From liberal homes and conservative families, urban centers and rural districts, women – single and married, young and old – came forward and joined the struggle against colonial rule. Though their total numbers were small, their involvement was extremely important. Women’s participation called into question the British right to rule, legitimized the Indian nationalist movement and won for activist women, at least for a time, the approval of Indian men.

Politics completely altered the goals and activities of organized women. Education, social reform and women’s rights appealed to some progressive women, but the movement to rid the country of its foreign rulers attracted women from all classes, communities and ideological leanings. Nationalist leaders deliberately cultivated linkages with peasants, workers and women’s organizations to demonstrate mass support for their position. Women were amazed to find political participation approved of by men who wanted their wives to behave in the home like perfect wives in religious texts.

The story of women’s role in the nationalist struggle is not simply one of those who were told when to march and where to picket. The number of women, who played some role in this movement, however small, far exceeded expectations. The nature of their work influenced how women saw themselves and how others saw their potential contribution to national development. At the same time, their involvement helped to shape women’s view of themselves and of their mission.

Their early contribution to nationalist movement   

Bankim Chandra Chattopdhaya (1838-94) wrote the novel Anandamath (1882) that portrayed revolutionaries sacrificing their lives for the Motherland. Bankim’s emotional hymn, Bande Mataram (“Hail to the Mother”) became famous throughout India. This call to save the Motherland was not a call to women to join the political movement but rather a linking of idealized womanhood with nationalism.

The situation began to change after a number of Bengali women wrote to the Viceroy in support of the Ilbert Bill. In 1889, four years after the Indian National Congress (INC) was founded, ten women attended its annual meeting. In 1890, Swarnakumari Ghosal, a woman novelist, and Kadambini Ganguly, the first woman in the British Empire to receive a BA and one of the India’s first female medical doctors, attended Congress session as delegates.

From this time on, women attended every meeting of the INC, sometimes as delegates, but more often as observers. Attending with their fathers and husbands, their contribution was both decorative and symbolic.

A chorus of fifty-six girls from all regions of India performed the song “Hindustan” in 1901. The next year, two Gujarati sisters sang a translation of this song at the opening session.

These educated and politically knowledgeable girls and their mothers informed the world that India was as advanced as any Western country in its vision of women’s public roles.

Participation in Swadeshi Movement

 In 1905 when the British portioned the province of Bengal, women joined men in protesting this division by boycotting foreign goods and buying only swadeshi goods. Women were at the forefront in picketing foreign goods’ shops.

 Support to Revolutionary terrorism

 Still other women gave their support to the revolutionary organizations. Nanibala Devi (1888-1967) was widowed at fifteen, and was forced to take shelter with her nephew Amarendranath Chattopadhyay. He was the leader of the new Jugantar (New Age) party, dedicated to violent defeat of the foreign rulers. Nanibala joined the party and acted as their housekeeper, occasionally posing as the wife of one of the revolutionaries.

Gandhi’s Role in Mobilizing Women

 Soon after Gandhi’s return to India from South Africa and introduction to Bombay society, he met women who belonged to women’s social reform organization. He was invited to talk to one of these groups, composed of middle- class women, about the poverty of the masses. He told his audience that India needed women leaders who were “pure, firm and self- controlled” like the ancient heroines Sita, Damayanti and Draupadi. It was these heroines Gandhi recalled when he told women to wake up and recognize their essential equality with men. Only when they appreciated the strength of their ancestors, would women comprehend their right to freedom and liberty.

With the end of World War I and renewed demands for self rule, Gandhi began to develop a program for women. On April 6, the day marked for general strike through out India, he addressed a meeting of “ladies of all classes and communities” and asked them to join the Satyagraha movement to facilitate the total involvement of men. Following the Jallianwala Bagh massacre Gandhi called off the campaign, but it was already clear that women had joined the fight against the British. Gandhi urged them to take the swadeshi vow to give up foreign goods and spin every day. India’s poverty, he explained, was caused by ignoring indigenous crafts and purchasing foreign goods.

Gandhi evoked India’s sacred legends, especially the Ramayana, when he asked Hindu women to join the political movement. In a series of articles and speeches on British atrocities in the Punjab, Gandhi compared the British rulers to the demon Ravana who abducted Sita. Under colonialism, the enslaved people were losing all sense of dharma. Restoration of the rule of Ram would come only when women, emulating the faithful and brave Sita, united with men against this immoral ruler. Appearing with Maulana Shaukat Ali at a meeting in Patna, Gandhi modified his message to appeal to Muslim women. Gone were references to the Ramayana and the Mahabharata, now Gandhi asked women to spin and encourage their husbands to join the movement. On other occasions, Gandhi told Muslim women that British rule was the rule of Satan and extorted them to renounce foreign cloth to save Islam.