Mothers of Indian Education- Savitribai Phule & Fatima Sheikh
Let's beautify human existence and make progress, Live and let live, get rid of all our fears and stress. Human beings and all of creation are but two sides of a coin. To preserve these priceless bounties let us our hands join. - Savitribai Phule
Pune University was renamed ” Savitribai Phule University ” on 9th August 2014. As of 2021, the university is ranked in the 591-600 category as per the QS World University Rankings.
In India, 42% of all teachers are women and in Indian culture, the status of a teacher is equated to that of god, it is almost unfathomable to think that at one point women in India had to struggle to educate and to be educated. Today most Indian women prefer becoming educationists, however, in 19th century India the situation was different, most women were not allowed any formal education, and working as teachers seemed to be a distant dream for them. In the 19th century, brutality against women had reached its peak, girls as young as 8 years old were married away, often to men who were much older than them, these girls were widowed at tender ages and then had to either forcefully live the life of an ascetic, wherein they were often ostracized and had to shave off their hair, follow strict dietary routines and were restricted from wearing colorful clothes or jewelry or had to be burned alongside their husbands at the funeral pyre. Girls, when born, were rarely celebrated as blessings and were instead often killed immediately after birth or given away as child brides since parents feared that girls were a mere economic burden. In domestic households, women were looked up to as epitomes of purity who constantly sacrificed their lives for their families and children.
Women were meant to be submissive and not have a voice of their own, and hence most of the time they never questioned the patriarchal brutality inflicted on them. Women in the upper class and royal families were often allowed an education, however, such was not the case for women belonging to lower classes where education was viewed as a privilege that was enjoyed by men belonging to higher castes.
Such was the backdrop that saw the birth of some of India’s most celebrated female teachers, Savitribai Phule and Fatima Sheikh. Savitribai Phule was born into a family that belonged to the Mali community, who were considered to be Shudras ( the lowest in the hierarchical caste structure ) and was married away at the age of 9 to the 13-year-old Jyotirao Phule. Jyotirao Phule began training and educating his wife at home as he believed in a society without any glass ceilings for women or other weaker sections.
By 1848, Savitribai Phule and Jyotirao Phule had established a school for girls and people belonging to lower castes within the premises of their house, however, this move was met by staunch criticism, and eventually, the couple was ousted from their home by Jyotirao Phule’s father. After being ousted from their own home the couple took refuge in the house of Usman Sheikh, who was a friend of Jyotirao Phule. Usman Sheikh had a sister who was known as Fatima Sheikh, Usman Sheikh had ensured his sister with formal education and had her trained to become a teacher. Alongside Fatima Sheikh, Savitribai Phule officially set up a girl’s school in the Sheikh household.
Savitribai Phule and Jyotirao Phule set up 18 schools for marginalized sections in the country and Fatima Sheikh who by that time had become one of Savitribai’s closest companions taught in most of these schools and Savitribai Phule fondly speaks of Fatima in her letters to her husband, she mentions how Fatima readily teaches and looks after the schools on her behalf while she is away, however, success was never easy as these two women were often subject to harassment as people from upper classes would hurl abuses and pelt them with stones and dung while they went to school but even this could not stop them and they would simply just change their sarees and carry on teaching. Savitribai Phule went on to lead the women’s department of the Satyashodak Samaj, a committee that was started by her husband to promote equity and denounced archaic practices against women and lower castes and also worked in the Balhatya Pratibandhak Griha, which was a place where victims of sexual harassment could give birth to their children and put them for adoption if needed.
Savitribai Phule wrote numerous poems in Marathi and her poems generally revolved around the themes of casteism, women emancipation, and education, she had released a collection of her poems, “Kavya Phule”. Mahatma Jyotiba Phule was an avid writer as well and Gulamgiri ( Slavery ) was his most notable work.
In 1877, Savitribai Phule and Jyotiba Phule started the Victoria Balashram wherein Savitribai cooked meals along with her friends and served the meals for free to all the needy and impoverished people for free who were affected by the drought that hit Maharashtra that year. There was genuine love and respect between Savitribai Phule and Jyotiba Phule and Savitribai is said to have not worn any other jewelry apart from her mangalsutra, when Jyotiba Phule died in 1880, it was Savitribai who lit his funeral pyre even though they had an adopted son, Yeshwant, who was the son of a woman who had been exploited.
Women like Savitribai Phule and Fatima Sheikh helped in shaping modern education in India, these women were born in a time where violence against women was commonly practiced, however, these women along with the help of Jyotirao Phule and Usman Sheikh continued to teach and spread the light of knowledge. Along with the help of her adopted son Yeshwant, Savitribai Phule set up a hospital to look after patients suffering from the plague that had taken over several lives in 1897, Savitribai succumbed to the plague while trying to save the life of a child who was himself suffering from the plague and she passed away as a hero on 10th March 1897.
In Maharashtra, Women’s Education Day is celebrated on 3 January, the birthday of Savitribai Phule to honor and respect India’s first-ever female teacher. At present, the female literacy rate in India stands at 70.3%, and the male literacy rate stands at 84.3%, while we have made the progress we still have a long way to go to achieve education for all in India.
For more information about Savitribai Phule and Jytoiba Phule-
https://sahitya.marathi.gov.in/scans/Savitribai%20Phule%20Samgra%20Vangmay.pdf
https://drambedkarbooks.files.wordpress.com/2015/04/gulamgiri-in-hindi.pdf
https://drambedkarbooks.com/2015/01/03/few-poems-by-savitribai-phule/
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