The women architects of India’s Constitution

Sarojini Naidu was part of a cohort of women negotiating a space for themselves and their politics on the nationalist stage, (Getty Images)
Sarojini Naidu was part of a cohort of women negotiating a space for themselves and their politics on the nationalist stage, (Getty Images)

Summary

It’s been 105 years since women won the right to vote and 75 years since the Constitution guaranteed equality for all. What transpired in between to guarantee us this fundamental right?

In 1917, Sarojini Naidu read a statement to the viceroy of India, Lord Chelmsford, and the secretary of state for India, Edwin Montagu. Signed by women across India, the statement pointed out “that in drawing up all provisions regarding representation, our sex shall not be made a disqualification for the exercise of the franchise or for service in public life".

Naidu’s speech in support of women’s right to vote, for a seat at the table, and for a chance to shape the narrative of a nation marked a pivotal moment in India’s nationalist movement. It came nearly two decades before women were granted expanded franchises under the Government of India Act 1935 and three decades before women were elected to the Constituent Assembly.

Naidu’s point about representation was almost universal in its appeal. It came at a time when Britain was on the cusp of granting women the right to vote (with age and property ownership conditions), and the US was nearly reconciled to the idea of women’s suffrage.

The quest for equitable and considerate politics in India was not Naidu’s alone. She was part of a cohort of nationalists, activists and equal opportunity advocates negotiating a space for themselves and their politics on the nationalist stage.

Also read: Women who led from the front

Growing in the shadows of larger fire and brimstone suffragette movements around the world, the Indian suffragists found kinship, voice and backing not just from women in the UK and Europe but also from societies like the Women’s India Association within India. Journals like Stri-Dharma, Indian Ladies Magazine and Bamabodhini Patrika maintained strong connections with international counterparts and published opinion pieces that lobbied for better conditions for women, equal rights and women’s suffrage. Women like Dorothy Jinarajadasa, Margaret Cousins and Annie Besant became instrumental in the development of a language for suffrage in India and encouraged women to come together for voting rights.

More women were writing, reading and coming together locally and regionally through societies fighting for greater participation in public life. The result was a public call for action and demand for votes and representation when the Montagu-Chelmsford Commission and the Southborough Franchise Committee toured India in 1918.

When the Government of India Act was passed in 1919, it offered a small window of opportunity to women by directing provincial legislatures within India to decide on voting rights for women. In 1921, Madras gave women the right to vote and stand for elections, Bombay followed. By 1930, women were made eligible to stand for legislative elections across all of India’s provinces.

Women’s societies like the Women’s India Association in 1917, the National Council of Women in India in 1925, and the All India Women’s Conference (AIWC) in 1927, worked to entrench ideas of equality, community and democratic constitutionalism. The AIWC became one of the pivotal organisations, recognised as much for its activism as for the stellar activists who led it. Kamaladevi Chattopadhyay, one of the founding members, described the AIWC as “the earliest national body of women which funnelled women’s aspirations, plans, projects, and focused its achievements and failures".

The work of leaders within the organisation—including stalwarts like Hansa Mehta, Naidu, Rajkumari Amrit Kaur, Herabai Tata, Purnima Banerji, Begum Aizaz Rasul—and outside resulted in expanded suffrage rules for women in the 1935 Government of India Act. Wives and widows of existing male voters or women with a literary qualification gained the right to vote.

In the 20 years between the AIWC’s founding and Indian independence, the organisation oversaw critical legislations like the Sarda Act, the right to inheritance and divorce, and re-defined women’s relationship with themselves, the state and society. Three documents—the 1931 Karachi resolution, the 1939 Report of the Sub-Committee on Women’s Role in the Planned Economy, and the 1945 Indian Woman’s Charter of Rights and Duties—transpired from discussions within the organisation and with the men leading the national struggle for independence. The intent was a radical re-imagination of society and women’s place.

The documents set forth rules, recommendations and a rights-based approach to giving Indian women a political identity. They identified and offered ideas on removing social, economic and legal barriers, enabling women to participate in the public sphere on their terms. The reports detailed citizenship duties alongside women’s responsibilities within the household. The resolutions and charters looked to correct the course of history.

When the Indian Constituent Assembly met on 9 December 1946, 15 of its 299 members were women—a first for any constituent assembly worldwide. They included Mehta and Kaur, the principal architects of the AIWC Charter of Rights and Duties. Dakshayani Velayudhan, the first Dalit woman to be elected to the legislative council, was against separate electorates for minorities. Vijaya Lakshmi Pandit, Sucheta Kripalani, Purnima Banerji, Begum Aizaz Rasul and Kamla Chaudhry were from the United Provinces. Banerji was a steadfast communist and trade union leader. Naidu also participated in the proceedings.

Annie Mascarene from the Travancore-Cochin constituency was a firebrand politician and one of the few members who called for greater decentralisation and believed that with time, “when the nation has attained full stature and we can stand on our own legs, we can amend the constitution and distribute powers equally".

Durgabai Deshmukh was the only woman lawyer in the assembly. As someone who used law as an instrument to dismantle patriarchal laws and practices, Deshmukh’s legal work, combined with her field experience, made her an invaluable asset in the assembly. She worked closely with Alladi Krishnaswamy and B.N Rau on the steering committee.

On Thursday, 17 November 1949, at 10am, B.R. Ambedkar stood up and addressed the assembly: “Mr. President, Sir, I move that the Constitution as settled by the Assembly be passed." Dr. Rajendra Prasad, the president, gave the members who wanted to speak 20 minutes each.

The women members who spoke were circumspect in their joy. There was a satisfaction that came from seeing adult suffrage implemented. They rejoiced that “The State shall not discriminate against any citizen on grounds only of religion, race, caste, sex, place of birth or any of them…" would be a fundamental right guaranteeing the equality they had demanded for nearly a century. There was caution, too. Renuka Ray pointed out, “it is the architects who will actually implement this Constitution, who will give it life and breath, who will really determine what manner it will be worked. It will be to them to make of it something worthy and worthwhile, and also, it may be that they can mar it, distort it, maim it, and make those very fundamental principles and rights which are meant for the security of citizens be used in such a way as to bring about the detriment of the citizen. It is not for us to say whether we have done our job well or badly. It is only posterity that can really judge us."

Posterity remembered very little of the women to judge them on it. However, the framework they put in place helped establish a legitimate means to restructure women’s relationship with law and society. The idea that the women fought for and were nearly united in demand was that the Constitution needed to emphasise equality rather than identity.

This idea was repeated across the AIWC reports. The family, rather than the husband, was seen as central to a household, and the economic rights of a housewife emphasised. Non-discrimination in employment, equal pay for equal work, maternity benefits and property and inheritance rights were all included in the charter of rights and duties and argued for during the directive principles debate.

In 1975, the Committee on the Status of Women in India (CSWI) submitted a Towards Equality report to the United Nations World Conference on Women. The report noted, based on evidence, that the status of women since independence had either declined or remained the same. Devaki Jain, 1975, edited a book titled Indian Women and had Kamaladevi Chattopadhyay write a chapter. Chattopadhyay observed regretfully that the modern Indian women no longer had the “vigour, drive, and adventure" that her generation of women had shown in the run-up to independence. She concluded that part of the problem was because the earlier struggle had achieved too much. Legal disabilities were removed, and economic parity had been adopted.

Were the founding mothers too hopeful, self-satisfied and too confident that once the Constitution guaranteed equality, it would carry the women of the country forward? Or did the women who came after them feel the Constitution and legal allowances were too little and not progressive enough? Both can be true. In the 2014 election, Indian women’s groups produced a “womanifesto" and requested all major parties to support the demands. Many of the points reflected the demands of the Charter of Rights created in 1946. But the womanifesto also sought separate seats and enshrined representation for women, something the women in the assembly strongly fought against.

The women architects carried with them a defiance and a deference that helped them push their agenda at a time when national equality and freedom trumped women’s issues. In the 1918 speech that Naidu delivered, she pointed out that “We ask for franchise, we ask for vote, not that we might interfere with you in your official functions, your civic duties, your public place and power but rather that we might lay the foundation of national character in the souls of the children that we hold upon our laps…" Many of these women refused to call themselves feminists and believed in reform rather than revolution.

Seventy-five years on, it is time to understand their ideas and judge them for the intellectual and ethical heft they brought to one of the longest constitutions in the world.

Priya Ravichandran is a Chennai-based freelance researcher and writer. She has interests in constitutional history, Myanmar and gender rights.

Also read: The women who heeded Gandhi's call

 

 

 

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