaka. Not much is known of her formative years and of how she developed sympathies for revolutionaries but academics agree that her transition into a fierce revolutionary fighter occurred in her early twenties. It coincided with her relocation to Calcutta where she began working as a teacher for students with hearing and speech difficulties.
It is not immediately clear how Ganguly became associated with the Jugantar revolutionary group in Calcutta, but she may have been introduced to the organisation by Pritilata Waddedar, a member, who like Ganguly, was a former student of the Dhaka Eden School and Kamala Das Gupta, who had also moved from Dhaka to Calcutta for higher education. Ganguly quickly became associated with the Chattri Sangha, a semi-revolutionary student group and began assisting other members with training and enlisting new recruits.
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The men of the Tagore family in Calcutta, especially its biggest name Rabindranath Tagore, have been well-documented for their roles in the freedom movement and their contributions in the fields of the arts, science and literature. However, the narratives never give due space to the women of the household. Rabindranath Tagore’s niece Sarala Devi is one such name.
To identify her merely as Tagore’s niece would be dismissing her own accomplishments and diminishing the innumerable ways in which she fought not only for the independence from British rule but for women’s rights as well.
Sarala Devi, sometimes also referred to as Sarala Devi Chaudhurani, an honorific suffix added to her name during that time, was born in September 1872 to Swarnakumari Devi, Tagore’s elder sister, and Janakinath Ghoshal, one of the founding members of the Indian National Congress. Sarala Devi first came to live in Jorasanko, the ancestral home of the Tagores in north Calcutta, along with her siblings, when she was five years old, after her father went overseas to study law. She stayed in the house for a significant part of her life.
Pritilata Waddedar is not exactly a forgotten revolutionary. But then she is not that well known even in her native Bengal where she spent her short life actively waging war against British rule.
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Born in Chittagong, now in Bangladesh, Waddedar was a promising student, having spent her school years in her hometown. While a student at Eden College in Dhaka, Wadderdar’s anti-British sentiments began to take a more form as she slowly developed connections with other women who were spearheading semi-revolutionary groups. One such was with Leela Nag, a student at Dhaka University and an associate of Subhash Chandra Bose, who established the Deepali Sangha, a revolutionary group that provided combat training to women.
Originally published on March 4 2020.