15 women of Constituent Assembly
The Constitution of India is one document which has not only united as many as 584 small principle states in 1947 but it is a document which is running the court of the greatest diversity in the world. When the Britishers were leaving the country, there was a need to unite the country and for this, a document was required to be prepared which could have not only brought uniformity in the country but also acceptable to the citizens of the country.
A Constituent Assembly was formed which comprised of 299 members. Out of the 299 members, there were 15 women members. What we don’t know or have very little knowledge about is that the Constitution drafting committee had 15 women members who had worked for 2 years, 11 months, and 17 days before the Constitution was ready. Their contribution to our constitution is equally irreplaceable.
What was more appreciable about these 15 iron ladies of the country was their contribution before this, and after this also. They came from very different backgrounds and played vital role in equating the constitution with many oppressed and distressed classes of the society. This Article emphasises over their life, and contribution very precisely.
1. Ammu Swaminathan @ A. V. Ammakuti (22.04.1894-04.07.1978)
Ammu Swaminathan was an upper-caste Hindu family in Anakkara of Palghat district, Kerala. She was instrumental in forming the Women’s India Association in 1917 in Madras, with other great women of the time such as Annie Besant, Margaret Cousins, Malathi Patwardhan, Dadabhoy and Ambujammal. She was a freedom fighter and she became a part of the Constituent Assembly from the Madras Constituency in 1946. She was elected as a member of the Rajya Sabha from Madras State in 1952. She was President of Bharat Scouts and Guides from 1960-1965. She was also selected as “Mother of the Year” in 1975 on the inauguration of International Women’s Year.
She got married to Subbarama Swaminathan and she got education after her marriage when she was taught at Home.
Her life was transformed under the tutelage of her husband. Swaminathan nurtured his wife who was very young that time and encouraged her talents. He appointed tutors to teach her English and other subjects at home, and thus rectify to the extent possible the fact that she was uneducated. She became fluent in English very soon, and the confidence that her husband's support gave her, developed her to be a forceful and willful personality. It was under her husband's influence that Ammu became a follower of Mahatma Gandhi and took part in India's struggle for independence.
2. Dakshayani Velayudhan (04.07.1912-20.07.1978)
Dakshayani Velayudhan was born on 4th July, 1912, on the island of Bolgatty of Cochin. She was leader of oppressed Classes. She was the first woman from Schedule Classes to graduate in India. She was a science graduate. She was one of the nine female members of the Constituent Assembly of India elected in 1946.
In 1945, Dakshayani was nominated to the Cochin Legislative Council by the State Government. She was the first and the only woman from a Dalit cast who got elected to the Constituent Assembly in 1946.
She was a staunch Gandhian and sided B R Ambedkar on many issues relating to the Scheduled Castes during the Constituent Assembly debates. She agreed with Ambedkar giving up the demand for separate electorates arguing instead for 'moral safeguards' and the immediate removal of their social disabilities.
When Dr Ambedkar introduced the draft Constitution for discussion, she expressed her appreciation for the draft while calling for greater decentralisation. She also suggested that the final draft of the Constitution should be adopted following a ratification through a general election.
3. Begum Aizaz Rasul (02.04.1909-01-08-2002)
Begum Aizaz Rasul was born in Malerkotla, into a princely family and was married to the young landowner Nawaab Aizaz Rasul. She was the only Muslim woman member of the Constituent Assembly.
With the enactment of the Government of India Act 1935, Begum and her husband joined the Muslim League and entered electoral politics. In the 1937 elections, she was elected to the UP Legislative Assembly.
After the partition of the country, few Muslim League members joined the Constituent Assembly of India. Begum Aizaz Rasul was elected the Deputy Leader of the Delegation and the Deputy leader of Opposition in the Constituent Legislative Assembly. When Chaudhry Khaliquzzaman, the party leader left for Pakistan, Begum Aijaz succeeded him as the leader of the Muslim League and became a member of the Minority Rights Drafting Subcommittee.
She was instrumental in creating consensus amongst the Muslim leadership to voluntarily give up the demand for reserved seats for religious minorities. During the discussions pertaining to the right of minorities in an assembly of the Drafting Committee, she opposed the idea of having 'separate electorates' for Muslims.
She quoted the idea as 'a self-destructive weapon which separates the minorities from the majority for all time'. By 1949, the Muslim members who wished for the retention of separate electorates came around to accept Begum's appeal.
She was elected to the Rajya Sabha in 1952 and was a member of the Uttar Pradesh Legislative Assembly from 1969 to 1990.
4. Durgabai Deshmukh (15.07.1909-09.05.1981)
Durgabai Deshmukh was born in Rajahmundry on July 15, 1909. She was a freedom fighter and when she was 12 years old, she participated in the Non-Co-operation Movement and along with Andhra Kesari T Prakasam, she participated in the Salt Satyagraha movement in Madras city in May 1930.
In 1936, she established the Andhra Mahila Sabha, which within a decade became a great institution of education and social welfare in the city of Madras.She was also President of Blind Relief Association. She was the only woman in the panel of chairman in the constituent Assembly. She was instrumental in enactment of many social welfare laws.
She became member of Planning Commission by nomination and also became first woman to be Chairman of the board. She was the first one to discuss the need of separate Family Court for speedy justice in familial matters.
She was elected to Constituent Assembly from Madras Province. In the assembly she proposed Hindusani as national language and also express her fear for forceful campaign for Hindi in Southern India.
5. Hansa Jivraj Mehta @ Hansa Mehta (03.07.1897-04.04.1995)
Born on July 3, 1897, to the Dewan of Baroda Manubhai Nandshankar Mehta, Hansa Mehta studied journalism and sociology in England. Along with being a reformer and social activist, she was also an educator and writer. She was also grand daughter of Nandshankar Mehta, the author of the first Gujarati novel Karan Ghelo.
She participated in various freedom movements in line with Mahatma Gandhi. She established Desh Sevika Dal in 1930. She was elected to Bombay Legislative Assembly. She wrote many books for children in Gujarati and also translated many English stories including the Gulliver’s Travels. She was elected to the Bombay Schools Committee in 1926 and became President of the All India Women’s Conference in 194546.
Hansa represented India on the Nuclear Sub-Committee on the status of women in 1946. Hansa later went on to become the vice chairman of the Human Rights Commission of the United Nations in 1950. She was also a member of the Executive Board of UNESCO.
6. Kamla Chaudhary (22.02.1908-1970)
Kamla Chaudhary was born in an affluent family of Lucknow, however, it was still a struggle for her to continue her education. Moving away from her family’s loyalty to the imperial government, she joined the nationalists and was an active participant in the Civil Disobedience Movement launched by Gandhi in 1930.
She was elected to the Constituent Assembly from the United Provinces (now Uttar Pradesh) in 1946. She was a Member of the Provisional Parliament (1947 to 1952) and acted as the Senior Vice-Chair of the 54th Indian National Congress Session. She entered the Lok Sabha in 1962 after winning from Hapur District in Uttar Pradesh.
She was vice-president of the All India Congress Committee in its 54th session and was elected as a member of the Lok Sabha in the late seventies. Chaudhary was also a celebrated fiction writer and her stories usually dealt with women’s inner worlds or the emergence of India as a modern nation.
7. Leela Roy (02.10.1900-11.06.1970)
Leela Roy was born in Goalpara, Assam in October 1900. Her father was a deputy magistrate and sympathised with the Nationalist Movement. She graduated from Bethune College in 1921 and became an assistant secretary to the All Bengal Women’s Suffrage Committee and arranged meetings to demand women’s rights.
She was a radical leftist Indian woman politician and reformer, and a close associate of Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose. She worked for educating girls nd established a girls school in Dhaka.
In 1923, with her friends, she founded the Dipali Sangha and established schools which became centres of political discussion in which noted leaders participated. Later, in 1926, the Chhatri Sangha, an association of women students in Dacca and Kolkata, was founded. She became the editor of a journal, Jayashree.
In 1931, she began publishing Jayasree the first magazine edited, managed, and wholly contributed by women writers. It received the blessings of many eminent personalities including Rabindranath Tagore, who suggested its name.
8. Malati Choudhury (26.07.1904– 15.03.1998)
Malati Choudhury was born in 1904 to a distinguished family in the then East Bengal, now Bangladesh. In the year 1921, at the age of 16, Malati Choudhury was sent to Santiniketan where she got admitted to Viswa-Bharati.
During the Salt Satyagraha, Malati Choudhury, accompanied by her husband joined the Indian National Congress and participated in the movement. They educated and communicated with the people to create a favorable environment for Satyagraha.
9. Purnima Banerjee (1911-1951)
Purnima Banerjee was the secretary of the Indian National Congress committee in Allahabad, Uttar Pradesh. She was one of a radical network of women from Uttar Pradesh who stood at the forefront of the freedom movement in the late 1930s and ’40s.
She was arrested for her participation in the Satyagraha and Quit India Movement. One of the more striking aspects of Purnima Banerjee’s speeches in the Constituent Assembly was her steadfast commitment to a socialist ideology. As secretary for the city committee, she was responsible for engaging and organising trade unions, Kisan meetings and work towards greater rural engagement.
Purnima Banerji, was one of those women who became a member of the Uttar Pradesh Legislative Assembly in 1946. She was a part of the Constituent Assembly from 1946 to 1950, who played an important part in drafting our constitution.
She represented the United Provinces in the assembly. She wished to add a new paragraph in Clause 16:
‘All religious education given in educational institutions receiving Statewide will be in the nature of the elementary philosophy of comparative religions calculated to broaden the pupils’ mind rather than such as will foster sectarian exclusiveness.‘
Purnima Banerji believed that ultimate sovereignty lies with people. She also wanted to drop the word “sovereign” from the Preamble. She believed that just by giving the public the right to vote in every 5 years, it’s not appropriate to use the word sovereign. When we compare today’s politicians treating the public as vote banks and later forgetting all their promises after getting elected, we can see the relevance of her concerns. At the same time, she truly believed that it is the common masses who vest power in the positions elected.
10, Rajkumari Amrit Kaur (2.02.1887 – 6.02.1964)
Amrit Kaur was born on February 2, 1889, in Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh. She was India’s first Health Minister and she held that post for ten years. She did her educated at the Sherborne School for Girls in Dorset, England, but gave it all up to become Mahatma Gandhi’s secretary for 16 years.
She was the founder of the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) and argued for its autonomy. She was a firm believer in women’s education, their participation in sports and their healthcare.
Following India's independence from the colonial rule in August 1947, Kaur was elected from the United Provinces to the Indian Constituent Assembly, the government body that was assigned to design the Constitution of India. She was also a member of Sub-Committee on Fundamental Rights and Sub-Committee on Minorities. As a member of the Constituent Assembly, she supported a proposal for a Uniform Civil Code in India. She also advocated for universal franchise, opposed affirmative action for women, and debated the language concerning the protection of religious rights.
As the health minister, Kaur played an instrumental role in establishment of the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) in New Delhi, and became its first president. Kaur introduced a bill in the Lok Sabha for the establishment of AIIMS in 1956,
Kaur was also instrumental in founding the Indian Council of Child Welfare. Kaur served as the Chairperson of the Indian Red Cross society for fourteen years.
Rajkumari Amrit Kaur played a key role in the development of College of Nursing, New Delhi (established in 1946), Government of India renamed the college as Rajkumari Amrit Kaur College of Nursing in her honor.
From 1957 until her death in 1964, she remained a member of Rajya Sabha. Between 1958 and 1963 Kaur was the president of the All-India Motor Transport Congress in Delhi.
11. Renuka Ray (04.01.1904–1997)
Renuka Ray lived in London to complete her BA from the London School of Economics. She submitted a document titled Legal Disabilities of Women in India; A Plea for a Commission of Enquiry’ in the year 1934, as legal secretary of the AIWC.
From 1943 to 1946 she was a member of the Central Legislative Assembly, then of the Constituent Assembly and the Provisional Parliament. In 195257, she served on the West Bengal Legislative Assembly as Minister for Relief and Rehabilitation. In 1957 and again in 1962, she was a member of Malda of the Lok Sabha.
She was also President of the AIWC in 1952, served on the Planning Commission and on the Governing Body of Visva Bharati University in Shanti Niketan. She served as a Minister for Relief and Rehabilitation. She established the All Bengal Women’ Union and the Women’s Coordinating Council. Her memoir is titled My Reminiscences (1982).
On returning to India, she joined All India Women’s Conference and worked hard to champion women's rights and inheritance rights in parental property. In 1932 she became President of All India Women’s Conference. She was also its President for the years 1953-54.
In 1943 she was nominated to Central Legislative Assembly as a representative of women of India. She was also a member of Constituent Assembly of India in 1946-47.
She was appointed as Minister of Relief & Rehabilitation, West Bengal in the years 1952-57. She was also Lok Sabha member for the years 1957-1967 from Malda Lok Sabha constituency. In year 1959 she headed a committee on Social Welfare and Welfare of Backward Classes, which is popularly known as Renuka Ray Committee.
She is author of the book My Reminiscences: Social Development During the Gandhian Era and After.
12. Sarojini Naidu (13.02.1879 – 02.03.1949)
Sarojini Naidu, also known as the Nightingale of India in her poetic surroundings, was born on February 13, 1879, in Hyderabad, India. She was the first Indian woman to become the president of the Indian National Congress in 1825 and the first woman to be appointed as an Indian state governor. Naidu was appointed the governor of the United Provinces (present-day Uttar Pradesh), making her India's first woman governor. She remained in office until her death in March 1949 (aged 70).
Naidu's birthday, 13 February, is celebrated as Women's Day to recognise powerful voices of women in India's history.
Naidu was a founding member of the All India Women's Conference.
Naidu formed close ties with Gandhi, Gopal Krishna Gokhale, Rabindranath Tagore and Sarala Devi Chaudhurani. After 1917, she joined Gandhi's satyagraha movement of nonviolent resistance against British rule.
When Gandhi was arrested on 6 April 1930, he appointed Naidu as the new leader of the campaign Salt March.
13. Sucheta Kriplani (25.06,1908 – 1.121974)
Sucheta Kriplani was born in 1908 in present-day Haryana’s Ambala town. She is especially remembered for her role in the Quit India Movement of 1942.
She came to the forefront during the Quit India Movement and was arrested by British. She later worked closely with Mahatma Gandhi during the Partition riots.
She was one of the few women who were elected to the Constituent Assembly of India. She was elected as the first woman CM of state of Uttar Pradesh from the Kanpur constituency and was part of the subcommittee that drafted the Indian Constitution. She became a part of the subcommittee that laid down the charter for the constitution of India. On 14 August 1947, she sang Vande Mataram in the Independence Session of the Constituent Assembly a few minutes before Nehru delivered his famous "Tryst with Destiny" speech. She was also the founder of the All India Mahilla Congress, established in 1940.
Kripalani also established the women’s wing of the Congress party in 1940. Post-independence, Kripalani’s political stint included serving as an MP from New Delhi and then also as the Minister of Labour, Community Development and Industry in Uttar Pradesh’s state government.
When Congress split in 1969, she left the party with Morarji Desai faction to form NCO. She lost 1971 election as NCO candidate from Faizabad
14. Vijalakshami Pandit (18.08.1900 – 1.12.1990)
Vijaya Lakshmi Pandit was born in Allahabad on August 18, 1900, and she was the sister of India’s first Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru. She was imprisoned by the British on three different occasions, in 1932-1933, 1940, and 1942-1943.
Her political career began with her election to the Allahabad Municipal Board. In 1936, she was elected to the Assembly of the United Provinces, and in 1937 became minister of local self-government and public health the first Indian woman ever to become a cabinet minister.
She was the first Indian woman to hold a cabinet post in pre-independent India. In 1936, she stood in general elections and became member of parliament by 1937 for constituency of Cawnpore Bilhaur. In 1937,
Following the death of her husband in 1944, she experienced Indian inheritance laws for Hindu widows and campaigned with All India Women's Conference to bring changes to these laws.
In 1946, she was elected to the Constituent Assembly from the United Provinces.
Following India's freedom from British occupation in 1947 she entered the diplomatic service and became India's ambassador to the Soviet Union from 1947 to 1949, the United States and Mexico from 1949 to 1951, Ireland from 1955 to 1961 (during which time she was also the Indian High Commissioner to the United Kingdom), and Spain from 1956 to 1961. Between 1946 and 1968, she headed the Indian delegation to the United Nations. In 1953, she became the first woman President of the United Nations General Assembly
She served as Governor of Maharashtra from 1962 to 1964. She returned as a member of parliament for 1964 to 1968 with her election victory in Phulpur.
15. Annie Mascarene (6.061902 – 19.071963)
Annie Mascarene was born into a Latin Catholic family of Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala. She was the first woman to be part of the Travancore State Congress Working Committee. She was one of the leaders of the movements for independence and integration with the Indian nation in the Travancore State.
In February 1938, when the political party Travancore State Congress was formed, she became one of the first women to join.
In 1942, Mascarene joined the Quit India Movement and two years later was elected as secretary of the Travancore State Congress.
In 1946, Mascarene became one of the 15 women who were elected to the 299-member Constituent Assembly of India, tasked with drafting the Constitution of India. She served on the Assembly's select committee that looked into the Hindu Code Bill. When the Indian Independence Act 1947 was passed by the British Parliament, the Constitutional Assembly became, on 15 August, the parliament of the Dominion of India. In 1948 she was reelected to the Travancore-Cochin Legislative Assembly and served until 1952. In 1949, she became the first woman post-independence to serve as a Minister in the state, when she was appointed Minister in Charge of Health and Power in the Parur T K Narayana Pillai Ministry.
Mascarene was elected to the First Lok Sabha as an independent candidate from the Thiruvananthapuram Lok Sabha constituency in the 1951 Indian general election. She was the first woman MP from Kerala and one of only 10 elected to Parliament in those elections.