Biography of

Sarojini Naidu

READER'S DELIGHT

Biography of

Sarojini Naidu

READER'S DELIGHT AN IMPRINT OF RAMESH PUBLISHING HOUSE

NEW DELHI

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Sarojini Naidu

Published by: Alok Kumar Gupta for Reader's Delight (An Imprint of Ramesh Publishing House) Admin. Office: 12-H, New Daryaganj Road, Opp. Officers’ Mess, New Delhi-110002 ) 23261567, 23275224, 23275124 E-mail: [email protected] Website: www.rameshpublishinghouse.com

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Book Code: A-29 ISBN: 978-93-5012-630-1 Price: ` 35/-

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Preface This book is a biography of Sarojini Naidu, one of the most prominent leaders of India’s freedom struggle. The book makes its reader familiar with the versatile personality of Sarojini Naidu. Known as nightingale of India, Sarojini Devi was a distinguished poet, renowned freedom fighter and one of the great orators of her time. The book is presented with the speeches of Sarojini Naidu, which gives the details about her on various topics. The book explains how boldly she had gone against the caste marriage system. The book also depicts her thought on Hindu-Muslim unity and the power of women in India. The unique and friendly relationship of Sarojini Naidu with Mahatma Gandhi is also explained in her own words. We hope, this book will be pleasurable and helpful to the students and scholars in understanding the personality of Sarojini Naidu. —Publisher

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Sarojini Naidu

Contents Introduction

5

Early Life and Family

9

Education

14

Marriage

17

Her Poetry

19

Naidu in Politics

22

Meeting with Mahatma Gandhi

26

Naidu on Hindu-Muslim Unity

33

In the Service of the Motherland

35

Naidu’s Personality

37

Sarojini as a Speaker

41

Naidu in Jail

45

Naidu’s Fight for Women’s Rights

48

Death

54

5

INTRODUCTION

“We want deeper sincerity of motive, a greater courage in speech and earnestness in action.”

–Sarojini Naidu

Sarojini Naidu was a distinguished poet, renowned freedom fighter and one of the great orators of her time. She was famously known as ‘Bharatiya Kokila’ or ‘The Nightingale of India’. Sarojini Naidu was the first Indian woman to become the President of the Indian National Congress and the first woman to become the governor of a state in Independent India. At a time, when a galaxy of great political leaders appeared in India, Sarojini Naidu stood out by her commanding personality and indemonstrable spirit.

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Sarojini Naidu

She answered the call for freedom and dedicated her life to her country, facing years of imprisonment. One of Mahatma Gandhi’s most trusted followers, she was the vibrant and articulate voice of India at gatherings across the globe, captivating audiences with her wit, grace and passionate love for the country. She was a superb ambassador of Gandhiji and the Indian national movement in her travels at crucial times to East and South Africa, Britain and the United States. Mahatma Gandhi whom she called ‘The high priest or honoured guru’ of the Satyagraha movement must have been glad of her clear thinking, her integrity and her sense of humour which he shared. Bhabani Bhattacharya, writing about her, remarks: ‘On one occasion, speaking at a meeting of the World Alliances of peace, when the flags of 70 countries bedecked the banquet room she said sharply to the audience: “Where is the flag of India?”’ Sarojini Naidu’s sense of humour and her fiery oratory were frequently lauded. Along with a love of social reform and politics, she also combined a love of poetry and wrote in English, and thereby earned herself the description, ‘Nightingale of India.’ Sarojini Naidu also led an active literary life and attracted notable Indian intellectuals to her famous salon in Mumbai. Her first volume of poetry, ‘The

7 Golden Threshold’ (1905), was followed by ‘The Bird of Time, (1912), and in 1914 she was elected a fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. Her collected poems, all of which she wrote in English, have been published under the titles ‘The Sceptred Flute’ (1928) and ‘The Feather of the Dawn’ (1961). Introduction

Sarojini Naidu was much more than a born poetess and leader. She was a glowing landmark in the saga of Ind ia ’s Pilgrimage to Fre ed om. She wa s so ma ny t hings ro lled int o one: p at riot , po et es s, politician, jailbird, perfect hostess and ideal house– wife, eloquent orator and inspirer of masses, maker and singer of melodious songs and upholder of reason. In fine, a many splendour integrated personality. She always upheld the ideal of “Indians first, Indians la st , and Indians always” with a w orld vis io n, lik e Ga nd hi, he r Ma st er. She had more than a man’s courage and yet she ever remained feminine to the core. She had been a lady with brilliant record of rare achievements.

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Sarojini Naidu

Aldous Huxley who met her in the twenties thought of her as ‘a woman w ho comb ine s in the mo st remarkable way great intellectual power with charm, sweetness with courageous energy. In 1935, Sri Aurobindo observed that her poetry was among the lasting things in English literature and that she would take her place among the immortals. The prophecy has come true. Today, she is among the immortals not only because of her enchanting poetry but also because of her great services to the country as a soldier and builder of modern India.

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EARLY LIFE AND FAMILY Sarojini Chattopadhyay or Sarojini Naidu, as the world knows her, was born on February 13, 1879 in a Hindu Bengali Brahmin family. As a child, Sarojini was of a very emotional and sentimental kind. The baby was named Sarojini - meaning lotus. Sarojini was very lively and pleasant from her very childhood, like a lotus. The only difference between Sarojini and lotus was of their surroundings. A lotus blooms in a puddle whereas baby Sarojini blossomed in an atmosphere of culture and refinement. Sarojini’s father, Dr. Aghorenath Chottopadhyaya, hailed from a Brahmin family of East Bengal. In his early youth, he migrated to Kolkata for studies. He had to study from borrowed books under street lamps. His inborn brilliance soon surfaced and won recognition. He was exceptionally bright in English, Bengali and Sanskrit, as also in Greek, Hebrew, French, German and Russian. But his main interest was in science, especially chemistry. Young Aghorenath was offered Gilchrist scholarship for higher studies in England. He joined the Edinburgh University, where he took the degree of

Sarojini Naidu 10 D.Sc, being the first Indian to become a Doctor of Science. Yet another foreign scholarship enabled him to go for further studies at the Bonn University.

While going to England for studies, he left his young wife, Varada Sundari, in the ‘Bharat Ashrama’ sponsored by Raja Ram Mohan Roy, who, together with Keshub Chandra Sen, had founded the Brahmo Samaj. Its social reform activities had attracted young Aghorenath’s reformist zeal, and hence his willingness to leave his wife in their care. On his return to India, Dr. Aghorenath got the job of a school teacher. Later he b ec ame t he Principa l of N iz am’s c olle ge a t Hyderabad, now capital of Andhra Pradesh. Sarojini was the eldest among their eight children. All the children grew learning and speaking besides Bengali, their mother tongue, Urdu, Te lugu and English. One of her brothers Birendranath was a revolutionary and spent his life outside India all the time for fear of getting extradited for sedition and black waters. Other brother Harindranath was a poet, dramatist and actor. Her ancestors for thousands of years have been lovers of the forest, the mountains and caves. They were great dreamer, scholars and ascetics. All these qualities were present in her also. She had a prominent romantic trait in her blood.

11 Sarojini’s letter to Arthur Symons, when she was a te enager invit ing him to her home re ve als he r passionate self - “Come and share my exquisite March mo rning with me… All is ho t and fierce a nd passionate, ardent and unashamed in its exulting and importunate desire for life and love…” Early Life and Family

Symons found, “Her eyes were like deep pools and you seem to fall through them into depths below depths.” She was petite and used to dress in ‘clinging silks’, and wore her hair loose ‘straight down her back’, spoke little and in ‘a low voice, like gentle music’.

Edmund Gosse

Edmund Gosse was amongst the first few poeple highly impressed by the poems of Sarojini Naidu. He said of her, “She was a child of sixteen, but…was alre ad y ma rvelous in mental maturity, amazingly well-read and far beyond a wes tern child in all her ac quaint ance w it h the world.”

Sarojini was the eldest of a large family, all of whom were taught English at an early age. “I,” she writes,

Sarojini Naidu 12 “was stubborn and refused to speak it. So one day when I was nine years old my father punished me—the only time I was ever punished—by shutting me in a room alone for a whole day. I came out of it a fullblown linguist. I have never spoken any other language to him, or to my mother, who always speaks to me in Hindustani. I don’t think I had any special hankering to write poetry as a little child, though I was of a very fanciful and dreamy nature. My training under my father’s eye was of a sternly scientific character. He was determined that I should be a great mathematician or a scientist, but the poetic instinct, which I inherited from him and also from my mother (who wrote some lovely Bengali lyrics in her youth proved stronger). One day, when I was eleven, I was sighing over a sum in algebra: it wouldn’t come right; but instead a whole poem came to me sudd enly. I wrot e it down.”

“From that day my ‘poetic career’ began. At thirteen, I wrote a long po em ‘ La dy o f the Lake’—1300 lines in six days. At thirteen, I wrote a drama of 2000 lines, a

Sarojini Naidu

13 full-fledged passionate thing that I began on the spur of the moment without forethought, just to spite my doctor who said I was very ill and must not touch a book. My health broke down permanently about this time, and my regular studies being stopped I read voraciously. I suppose the greater part of my reading was done between fourteen and sixteen. I wrote a novel, I wrote fat volumes of journals; I took myself very seriously in those days.” Early Life and Family

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Sarojini Naidu

EDUCATION The fortunate circumstances of her life cannot be measured in terms of worldly riches but by riches more valuable than gold. Her father, a true academician brought up his children in perfect freedom. She enjoyed unrestricted freedom at home. In a sense, she was brought up in the lap of luxury. Her father employed an English and a French governess with a view to give her an excellent training. She also had a Persian teacher and developed a taste for it. Even as a child, she had the luxury of having her own room, her own library, her own furniture and her own wardrobe, of which an average Indian child could not even dream of. Sarojini Naidu was a precocious child, a ‘wonder girl’. When barely twelve years old, she wrote a 1300line poem a la ‘Lady of the Lake’ in six days! ‘The next year, she penned an impassioned poetic drama of 2000 lines! In 1897, Dr. Aghorenath sent Sarojini to Madras to appear for the Matriculation examination, which she passed with distinction. The result of her college studies at the Madras University was also outstanding. She

15 passed in First Class first. This was a brilliant feat and her first leap into fame. The jurisdiction of Madras University at that time extended much beyond Tamilnadu into many regions of the present State of Kerala, Andhra and Karnataka. Women’s college eagerly waited for her entry but she returned to Hyderabad due to frail health. Education

As a college student, Sarojini had written a verse play in Persian “Mehar Munee” (a legendary romantic couple). Dr. Aghorenath printed a few copies of the play for private circulation and he ventured to present a copy to the Nizam. His Exalted Highness was so much impressed that he sanctioned a scholarship for her higher studies in England. By a happy coincidence, Dr. Annie Besant was also a passenger in the ship that Sarojini chose for her voyage to London. Dr. Annie Besant was at that time a highly esteemed and renowned personage in India. Though Irish-born, and English bred Annie Besant made India her home, first as the head of the Theosophical Society headquartered at Chennai, and later by her full-throated championship of Home Rule for India. She was elected President of the Kolkata Session of the Indian National Congress in 1917. She came to love Sarojini, ‘the singing bird’, as a daughter and offered to chaperon her. In London, Sarojini studied at the King’s College, London and later at Girton Girls College, Cambridge. She stayed in England till 1998.

Biography Books Series

Book Code A-70 A-71 A-72 A-73 A-74

Book Name Subhash Chandra Bose Dr. B.R. Ambedkar Dhirubhai Ambani Dr. Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan Pt. Madan Mohan Malaviya

Book Code A-75 A-76 A-77 A-78 A-79

Book Name Chandra Sekhar Azad Lala Lajpat Rai Rani Lakshmibai Chhatrapati Shivaji Dr. C.V. Raman

Book Code A-25 A-26 A-27 A-28 A-29

Book Name Rabindranath Tagore Mahatma Gandhi Indira Gandhi Mother Teresa Sarojini Naidu

Book Code A-30 A-31 A-32 A-33 A-34

Book Name Swami Vivekananda Sardar Patel Bal Gangadhar Tilak Jawahar Lal Nehru Kalpana Chawla Book Code : A-29 ISBN 978-93-5012-630-1

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