While celebrating women achievers and leaders, we sometimes overlook some of the pioneering women in our own city. In just the areas of Girgaon and Gamdevi in Mumbai, there was a profusion of great social activists–women, who not just overcame the restrictions imposed on females in their time, but also worked towards helping others get out of the cages of tradition. History textbooks seldom mention these heroines, though to be fair to the city’s administrators, some the streets in that area have been named after these local heroines; though how many of us pause to ask, who was Pandita Ramabai, or Kashibai Navrange, to name just two. The very illuminating WonderWomen walk, conducted by Aniket Kharote, of Khaki Tours, gave just a brief glimpse of accomplishments of some of these brave women, and the also the progressive men who supported them.
The late 18th and early 19th centuries were marked by a reformist zeal and women’s education was one of the areas– particularly in Maharashtra—that these social reformers worked on.
The walk started at the Royal Opera House, where once a stage artiste became a fashion icon for women of the time, though Bal Gandharva was a man playing female parts in Sangeet Natak, at a time when women were not permitted to act in plays. In real life, Bal Gandharva, or Narayan Shripad Rajhans, defied conservative Maharashtrian society, by marrying Gauharbai Karnataki, a Muslim singer and actress. She was an achiever in her own right, but was not accepted by his family, or Brahmin society of the time.
A small sign of Hind Mahila Samaj across the street, tells the story of Avantikabai Gokhale, nee Joshi, who was married at the age of nine to Baban Gokhale. Her family did not believe in schooling for women’s education, but her husband, an engineer, took charge of her education. Her father-in-law encouraged her to complete a diploma in midwifery. When her husband lost his fingers in an accident, Avantikabai became the sole breadwinner. In 1913, she joined the Social Service League and travelled to London, where she met Indian leaders like Sarojini Naidu and G. K. Gokhale, and also expanded her medical knowledge by visiting hospitals. The Gokhale couple became followers of Mahatma Gandhi and took part in the Champaran Satyagraha in early 1917. Avantikabai, with her expertise in nursing and midwifery, campaigned for better hygiene and sanitation, along with education for women and upliftment of the indigo workers. She wrote the first-ever biography on Gandhi in Marathi and published it in 1918, with a preface by Lokmanya Tilak. On her return to Mumbai, she founded Hind Mahila Samaj to empower women, by offering vocational training. She worked with the Bombay Municipal Corporation, where she initiated plans to “improve the workplace conditions in Municipal hospitals, clinics, and simultaneously of the slums. She proposed resolutions concerning unhealthy food stalls outside the schools, maintained cleanliness in the Chowpatty, lanes, and roads, facilitated treatment and medical examination of women in municipal hospitals and for improving the living standards of the Municipal workers.” (source amritmahotsav.nic.in). She participated in the Salt Satyagraha and inspired women to become active in the freedom movement.
Anjanabai Malpekar lived in the area too, a classical singer of the Bhendi Bazaar Gharana, a teacher whose students included Kumar Gandharva, Kishori Amonkar, Begum Akhtar, Naina Devi. She gave a concert performance in Mumbai at the age of 16, when women from respectable families did not sing in public. Later, she became the first woman to receive a Sangeet Natya Akademi Fellowship. Her great beauty made her the muse of the great artist Raja Ravi Varma.
It was the time when Pandit Paluskar, after whom a chowk in the area is named, took classical music training out of the gharana system and made it accessible for everybody, which allowed many women to learn music. His disciple, BR Deodhar established the Deodhar School of Music in Mumbai, also breaking away from the gharana tradition.
The crusading Scotswoman, Dr Edith Pechey was the first female doctor to practice in Mumbai. She started a training course for nurses and campaigned for better medical care for women and spoke out against child marriage. More importantly she facilitated higher education for Rukhmabai (seen in pic), who became the first Indian woman to practice medicine. This redoubtable feminist also filed a landmark case to annul her child marriage, which after a lot of turbulence among the conservatives, fiery pro and con debates in the media, and her writing to Queen Victoria, eventually led to the Age of Consent Act of 1891.
The building where the Dhurandhar sisters—Jamnabai and Jaybala— lived still stands at the corner of the French Bridge. Both were in the medical field and pioneered the treatment of infertility issues; since women of the middle and upper classes felt comfortable discussing their problems with women.
The splendid Blavatsky Lodge associated with the Theosophical Society and women like Helena Blavatsky, Annie Besant and Rukminidevi Arundale is a landmark. Not only was it in the thick of the Independence movement, but many musical greats performed there, including the imperious Kesarbai Kerkar, who in her time charged more than male singers for her concerts. The song Jaat Kahan Ho in her voice was included on the Voyager Golden Record, a disc with music selections from all over the world, which was sent into space aboard the Voyager Spacecraft in 1977.
The beautiful Raut bungalow is an aesthetic marvel that forces passersby to stop and gawk. Sakharam Arjun Raut had caused a scandal in his time by marrying a widow with a daughter—the same Rukhmabai who went on to become a doctor. Campaigning for the abolition of purdah, which prevented females from progressing, she was instrumental in the founding of Sharda Mandir High School for girls. The school still stands, but has been taken over by a builder.
The bungalow where Durga Khote and Shuba Khote grew up has been redeveloped into a tower, as is the chawl where PL Deshpande and his wife Sunita, actress and writer lived.
The Mathuradas Goculdas bungalow was where Sumati Morarjee lived before her marriage. She headed her marital family’s shipping company, and was the first woman in the world to head an organisation of ship owners, the Indian National Steamship Owners’ Association. A social activist, she helped Sindhis come to India during the Partition and set up a school in Juhu. She also helped Swami Prabhupada in spreading the ISKCON movement in the west.
Saraswat Mahila Samaj was founded in 1917 by Sitabai Padbidri and Shantabai Sirur, to help women become financially independent by making and selling small homemade products. The Samaj publishes a book called Rasachandrika, authored by Kalyanibai Samsi, to guide women about festivals and rituals, as well as home remedies and traditional recipes. First brought out in 1943, it continues to be published and is still popular.
In keeping with the tradition of women’s rights activism in that area, Ramabai Ranade’s was responsible for founding, among other institutions, Seva Sadan, offering vocational courses for women, that is still functional.
Dr Kashibai Navrange was the first Indian woman doctor to open her own clinic. She started a Milk Fund for pregnant and lactating mothers under the umbrella of the Arya Mahila Samaj.
Pandita Ramabai was a social reformer and a Sanskrit scholar, the first woman to be awarded the title of Pandita. During a visit to England in the early 1880s, she converted to Christianity. She then toured the US to raise funds for destitute Indian women, and started the Sharada Sadan for child widows. She became a Christian evangelist and founded Mukti Mission, a charitable organisation near Pune.
The walk learning about these remarkable women that formed what Khaki founder Bharat Gothoskar called “ cradle of Indian feminism” ended at the August Kranti Maidan, where freedom fighters like Aruna Asaf Ali and Usha Mehta left their mark.
Today, when we take things like education, health care and jobs for women for granted, the battles these women must have had to fight and win deserve to be acknowledged and recognized.
(This piece first appeared in The Free Press Journal dated December 13, 2024)
