Savitribai Phule : Crusader of Modern Education
Savitribai Phule : Crusader of Modern Education
There are people who are born in unpleasant circumstances and get used to living in unpleasantness only to become ordinary mortals. However, there are a selective few, who swim the adverse tide only to fight for one’s rights and carved her niche. SavitriBai was one such extraordinary Lady who fought against the male bigotry and became a light of knowledge illuminating the lives of millions of women in this country. Today, I owe her a token of gratitude, for had she not laid the foundation stone of education, I might have been sitting in some corner next to the doormat.
Savitribai was born in an affluent family at Naigaon village in Satara District to mother Laxmibai and father Khandoji Navse-Patil, a village chief.
It was at the same time, that the British sovereignty was gaining momentum and everywhere there was an atmosphere of suppression and helplessness. Most of the people had even started to play servile to the British. Discrimination of people on the basis of caste, creed and religion also played a major role at that time.
At the age of nine, Savitribai was married to thirteen year old Jyotirao Phule in 1840. Savitribai’s father-in-law basically hailed from Phursungi (a village not much far from Pune), however, the Peshwa gifted him a horticultural land in Pune and he migrated to start horticultural business. This is how he acquired the name Phule. His mother had died at an early age. His cousin sister Saguna nurtured him. She worked as a nanny of a British Officer’s son. She therefore could converse in English. She used this knowledge to inspire Jyotiba. This led him to strive for education. Later he educated his wife, little knowing that this would lay the foundation for a whole new chapter in Indian history. Wrong and negative notions prevailed those times. Any person who studied would send his seven successive generations to hell. To counter this myth, people spread that the British had discovered that the persons not studying would send his 14 succeeding generations to hell.
Long believed to be the preserve of the Brahmins, children from other castes and communities were denied the right to an education. Savitribai and her husband broke the rules and established the first school for girls in 1848 in Bhide Wada, Pune, a city then considered a den of orthodoxy. Eight girls, belonging to different castes, enrolled as students on the first day. When she started her unique school, Savitribai also overcame another hurdle – of women not being allowed to step outside the home to work. She carried a change of sari with her every day as men pelted her with stones, mud and even cowdung as she made her way to the school. But undeterred by all the opposition, Savitribai opened another school for adults the same year. By 1851, she was running three schools with around 150 girl students.
“Every Indian woman who is educated today owes Savitribai a debt of gratitude,” for she is one of the earliest crusaders of education for girls, and dignity for the most vulnerable sections of society – dalits, women and widows.
SavitriBai realised that along with education it was necessary to work on other social fronts, to build up the self esteem and confidence of women. She also campaigned against some cruel social practices. She also took on the responsibility for the health and well-being of young widows, another exploited group. Many girls married off young would be widowed by the age of twelve – thirteen. After the death of their husbands, either they would have to take Sati (a practice of burning the widow on the funeral pyre of the husband) or their head would be clean shaven to make them ugly and unattractive to other men. These helpless women, with no rights to denial, would be easy targets for depraved men. The resultant pregnant widows would be scared of being ostracized by the society and the suppression that the bastard child would have to suffer, and would resort to suicide or aborting the foetus. Pained by the plight of young Kashibai, a widow, the Phules opened up ‘Balhatya Pratibandhak Griha’ a delivery home home in his house as a shelter for young widows.
Jyotiba and Savitribai were also opposed to idolatry and championed the cause of peasants and workers. She had a major role in the Satyashodhak movement too. Earlier in 1868, during a very dry spell, they had opened up their wells to the Dalits, who were forbidden to draw water from other wells.
The plague created havoc in Pune and its vicinity in the year 1896-97. When the Britishers came to know of it as a contagious disease, they intentionally started shifting of some people outside the city. On knowing this, Savitribai opened up a hospice in the farmhouse of Sasane near Pune to take care of those affected with plague. While performing this selfless service to humanity, she herself became a victim and later succumbed to plague in 1897.
Savitribai broke yet another taboo when she led the funeral procession of her husband. Even today, the Hindu last rites are considered to be the sacred privilege of men alone.
Savitribai Phule may not be as famous as many other national leaders. However, her imprint and impact on the liberation of the Indian woman has been no less spectacular. Savitribai broke all the traditional shackles of 19th century India to herald a new age of thinking. She can be legitimately hailed as the mother of Indian Feminism.
Today, the school Savitribai had set up is part of Pune’s ‘heritage’ walk, a reminder that her legacy needs to be carried forward for the generations that follow.
O - Amarjyot Kaur Arora
