BSOG-171

INDIAN SOCIETY: IMAGES AND REALITIES

Assignment A

1. Discuss the cultural communication approach to the study of Indian civilization

Ans. The cultural communication approach entails focusing on the ways and processes through
which the content of the civilizational system are transmitted and communicated through different
levels of society. It draws attention towards the structural integration of the Indian civilization. The
works of social anthropologists, McKim Marriott (1955) and Robert Redfield (1956) provide a
significant basis to understand the unity and interdependence of various parts of a civilizational
entity. Marriott highlights cultural synthesis and interaction between ‘Great Tradition’ and ‘Little
Tradition’ while focusing on festivals celebrated in a small north Indian village, Kishangarhi in Uttar
Pradesh. Similarly, Redfield’s analysis reflects constant interaction and communication between great
tradition and little tradition in the form of folk-urban continuum, which stands for symbiotic and
interdependent relationship between the two. You can read more about views of Marriott and
Redfield regarding the unity of a civilizational entity, society and culture in Box 1 and 2

Box 1: Parochialization and Universalization

McKim Marriott’s work Little Communities in an Indigenous Civilization (1955), proposes the twin
concepts of Universalization and Parochialization for explaining the cultural exchange between great
tradition and little tradition in India. Universalization is the process of carrying further the great
tradition by encompassing the elements of little tradition. In other words it relates to the
systematisation and standardisation of local rites, values and cultural ideals by universal sanskritic
belief system. To explain his point he takes the example of the diwali — the Festival of Lights
celebrated locally, in Kishangarhi village to propitiate goddess of wealth and prosperity Saurti. He
elaborates that goddess Lakshmi may be a universalised form of Saurti of the little tradition as the
former is also symbolic of wealth and prosperity. In contrast to the universalization process is
parochialization. It stands for the downward spread of rites, beliefs and cultural ideals of universal
appeal to suit the local environs. It reflects the creativity of little communities within India’s
indigenous civilization. Mariott explains this process by citing the example Naurtha festival in
Kishangarhi, pointing it as a parochialized version of Navarathri in which nine different consecrates
of the Sanskritic goddess Durga is propitiated for nine successive days.

Box 2: Little and Great Traditions

Robert Redfield’s work Peasant Society and Culture: An Anthropological Approach to Civilization
(1956) is based on his experiences with Latin American peasants. However, like McKim Marriott he
too discovered that the peasant-based societies were not isolated and bounded. Peasants’ way of life
is influenced by tribes, towns and cities people. He viewed peasant society as a system of social
relations, with relationships extending outside it to wider communities. His emphasis was to
highlight the interdependence of peasant community as bearers of little tradition on townsfolk and
populace who represented great tradition.

Analysing Indian Civilization as a Type

This approach is predominantly popular with comparative sociologists. According to this approach
Indian civilization is seen as a distinct type in juxtaposition with other societies and culture. The
emphasis is to view Indian society as a traditional society, which is experiencing processes, such as
modernisation that illustrate cultural, social and historical principles. The aim is however, not to read
distinct values or aspects that are unique to India’s structure, but typify it on the basis of what it has
in common with other societies and culture and then to examine variations. For example, India may
be seen as a type in being a village society or an agrarian society as this allows comparisons with
other societies and cultures which may display a similarity in terms of presence of a rural life and
community. However, to view India as a caste society will be a futile exercise as the
concept/phenomenon of caste is unique to India. This rules out the possibility for making India’s
cross-cultural/societal comparisons. The unique is thus ‘scientifically incomprehensible’ in view of
this approach (Cohn 1971:4).

2. Critically examine the Indological approach to the study of Indian society

Ans. The need to govern people of various ethnic groups and different cultures created the urgency in
the European rulers to study the life and cultures of the ruled. Bernard Cohn (1968) argues that the
British Orientalists’ study of Indian languages was important to the colonial project of control and
command. The college at Fort Williams in Calcutta was established with the specific goal of training
young administrative officers in Sanskrit and other Indian languages and also culture. In the post
Battle of Plassey period (1757 onwards) we find growing knowledge of Persian, Sanskrit and
vernacular texts among the British administrators that enabled a comprehensive analysis of the
society and culture of India. The depth and range of India’s history, philosophy and religion came to
be known through the translations that were now being attempted by early scholars. Alexander Dow,
the first to translate the Persian history of India and arriving at the understanding of Hinduism also
realised the limitations of not referring to the original texts of Hinduism written in Sanskrit.
Interestingly enough, in the process of giving importance to the text as the main source of knowledge
about Indian society and culture, little attention was paid on the experienced reality. Thus a textual or
Brahmanical version of Indian society was constructed that greatly neglected the way the masses
lived. The Indological view 18th century and onwards gave a more systematic account and provided
some concepts, theories and framework that the scholars claimed to have drawn from their study of
Indian civilization. The scholars’ approach and their understanding of Indian society and its
structure’ was based largely on their study of classical Sanskritic texts and literature. The School of
Indology drew attention to the presence of a traditional, Sanskritic and higher civilization that
demonstrates a semblance of ‘oneness’. However, its fault lies in assuming that India has a
homogenous population thereby refusing to accept the lower or popular level of the civilization. This
‘unity’ of India that Indologists talked about did not take into account local, regional and social
diversities. Following are some of the assumptions that Indologists made about India as a
geographical entity and as a civilization:

• India had a glorious past and to understand it one must go back to the sacred books that were
written during the ancient times. Both the philosophical and the cultural traditions of India are rooted
in these texts.

• These ancient books reveal the real ideas of the Indian culture and society. One must understand
these books to chart out the future development of India.
• Institutions should be set up to encourage the study of ancient Indian texts and teach Sanskrit and
Persian literature and poetry.

The Indologists stressed on the spiritual aspect of Indian civilization and largely overlooked the study
of material culture. Hence, they arrived at a more unitary definition of Hinduism, that did not
account for numerous diversities. Secondly, it led to a fixed view of Indian society with no regional
variation let alone historical changes over time. What followed is an unquestionable acceptance of
authority of texts and prescriptive behavior rather than the actual behavior and customs being
practiced by the people. Hence Indian society came to be understood as a system of rules and social
order that was more static. In the 18th century there were many who subscribed to this Indological or
Orientalists view of India. Works of Max Mueller, William Jones, Henry Maine and later Henry
Thomas Colebrooke, Alexander Dow, Alexander Cunningham had an influence in shaping the
subsequent writings on India.

The Indological writings dealing with the Indian philosophy, art, and culture are reflected in the
works of Indian scholars like A.K. Coomarswamy, Radhakamal Mukerjee, D.P. Mukerji, G.S. Ghurye,
Louis Dumont and others. Even within sociology many of the founding fathers of Indian Sociology
were also influenced by Indology, like B.N. Seal, S.V. Ketkar, B.K. Sarkar, G.S. Ghurye and Louis
Dumont among others. Ghurye, although a trained anthropologist under W.H.R. Rivers, turned
routinely to classical texts for understanding all manners of contemporary phenomena – costume,
architecture, sexuality, urbanism, family and kinship, Indian tribal cultures, the caste system, ritual
and religion. His colleagues and students like Irawati Karve and K.M. Kapadia also continued to do
so. Ghurye’s method has often been later referred to as indigenous Indology, more influenced by the
writings of Indologists of Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute (Mumbai) rather than the British
writings established by Sir William Jones or Max Muller. Dumont’s Indological bias is more apparent
in his thesis about varna and caste where he assumes unity of Indian civilization. The work, Homo
Hierarchicus is based on the fixed view of four-varna theory of caste which sees it as an all-inclusive
category and therefore Indian society as basically based on the principle of hierarchy, where everyone
is ranked on the basis of their birth. He further assumed that the structure of caste is the result of the
ideology of principle of purity and pollution – a fixed and unified set of ideas and values which do
not change. Louis Dumont imagined a modern Western society which – unlike India – aspires to
rationality and was essentially individualist compared to the collectivist or group/community-based
identities in India (Dumont 1972). Hence in many ways he followed the Indologists by going back to
the idea of a European-Indian divide, the West and the East as typically opposite. Sociologist A.R.
Desai critiques those viewing Indian society from the lens of culture and providing a textual view as
being far removed from the real India with its inequalities, diversities, dialectics and exploitations.

Assignment B

3. Explain the nature of political unification brought about by the British in India

Ans. Desai write that “one of the significant results of the British conquest of India was the
establishment of a centralised state which brought about, for the first time in Indian history, a real
and basic political and administrative unification of the country . Such a unity was unknown in pre-
British India, which was, almost chronically, divided into numerous feudal states, frequently
struggling among themselves to extend their boundaries. It is true that attempts were made by
outstanding monarchs like Ashoka, Samudragupta and Akbar, to bring the whole of India under a
single state regime and administrative system. However, even when they succeeded in bringing a
greater portion of India under their rule, the political and administrative unity achieved was of a
nominal character only” (Desai, 1984: 152) . So, the political unification achieved by British colonials
was of immense scale. One is led to further enquire as to how political unification was achieved by
colonials which was unparalleled in Indian history. Desai believes that the political and
administrative unity could not take place in pre British India because of lack of unfied economy and
means of communication that connected many parts of India then. Desai, however says that : “it is
true that a conception of unity of India existed and flourished in pre-British India. But this unity was
conceived as the geographical unity of the country and the religio-cultural unity of the Hindus. India
was ‘both a geographical and cultural continuum. . .The concept of the political unity of the entire
Indian people did not and could not emerge under the given socio-historical circumstances. The
people were not socially and economically integrated; they were, therefore, not integrated politically
either. The British established a state structure in India which was of a distinctly new type. It was
highly centralized and ramified in the remotest corner of the country” (Ibid:153).

India’s political unification is a product of colonialism and anti-colonial struggles. Before colonials,
there were feudal kingdoms and fiefdoms in India, but the territories they ruled were limited
geographically. For instance, the first empire in Indian history was Mauryan Empire which could
consolidate its territorial foundation, but it could not emerge as a nation. Oommen writes, “the
compulsion for conceptualising an Indian nation was largely the outcome of British colonial presence
and its articulation. In the pre-independence period, the use of the term “nation” for India was
applicable to colonial India”(Oommen 1999:1).

One of the enthralling statement in this regard is by British politician John Strachey – “This is the first
and most essential thing to learn about India – that there is not, and never was an India, or even any
country of India, possessing, according to European ideas, any sort of unity, physical, political, social,
or religious; no Indian nation, especially no ‘people of India,’ of which we hear so much” (Strachey,
1894:5). This characterisation implies that India as we know it today was completely absent when
British colonials came. In the same spirit, Sir John R. Seeley in his book The Expansion of England
writes, “India is only a geographical expression like Europe or Africa. It does not make the territory of
a nation and a language, but the territory of many nations and languages”(Seeley, 1993:255 cited in
Oommen, 2003: 1). “ If nationhood requires people living within a given political boundary to have
one language, one faith, one culture and one race, then claiming nationhood for India required
stretching credulity. This is how the early nationalists responded to the colonial insinuation: They
invoked the essential unity of the people of India, but struggled to explain how that essence fitted all
the areas that fell within the boundaries of colonial India. The one thing they found hardest to wish
away was religious diversity and divisions. The dilemma has persisted in post-colonial India”
(Yadav, 2013). Oommen argues that the essential unity of India has been defined in several ways, in
terms of (i) an ancient civilisational entity; (ii) a composite culture; (iii) a multi-national polity; (iv) a
religious entity; (v) a territorial entity populated by a multiplicity of religious communities; (vi) a
geographical/collectivity of linguistic communities; and finally (vii) as a unity of great and little
nationalisms (Oommen, 2003:267). In these seven ways of defining India as a nation, two important
elements – political and economic are missing which were specific to the colonisation due to which
India could emerge as a nation.

4. Discuss the Agrarian Reforms in post Independent India

Ans. Agrarian Reforms: Provisions and Implications

The land reforms introduced after independence however, further led to the concentration of land in
the hands of the large landowners. The fundamental provision, “land to the tiller” was subverted by
large landowners who to a large extent got evicted long-term tenants prior to the enactment of the
legislation. Further, the basic objectives of the Land Ceiling Act were largely defeated by the big
landlords and other vested interests through fictitious divisions of land, mere paper entries in the
records through the benami transaction or fake ownership of holdings, fraudulent means adopted in
the distribution of land to the landless and poor peasants, conflict with the law of inheritance and
illiteracy of the peasants. Also, ideas like joint-farming met with little success as were practised as a
convenient method to by-pass land reforms by the privileged classes and garnering facilities as loans
from government agencies. Mencher (2002: 216-17) points out that the state has shifted its focus from
land redistribution to increasing ‘efficiency’ of agriculture. The growing corporatisation and
commercialisation of agriculture led to land consolidation, introduction of capital intensive farming
techniques, mono-cropping and export crop production. This has made medium and small farmers
and landless agricultural labours unemployed and driven them to a state of abjection. The capital
intensive agriculture and its implications in heightening of rural inequalities first became visible with
the introduction of Green Revolution by the Indian state in 1960s. The Green Revolution entailed
introducing modern methods and technology such as high-yielding variety (HYV) seeds, tractors,
irrigation facilities, pesticides and fertilizers. This required heavy investments and could be afforded
only by the large landholders and rich farmers. According to P.C. Joshi (1974), in Punjab and Haryana
the trend that emerged was that small landowners rented their land to big farmers who needed a
larger land spread to use their machinery profitably. This while enriched the large landowners; it
pushed the landless workers into misery and unemployment.

Agrarian Class Structure and Class Relations

The agrarian social structure varies regionally. Every region has diverse groups and classes that
occupy certain positions in order to control and manage the affairs of the land. A.R. Desai and Daniel
Thorner are prominent scholars to have constructed general frameworks for classifying agrarian
classes found in post independence India. These frameworks reflect hierarchies of income and
wealth/property in agrarian society, throwing light on prevailing economic inequality. The land
reforms, emergence of cooperatives and credit societies failed to reduce the power of the landlords as
seen in the earlier section. A.R. Desai (1959) enumerates the most popular conceptions of agrarian
social structure as consisting of four classes: the three classes in the agricultural field (categories of
cultivators) are constituted by land- owners, tenants, and labourers, while the fourth class is of non-
agricultur-ists. Daniel Thorner (1956) rejected the above classification of cultivators as landlords,
tenants, and labourers. In his view the same man can belong simultaneously to these categories. A
person can himself cultivate a few acres of land he owns, give some land on rent, and in emergency
may work on other’s field as labourer. He has analysed agrarian relations by using three specific
terms:

5. Examine the language –religion interface in the medieval period of India

Ans. With the medieval period came a major shift in the language-religion interface in India. Till then,
all the major religions were usually expressed in their single language, respectively. For instance:
Sanskrit was the language of Hinduism, Ardhamagadhi of Jainism and Pali of Buddhism. Each of
these languages had the power to completely express their respective religions. However, in the
medieval period, mystics and saints from various parts of the country (like Jnaneshwar from
Maharashtra, Basavanna from Karnataka, Nammalvar from Tamil Nadu, Tulsidas, Mirabai, Nanak
and Kabir from North India) started arguing for the legitimacy of vernacular languages for the
expression of religion, challenging the hegemony of classical religious languages. They started
writing their religious poetries in vernacular languages specific to their regions, like Tamil, Marathi,
Awadhi, Rajasthani, etc. These saints were the reformists who on one hand liberated religion and
religious practices from the hold of single classical languages, often the possession of the elite; also
raised the status of vernacular languages in the context of religious conduct, opening the access to
religion for the masses.

With this even the scriptures were made accessible to the masses in the language they spoke. For
example: Jain scriptures were translated into Kannada and Hindi. The impetus for the translation of
religious texts into vernacular languages came from many reasons – a) in order to make them
accessible for the common masses who usually were not literate in the classical languages, which
were used mostly by the elites of their respective religion, like: Brahmins within Hinduism could
receive a formal training in Sanskrit, whereas the lower castes were devoid of it; b) the Roman
Catholic and Protestant missionaries had started escalating their activities in India of converting the
local population into Christianity. Thus, converting the canonical religious texts into the language of
the masses became a pressing need.

Assignment C

6. Jajamani Sytem

Ans. Jajmani system, (Hindi: deriving from the Sanskrit yajamana, “sacrificial patron who employs
priests for a ritual”) reciprocal social and economic arrangements between families of different castes
within a village community in India, by which one family exclusively performs certain services for
the other, such as ministering to the ritual or providing agricultural labour, in return for pay,
protection, and employment security. These relations are supposed to continue from one generation
to the next, and payment is normally made in the form of a fixed share in the harvest rather than in
cash. The patron family itself can be the client of another whom it patronizes for certain services and
by whom it is in turn patronized for other services. The hereditary character allows for certain forms
of bond labour, since it is the family obligation to serve its hereditary patrons.

The extent to which this system has ever truly operated in the Indian countryside is a matter of
considerable debate. The jajmani ideal is suspect as the anthropological analogue of the same
theoretical system presented by texts that describe a unified, conflict-free, reciprocal, and
hierarchically weighted system of interrelated varnas (social classes). While aspects of jajmani
relationships have been clearly attested in both the past and the present, and the influence of the
jajmani ideal is something to be reckoned with, these are undeniably and increasingly accompanied
by litigation, harassment, boycott, violence, political maneuvering, and a variety of monetized
exchanges.

7. Ryotwari System

Ans. Ryotwari system, one of the three principal methods of revenue collection in British India. It was
prevalent in most of southern India, being the standard system of the Madras Presidency (a British-
controlled area now constituting much of present-day Tamil Nadu and portions of neighbouring
states). The system was devised by Capt. Alexander Read and Thomas (later Sir Thomas) Munro at
the end of the 18th century and introduced by the latter when he was governor (1820–27) of Madras
(now Chennai). The principle was the direct collection of the land revenue from each individual
cultivator by government agents. For this purpose all holdings were measured and assessed
according to crop potential and actual cultivation. The advantages of this system were the elimination
of middlemen, who often oppressed villagers, and an assessment of the tax on land actually
cultivated and not merely occupied. Offsetting these advantages was the cost of detailed
measurement and of individual collection. This system also gave much power to subordinate revenue
officials, whose activities were inadequately supervised.

The name of the system comes from the word ryot, an Anglicization by the British in India of the
Arabic word raʿīyah, meaning a peasant or cultivator. The Arabic word passed into Persian (raʿeyyat)
and was carried by the Mughals, who used it throughout India in their revenue administration. The
British borrowed the word from them and continued to use it for revenue purposes in the Anglicized
form. The word has passed into various Indian languages, but in northern India the Hindi term kisan
is generally used.

8. Parallel and Cross –Cousin marriages

Ans. In some cultures, it is acceptable to marry cousins, who are consanguineal kin, meaning related
by blood. There are a couple of different arrangements that this can take.

In parallel cousin marriage is marriage between the children of same sex siblings. Say a mother's
daughter marries her sister's son. These two newlyweds would be the result of parallel cousin
marriage, where the children of two sisters or two brothers marry. The marriage of two brother's
children is more common of these types of cousin arrangements. This is called patrilateral parallel
cousin marriage.

Now, cross cousin marriage occurs when children of siblings of the opposite sex marry, basically the
opposite of parallel cousin marriage. Let's say a father's son marries the daughter of the father's sister.

As an aside: compared to our own culture, we might find some of these traditions to be strange or
unusual. But keep in mind a concept in anthropology known as cultural relativism. This means that
we don't judge other cultures based on our own, but instead try to understand them based on the
cultural context in which we find them.

Put another way, what seems strange to us might be very common in some places and would not
seem strange there at all.

9. Urbanism as a way of life

Ans. Industrialism does not simply increase numbers; it distributes them in particular ways,
concentrating mass populations in cities. Modern life is unquestionably urban life. It may be argued
that it was in the cities of ancient Mesopotamia, Egypt, Greece, and Rome that a distinctively urban
existence was first brought to that pitch of refinement that signifies an advanced civilization.
Certainly for those fortunates who were free citizens the Athens of Pericles provided an agreeable
existence. The Italian cities of the Renaissance, too, provided a distinctly urban culture.

Industrial urbanism differs from preindustrial urbanism in two ways. The first is in its quantitative
reach and intensity; the second is in the new qualitative relationship it sets up between the city and
society. For all the culture and sophistication of the preindustrial city, it remained a minority
experience. Full participation in urban life was available to no more than the 3 or 4 percent of the
population who were city dwellers in 3rd-millennium-BC Egypt and Mesopotamia and to the 10 to 15
percent of Romans who lived in cities at the zenith of imperial Rome (but who were heavily
dependent on food supplies from North Africa). These latter represent a high point of preindustrial
urbanism.
Industrialization brings a growth in trade and manufactures. To serve these activities it requires
centralized sites of production, distribution, exchange, and credit. It demands a regular system of
communications and transport. It multiplies the demand that political authorities establish a
dependable coinage, a standard system of weights and measures, a reasonable degree of protection
and safety on the roads, and regular enforcement of the laws. All these developments conduce to a
vast increase in urbanization. Whereas in typical agrarian societies 90 percent or more of the
population are rural, in industrial societies it is not uncommon for 90 percent or more to be urban.

10. Pandita Ramabhai

Ans. Pandita Ramabai was born on 23rd April in the forest of Ganamal in Maharashtra to Lakshmibai
and a High caste Hindu Brahmin named Anant Shastri, who was a social reformer and was interested
in educating girls. He was very learned in Sanskrit and he would read the Puranas in temples for
livelihood. He was abandoned from the society for teaching his wife Sanskrit. The village Brahmans
shunned him and he decided to leave the village and built a home in the forest. Soon Ramabai was
born. She was the youngest of the three surviving children. While she was still young the family
started moving from forest to forest and town to town.

Wherever he could her father would give lectures on the need for female education. Born at the forest
home, she grew up in a family that embarked on several continuous journeys to holy places across
India, managing to survive by reciting sacred stories and practising severities that the Hindu religion
commands, in order to gain religious merit and thus a living. Ramabai’s parents passed away in the
year 1877 due to famine. Her sister too died during the same time.

With only a brother left, she continued travelling all over India with him and reached Calcutta in
1878. Ramabai had impeccable command over the Sanskrit vernacular by then. Her exceptional
knowledge of Sanskrit texts astonished the scholars and she was awarded with the highest titles of
Pandita and Sarasvati, which means ‘A wise person’ and ‘goddess of learning/wisdom’ respectively.
Ramabai’s brother passed away after they moved to Calcutta, following which she got married to
Bipen Behan Das Medhavi who was a Shudra by caste, a lawyer and a teacher by profession. Both of
them studied the western philosophy and ideas together. They had a daughter out of their wedlock.
Unfortunately her husband died the following year, after which she returned to Pune.

Life and Work

Ramabai was drawn into the world of social reform early in life. She travelled widely in Calcutta and
Bengal Presidency, addressing women for getting educated and empowered. She worked rigorously
for women’s emancipation. She was already known as an educationist even before she turned 20. She
and her brother had toured the country to spread awareness about female education and social
reform.

When she came to Pune after her husband’s demise, she founded the Arya Mahila Samaj, which
showed how inclusive her idea of education was and how committed she was for the cause of social
reform. She believed in the idea of ‘self-reliance’ for real progress of society. Ramabai also got
involved in Missionary activity later in life, though her deep religiosity towards Christianity that she
believed in strongly came much later after her initial connections to the Hindu traditions due to her
upbringing and family values.

In the year 1882, the government of India had appointed a commission (The Hunter Education
Commission) that was to look into education in India and Ramabai gave evidence before the
commission suggesting that the teachers should be trained for their jobs and more women should be
appointed by schools. She also demanded that there should be more women in the medical field for
some treatments for women required the presence of other women. Such was the impact of her
evidences that it reached Queen Victoria.

What also needs to be mentioned is her speech on two resolutions of gender reform, wherein she at
first choose to remain silent until there was pin drop silence in her audience and then went on to say,
“It is not strange, my countrymen, that my voice is small, for you have never given a woman the
chance to make her voice strong!” Not only were the resolutions passed with massive majority, but
she literally captivated the attention of everyone sitting there. Her speeches were usually met with
applause and standing ovations everywhere.

By the time Ramabai left for England in 1883 with her companion Anandibai Bhagat and settled in
Wantage, she had declared that she was unwilling to convert to Christianity. A few months later, her
companion Anandibai committed suicide. This incident shocked Ramabai. She was only twenty-five
years of age and had already watched her parents, her brother, her husband, and her closest friend
die tragic deaths.

While her future was a little uncertain, during the same time she was invited to America, in 1886 to
attend her cousin Anandibai Joshi’s graduation ceremony, India’s very first woman doctor. A year
later in December 1887, the American Ramabai Association was formed in Boston by her admirers,
and she was able to gather financial support for residential schools for Hindu widows.

To raise funds for the same purpose, she also wrote the book The High Caste Hindu Woman and was
able to sell ten thousand copies of it. It’s important to point out here that her book highlighted
Brahmanical patriarchy especially in the region of Maharashtra. She travelled throughout the United
States and Canada studying educational, philanthropic, and charitable institutions and delivering
lectures to various groups. By 1888, she had collected over 30,000 dollars for her association.

Ramabai came back to India in 1889. A month later in March 1889 (11th march) she opened Sharada
Sadan (or Home for Learning) in Mumbai. She started this with an aim to empower young widowed
women. She taught the women to read, write, learn history and environment, among others. Sharada
Sadan was the first institution in India to provide residential school for Brahmin women, mainly
widows, but also unmarried girls. It was the first organisation to provide them formal and regular
school education and vocational training. It not only assured economic safety for women, but also
social acceptance for their livelihoods. She also received complete support from the social reformers
in India, who were impressed with her ability to raise finds in a foreign country and even more
impressed with her devotion to social reform back in India.

In 1889, famine hit Pune city. Attempting to control it, the government placed restrictions on the
movement of people and a limit was placed on the number of people who could reside in Sharada
Sadan. Not wanting to waste time, Ramabai went to Khedgaon near Pune, where she had purchased
100 acres of land, and set up Mukti Mission. She provided housing to women and children attending
the school. Widows were encouraged not only to be independent, but were taught a variety of skills –
from carpentry to running a printing press, the kind of skill sets that women were barred from
acquiring and learning then. She also designed a remedial curriculum which included subjects like
physiology and botany. It also included learning about one’s own body and physical world around
them. Industrial training, printing, carpentry, tailoring, masonry, wood-cutting, weaving and
needlework, as well as training in farming and gardening was taught.

Conversion to Christianity
In September 1883 Pandita Ramabai converted to Christianity. This was when she was living in at
Wantage as a guest of the Anglican Community of St Mary the Virgin. The conversion created
shockwaves throughout India. A Brahmin woman from a highly respected family in India, after her
orthodox learning, someone who championed for widow women’s emancipation, had converted to
Christianity.

Meera Kosambi has pointed out that her conversion also needs to be seen and critiqued from the
context of the imperial, orientalist, patriarchal framework. However, she goes on to say that her
conversion comes at a juncture where she had received immense spiritual support and aid from her
Christian community and the dominance and patriarchal structures of the Hindu caste society were
exposed in front of her. Her conversion also needs to be remembered and celebrated, given her social
context and her upbringing in a traditional upper-caste Hindu society. She also had to pay a heavy
price for it and was marginalized from the official histories of western India and especially
Maharashtra for betraying her caste and community.

Amidst her work, her conversion ensured a backlash from the Hindu community. Her act of
upholding the rights of women who were widowed was unacceptable to a considerably large section
of the Brahmin community. They fuelled Christian propaganda following Ramabai’s policy of
allowing the girls to attend her private prayers.

Yet she continued working. In 1919, she was awarded the Kaiser-e-Hind Gold Medal. Many more
activities were introduced elsewhere by Ramabai’s daughter Manorama. However, due to bad health,
her daughter passed away at the age of 40 in the year 1921. A year later, Ramabai passed away at 64,
soon after copies of the Marathi translation of The Bible started coming out from the Mukti Mission’s
press.