IWD on March 8 is celebrated by women's groups around the world. This date is also commemorated at the United Nations. When women on all continents, often divided by national boundaries and by ethnic, linguistic, cultural, economic and political differences, come together to celebrate their Day, they can look back to a tradition that represents at least nine decades of struggle for equality, justice, peace and development.
Source; Delcampe.netInternational Women's Day is the story of ordinary women as makers of history; it is rooted in the centuries-old struggle of women to participate in society on an equal footing with men. During the French Revolution, Parisian women calling for "liberty, equality, fraternity" marched on Versailles to demand women's suffrage.
The idea of an International Women's Day first arose at the turn of the century, which in the industrialized world was a period of expansion and turbulence, booming population growth and radical ideologies. (Source http://www.un.org/ecosocdev/geninfo/women/womday97.htm)
Flags and Stamps Honours 'Women of India' and their
Contributions to the cause of the National Flag of India
Sister Nivedita
Sister Nivedita
Perhaps, the first
serious attempt at flag-making in India came from a woman - Sister Nivedita(1867–1911) - an Irish devotee of Swami
Vivekananda. Born as Margaret Elizabeth Nobel in Northern Ireland. Swami
Vivekananda inspired her to come to Calcutta to spread education among Indian
women. Sister Nivedita actively participated in the Swadeshi (Swadeshi
standing for a political movement to attain ‘self-sufficiency’) movement and
greatly contributed towards Indian nationalism.
Sister Nivedita conceived the idea of the national flag
during a visit to Bodh Gaya in 1904,
in the company of Jagadish Chandra Bose
and Rabindranath Tagore. She was
inspired by the vajra (thunderbolt)
sign, a symbol of Buddha, that
implies ‘the selfless man’. It
was the weapon of Lord Indra and
is a symbol of strength. It is also associated with the Goddess Durga. According to legend, vajra was created from the bones of Rishi Dadhichi. It is a symbol of supreme sacrifice.
Sister Nivedita
died in 1911 in Darjeeling; her epitaph aptly reads, ‘Here reposes Sister Nivedita who gave her all to India.’
Bhikaiji Rustom Cama
A strikingly similar flag to the 1906 Calcutta flag (Bande
Mataram flag), with minor deviations, was waved by Bhikaiji Rustom Cama on
22 August 1907 at the Second International Socialist Congress in Stuttgart,
Germany. Waving the flag Madame Cama declared,
This flag is of Indian
independence. Behold it is born. It is
already sanctioned by the blood of martyred Indian youths. I call upon you,
gentlemen, to rise and salute this flag of Indian Independence. In the name of
this flag, I appeal to lovers of freedom all over the world to cooperate with
this flag in freeing one-fifth of the human race.
Madame Cama
wrote in a leaflet titled ‘Bande Mataram – A Message to the People of India’ (1908) ;
This flag of Bande Mataram, which
I wave before you, was made for me by a noble selfless young patriot [Hemchandra Kanungo], who is now standing at the bar of the
so-called court of justice in our country. What a mockery to talk of
justice and jury!
In the
1984 edition of Hemchandra Kanungoe’s book “Banglai Biplab Prachesta’ (first
published in June 1928) Gaurishankar Bhattacharya wrote in his introduction
that it was Hemchandra who made the Flag in Paris as per request made by Madam
Cama and Shyamji Krishna Varma.
Dr Bhupendranath Dutta
(1880-1961), who researched in great details about the genesis of the Bande Mataram flag in his book Bharater Dwitiya Swadhinater Sangaram—Aprakashita
Rajnaitik Itihas, wondered
how a flag which was
conceptualized and made in Calcutta could again be surfaced with such stunning similarity
in far away Europe unless there was a common link between the two. Dr
Dutta hinted it was Hemchandra (Das)
Kanungoe, who made the flag for
Madame Cama. According to Dr
Dutta’s findings Khasi Rao,
the revolutionary brother of Madhav Rao, a general in the army of the Baroda state,
had gone to Switzerland to undergo military training. Khasi Rao took with him a small replica of the Calcutta Flag given to him
by the Bengal Congress leaders in 1907.
After World War I she had to remain in exile and was allowed
to return to India only when her health deteriorated in 1935. Madame Cama quietly passed away in Bombay (Mumbai) on 16
August 1936, unsung and unmourned. The undaunted lady wrote for her tombstone
in French and Gujarati, ‘Resistance
to tyranny is obedience to God’—her most befitting epitaph.
Madam Cama’s flag was clandestinely brought into India and kept it at a secret location in
Bombay. In 1937. G.V. Ketkar, grandson of Bal Gangadhar Tilak and former editor
of the Kesari and Tarun Bharat
retrieved the original flag from the secret place receiving tips from Indulal
Yagnik of Gujarat. The framed flag is preserved for public viewing in the
Tilak Museum of Maratha and Kesari Library in Pune.
India’s first female prime minister, Mrs Indira Gandhi, paid
her tribute in her ‘Foreword’ to the book Madame
Cama – Mother of Indian Revolution by Dr Panchanan Saha: ‘We remember
specially her bold action and pioneering work to popularise our national flag.
It is the tricolour she unfurled which was adopted with some alternation by our
freedom movement.’
Aruna Asaf Ali (Ganguli)
During
Quit India movement on 9 August 1942,
following the arrest of most of the prominent leaders, Aruna Asaf Ali (Ganguli), came forward and unfurled the Purna Swaraj flag at the Gowalia Tank Maidan
to announce the commencement of the Quit India movement. The raising of the
flag by Aruna Asaf Ali provided the spark that ignited the Quit India movement.
She became an iconic figure for thousands of youths who rose to emulate her.
Forty-five years later, on 9 August 1987, Aruna Asaf Ali reenacted the flag
hoisting ceremony at the same venue in Bombay, renamed August Kranti Maidan to celebrate the
fortieth anniversary of India’s Independence.
Kanaklata Barua
On 10 September 1942, at Barangabari under Gohpur Police Station in the
district of Darrang (at present Sonitpur) a young girl named Kanaklata Barua
from the village of Barangabri led a procession of unarmed villagers under the
Purna Swaraj flag. As soon as Kanaklata unfurled the flag she and her companion
Mukunda Kakati were gunned down by the armed police. Their heroic sacrifice is
still remembered with pride. On the same day at Dhekiajuli Police Station
eleven unarmed villagers were gunned down by the armed police while trying to
hoist the tri-color at the police station. Three teenage girls called
Tileswari, Numali and Khahuli killed in this incident are especially
commemorated by the locals.
Kanaklata Barua has not yet been philatelically honoured by India post
Matangini Hazra
Matangini Hazra was known as ‘Gandhi-buri’(literally
an old female version of Gandhi). At the age of seventy-three
she joined the Quit India movement, as an active volunteer. On 29 September1942, while she was leading
a procession at Tamluk in Midnapore, with the Purna Swaraj flag in her hands, a shower of bullets from the police
felled her. While dying, she had held the flag high and had collapsed only when
she had passed the flag onto the next marcher; the flag had remained unsullied.
The sample of
the ‘Tiranga with the emblem of Asoka Chakra’ which was presented by Pandit
Jawaharlal Nehru in the Constituent Assembly on 22 July 1947, for adoption as Free India’s National Flag, that, so proudly we hail today, was
prepared by Mrs Badr-ud-Din Tyabjee (her husband was the joint secretary in the Constituent Assembly and
grandson of the great Tayabjee who was the president of the All India Congress party in
1887).
Badr-ud-Din Tyabjee has not yet been philatelically honoured by India post
Mrs Sarojini Naidu, the ‘Bulbule Hind’,
was given the honour of making the final speech in the Constituent Assembly on
22 July 1947. And she concluded her long emotional speech by saying;
… Many of my friends have spoken of this Flag with the poetry of their
own hearts. I as a poet and as a woman,
I am speaking prose to you when I say that we women stand for the unity of
India. Remember this Flag there is no prince and there is no peasant, there is
no rich and there is no poor. There is no privilege there is only duty and
responsibility and sacrifice. Whether we be Hindus or Muslims, Christians,
Sikhs or Zorostrians and others, our Mother India has one undivided heart and
one indivisible spirit. Men and women of reborn India rise and salute this
Flag. I bid you, rise and salute the
Flag.
At the stroke of midnight on 15 August 1947, free India’s national flag
was hoisted atop the Council House, renamed
Parliament Bhavan in New Delhi. The flown flag was presented by Mrs Hansa Mehta representing the Flag Presentation
Committee comprising of all the women members of the Constituent Assembly, as a
gift from
the women of India.
Born in Surat, she was a freedom fighter who made it her mission
to free India. She actively took part in the freedom struggle and had to suffer
imprisonment many a times. Hansa Mehta was the
first woman to be appointed Vice-Chancellor of a co-educational University in
India.
Hansa Mehta has not yet been philatelically honoured by India post
