Rise to learn and act

Rise to learn and Act

Weak and oppressed! Rise my brother  

Come out of living in slavery.  

Manu-follower Peshwas are dead and gone

Manu’s the one who barred us from education.

Givers of knowledge –the English have come

Learn, you’ve had no chance in a millennium.

We’ll teach our children and ourselves to learn

Receive knowledge, become wise to discern.

An upsurge of jealousy in my soul

Crying out for knowledge to be whole.

This festering wound, mark of caste

I’ll blot out from my life at last.

In Baliraja’s kingdom, let’s beware

Our glorious mast, unfurl and flare.

Let all say, “Misery go and kingdom come!”

Awake, arise and educate

Smash traditions-liberate!

We’ll come together and learn

Policy-righteousness-religion.

Slumber not but blow the trumpet

O Brahman, dare not you upset.

Give a war cry, rise fast

Rise, to learn and act.

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Sunil Sardar and Victor Paul have translated this poem along with four other poems for a chapter in a lovely new book titled: A forgotten liberator: The life and struggles of Savitribai Phule. These poems were translated from M.G. Mali’s original marathi collection Savitribai Phule Samagra Wangmaya.

This book is a first of its kind in English on the social reformer and first woman teacher of India Savitribai Phule, by independent  authors.

Indian history is not just porous and one sided but is often a naked lie for and about the large majority of people who were once forbidden any formal education under the caste system. It would have us believe that this vast humanity produced no thoughts and actions worthy of mention in its pages. Occasionally stray strands do get woven into this brutally selective reading of the past like the 9th century Saint Nandanaar and 13th century Janabai. These are names that have escaped and appear in literature inadvertently; perhaps a rare occurrence of negligence in the maintenance of tightly clamped literary facilities. The hegemonic majority treats any acknowledgement of original, radical thoughts and actions emanating from the lower castes akin to radiation leaks. It has to be avoided at all costs and they use every single resource they command to do so. However, when such histories are far too powerful to fall into the usual traps of appropriation and co-option, they have the strategy of just saying and writing nothing about it. Stonily waiting for the collective memory to erase itself over generations.

In the last century a small group of people from within the lower castes have emerged to retell Indian history. This they do by finally claiming and owning the alphabet, taking us to the ones who made it possible; Savitribai Phule and her husband Jyotirao Phule, the visionary educators and social reformers. How cruel and effective a system we face, when this lady who in the mid-late 1800’s sought English as a liberating tool for the masses, only now in the year 2009  an independent well researched book on her life and achievements gets published in English!! This effort has been done by a group of dedicated scholars and researchers on their own steam. To the marginalized these efforts come as iridescent showers of enlightenment connecting us to the vibrant ancestors and their vision of an egalitarian society, their compassion and empathy rooting us firmly back to this soil. We stop feeling like ahistorical entities as we begin reading about the life and struggles of Savitribai Phule. A feeling of sudden awakening grips and removes the hovering disconnectedness for members of the oppressed communities, to whom she dedicated her life!

The startling strength and razor sharp intellect of this pioneer leader taking on society’s myriad evil and unquestioned practices of inequality among humans and between men and women is stunning in its forcefulness and sincerity. We receive this rare and fantastic effort of bringing out a book on Savitribai Phule like a sparkling oasis to quench the thirst of a million throats, charging us with fresh energy to continue on with her legacy.

I chose this poem of the five in this book as it brings us closer to the multifaceted personality of a reformer whose engaged poetry weaves her politics into her verses. In them one gets a glimpse of the mind of a woman completely dedicated to education of the downtrodden. Her impatience to see them empowered, her conviction that knowledge alone is the ingredient for salvation of people caught in unending cycles of servitude and destitution speaks volumes. Her revolutionary call to shake of the mantle of ignorance and fear of scriptures can be grasped only in the background of a time when her husband and she were ostracized from their family and home as they feared a backlash against the couple’s move to educate women and untouchables.

The undisputed place Savthribai Phule holds as the pioneer in women and human rights movements in India at a glance below:

Events	Year
Birth of SavitriBai.(Naigaon,Tha. Khandala Dist. Satara) Father’s name- Khandoji Nevse, Mother’s name- Laxmi.	3rd Jan.1831
Marriage with Jotirao Phule.	1840
Education started.	1841
Passed third and fourth year examination from Normal school.	1846-47
Started school with Sagunabai in Maharwada.	1847
Country’s first school for girls was started at Bhide’s wada in Pune and Savitribai was nominated as the first head mistress of the school.	1 Jan.1848
School for adults was started at UsmanSheikh’s wada in Pune. Left home with Jotirao for educating Shudra and ati Shudra’s .	1849
First public Til-Gul programme was arranged by Mahila Seva Mandal.	14 Jan.1852
Phule family was honoured by British government for their works in the field of education and Savtribai was declared as the best teacher.	16 Nov.1852
Infanticide prohibition home was started.	28 Jan.1853
Prize giving ceremony was arranged under the chairmanship of Major Candy.	12 Feb.1853
“Kavya Phule”-the first collection of poems was published.	1854
A night school for agriculturist and labourers was started.	1855
‘Lecture’s of Jyotiba’ was published.	25 Dec.1856
Orphanage was started.	1863
Opened the well to untouchables.	1868
Adopted son of Kashibai, a Brahmin Widow’s Child.	1874
Done important work in famine and started 52 free food hostels in Maharashatra.	1876 to 1877
Adopted son, Dr.Yashwant was married to the daughter of Sasane.	4 Feb.1889
Death of her husband Jotirao Phule .	28 Nov. 1890
Chairperson of Satya Shodhak Samaj Conference at Saswad.	1893
Again famine in Maharashtra. Forced government to start relief work.	1896
Plague epidemic in Pune.Had done social work during this hour.	1897
Died while serving the Plague paitents during plague epidemic.	10 March 1897
Centenary year in Maharashtra and National honour.	10 March 1997 to 98
Government of India honored her by publishing a postage stamp.	10 March 1998

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Source: A forgotten liberator: The life and struggles of Savthribai Phule. Page 66.

Edited by

Braj Ranjan Mani

Pamela Sardar. 

Update: A earlier NCERT book on the life of Savithribai Phule is also available.

Melanin rich Dalits

This conversation here reminded me of this first post i had written, it is one of the posts that is most regularly read for some odd reason, readers use the tag ‘dark indian girl’ to reach here, i wonder about it sometimes .

Valli’s Beauty

Not the Tamil God’s tribal consort, but just someone known to me. Valli, husband and young son arrived in Bangalore as migrants. What they sought? What they got? Interesting line of inquiry, but, here, I want only to share few stories that I heard from Valli.

Valli did not land in the usual receptacles meant for poor villagers fleeing drought and other nasties, i.e, the sprawling slums of Bangalore city. Instead, she got housing within the grounds of a regal bungalow owned by an elite Anglo-Indian family, thanks to husband’s green fingers. He was hired as the resident gardener. Valli, got into the bungalow routine. Thus, knew the tea-making, serving and other genteel stuff.

Valli as I remember her then, was in her late thirties, around 5′2, very dark skinned, not the blotchy kind, but the uniform shade, with even facial features. She wore thick rimmed glasses, giving her the appearance of a stern professor with an exotic hairstyle. Wish I could draw, for describing that style is difficult. Hair was tucked in a way that had the ends of her tresses framed around her head in a fan shaped arrangement. Her gait was proud and erect. Her form was slender.

Death of the aging patrons, brought Valli and family to the slums. A reluctant Valli started as housemaid and baby sitter to families in the neighborhood. She gained the reputation of being a loyal but fastidious worker. In the meantime, the extended family from the village kept coming into the city, in a steady stream. As the drought did not go away, the elections always got over, with it, promises of better rural life, while other nasties just got nastier. Valli kept track of the in coming clan members, doing her best to keep the men from succumbing to alcohol, and women from prostitution.

Valli and husband, could never do enough for their only son. The story of her becoming a mother after many years of marriage, was recounted in great detail, every moment of motherhood was magnified for Valli. Poor eyesight had always plagued her. She would tear up while recalling near total blindness, for the first three years of her son’s life. The way she traced her baby’s features and kept him safe from danger, always transfixed her listeners. Herbal medicines and glasses helped her regain her sight to some extent.

When it was time to find a bride for the beloved son, Valli was teased by other women, where will you find the perfect girl? Are you going to find him a fair one? No, was the prompt reply. “Amman pola”, meaning dark like the village goddess, she said. She was dead serious and would explain in her clear voice, that in her community pale skinned girls were not sought after. Beauty is dark. Period.

Take home messages for me from Valli’s anecdotes came in handy at different points.

It took me a long time to realize that girls like me in School were not part of any cultural activities (read on-stage), not because we lacked grace in our movements, or articulation in our voices, but simply because we had little too much melanin. Did not do too much harm to my psyche, though (I am dark and thick skinned, I guess).

A sometime Sunday activity by girls in my hostel, was reading aloud the Hindu matrimonial ads, each girl would pick her community section and read it out, to the sneering rest. We concluded, here within the pages of Hindu matrimonial ads was the sign that Indians were indeed unified. No matter what caste, profession, age, or whatever, they all sought a FAIR girl.

As I follow arguments all over the world about objectifying women’s bodies and its effects, the manner in which Valli objectified, her would be daughter-in-law, always amuses me. For the sheer counterpoint it brings to the prevailing notion of a Nation obsessed with light skin. Then again, Valli spoke about her community, probably there are more Indians out there who are not terrified of the ‘pigment’. Just that their voices are not in all the noise that gets heard.