LEAD KINDLY LIGHT

When women lead the way, the others following them at a later part of their lives become all the more passionate to light up the paths of others.

The two words, ‘women empowerment’ has been a major topic of discussion probably even before we knew how important they could be in the larger context of the term.

Having said this, did we even know that the poet, the politician, Sarojini Naidu travelled extensively between 1915-1918 all across the country to counsel women and empower them in more ways than one? And this is where I have the second strong connection with this lady of my admiration, the first being poetry.

Speaking about poetry, I especially remember having read Coromandel Fishers back in school and it kind of stayed in one corner of my ‘favourite memories’ chamber.

The Coromandel Fishers

Rise, brothers, rise; the wakening skies pray to the morning light, 
The wind lies asleep in the arms of the dawn like a child that has cried all night. 
Come, let us gather our nets from the shore and set our catamarans free, 
To capture the leaping wealth of the tide, for we are the kings of the sea! 

No longer delay, let us hasten away in the track of the sea gull's call, 
The sea is our mother, the cloud is our brother, the waves are our comrades all. 
What though we toss at the fall of the sun where the hand of the sea-god drives? 
He who holds the storm by the hair, will hide in his breast our lives. 

Sweet is the shade of the cocoanut glade, and the scent of the mango grove, 
And sweet are the sands at the full o' the moon with the sound of the voices we love; 
But sweeter, O brothers, the kiss of the spray and the dance of the wild foam's glee; 
Row, brothers, row to the edge of the verge, where the low sky mates with the sea.

After visualising this poem, one is wont to fall in love with the words she weaved to portray the sea and its surroundings. When I recited this poem recently at a Rotary meeting, I could feel the collective emotion within the group of people who were listening in rapt silence to my recitation.

Sarojini Naidu, the eldest amongst eight siblings, was born Sarojini Chattopadhyay, in a home which wrapped her in art and culture and extensive discussions on the freedom of the country. Her father wanted her to be a doctor but she preferred to be a poet. But she was no less an emotional doctor for many women across the country, whom she met, spent time with, counselled, advised and most importantly, empowered them to latch onto their dreams. It could have been a dream like starting a small-scale industry at home or a dream to serve the country or a dream to get enrolled in school. Patriotic to the core, Sarojini Naidu met these women and told them that no dream was small. Every dream is big. Every dream is one step to make the country a better place. And if the women take responsibility for the country, then definitely that country will shine in the map of the world.

A woman patriot, politician, orator and administrator, of all the famous women of India, Sarojini Naidu's name is at the top. Not only that, but she was truly one of the jewels of the world. Being one of the most famous perosnalities of the 20th century, her birthday is celebrated as "Women's Day".  She was an Indian Independence activist and was jailed in 1942 for taking part in the Quit India Movement. She served as the first governor of the United Provinces of Agra and Oudh from 1947 to 1949 and the first woman to become the governor of an Indian state. She was the second woman to become the president of the Indian National Congress in 1925 and the first Indian woman to do so.

Sarojini Naidu after becoming the President of the Congress party went onto preside over the annual session of the Indian National Congress at Cawnpore (now Kanpur) in 1925. In 1929, she presided over the East African Indian Congress in South Africa. In 1930, during the Salt Satyagraha, she was one of the women protesters at the Dharsana salt works, Gujarat. In 1931, she participated in the Round table conference with Gandhiji and Madan Mohan Malaviya.

A woman empowered to the core, Sarojini Naidu didn’t need a man to give her the space to become the person who she rose to be. She carved her own niche, standing forth in all her grace and charm to be a beacon, a light, an idealistic leader whom millions of others like me can emulate and follow.

As we celebrate the life of Sarojini Naidu on her birth anniversary on the 13^th of February, I personally would like to dedicate a poem on this occasion:

TO MY COUNTRY

The purple sunset

Cloaked, in her dark stead;

Then wolves –

Are they not but, the

Follies of men?

To bring hyenas and

Bats!.......Racing

Towards the mortal?

Who is he (here)

That laughs – without

A tear in the eye

“I” she whispers –

But she’s mottled – the

Jarring sound of chains

Blotting the song on her lips

She’s now banished

From her loved one – but

She was the one – for

Whom, the war was fought!

T’was a bloody battle

Ages old,

Reminiscence of heroes

In tombs?

Why? We are

But gullible

Flocking the street

Mocking the democrat

Wounding –

The dead, the sick,

Why?

Are we thus so weak?....

Unable to pluck

The thorns from her feet

A shrouded figure

Now creeps

With bloodshot eyes….

Spreading the plague

Thrashing the old

And bleeding the young;

In disguise?

A mother weeps

In the hearth

Consoling her child

Just born.

I AM ANGELICA

My name is Angelica, though this is not my real name. It’s a name given to me by the man who I love very passionately and who loves me more than I do him.

I was born in a small hospital in a small town run by a dedicated Anglo-Indian doctor, or so my mother said. Mother said it was a cold January night of pain and angst when she delivered me and she could see patches of blood splayed all over the doctor’s white coat, even though the lights were dim and she was almost passing out, while he deftly tried to wriggle me out of her. The doctor and the nurses assisting him kept telling her that everything was fine when actually it was not. Mother didn’t deliver me normally. No, you shouldn’t think it was a Caesarean but it was a breech delivery. A Wikipedia definition of a breech delivery means the birth of a baby, in which the baby exits the pelvis with the buttocks or feet first as opposed to the normal head-first presentation. This process presents some hazards to the baby during the process of birth.

Mother thought she wouldn’t live to see me but she fought a war raging in her head; a war of voices telling her that if millions of women have become mothers, why not her too? And she survived. Father was elated the next morning when he saw me, cuddling me close to his heart when his turn came.

All this is just besides the point of what I want to say.

I love the colour red. I have always loved it. Red has attracted me like no other colour. It’s beautiful. I can almost always touch the beauty of red as it radiates energy, love, elation, passion and so much more. It is life itself. A radiance, a shine I find in no other colour. I love the fact that red is the colour at the end of the spectrum opposite to violet, next to orange.

But my loving the colour red was always looked at dispassionately by mother, who never ever stitched me the red pinafore I wanted to wear. When I asked her what was her justification for not letting me wear red, when every other friend from class has been wearing something or the other in red, she promptly told me that it was ‘too bright’ and ‘not good’ for me.

However, at 16 she stitched me a red blouse with a flouncy chiffon skirt. I was elated.

My affinity for red grew as I grew older, though this time around, I didn’t feel the happiness I attached the colour with when I was small.

I had never seen the colour of blood. Is it black, blue, pink or yellow? I wish I knew. The other day someone told me, “Don’t be silly! Don’t you know the colour of blood? It is red?” But is it? I always associated red with life. Red means love. Red was the colour of the sun in my painting which I especially did for Dad when I was four years. Red was the colour of my ribbons I wore in my hair to school. Red is the colour of the gown I have been dreaming to wear for that dance with my beau. Red is the bindi I wear on my forehead.

But ofcourse, red is the colour of life. Red is the colour which courses through everyone’s veins. Red is the colour of my glass bangles. Red is the rose blooming in my neighbour’s garden.

But recently, I have been seeing too much red. A red which I didn’t like at all!

Since when has red started pouring from the throat of a Shia as a Sunni slits it open? Is it the same colour which was splayed all across the floors and walls of the school where terrorists wearing suicide jackets gunned down more than a 150 students in Peshawar? What was the fault of all those innocent people in Mumbai who were randomly and recklessly gunned down with AK-47s by terrorists in 2008 where more than a 170 lay in pools of red? What was the fault of my people who died in red all across the state of Assam in 2008, planned by the very same people who call themselves Assamese? Did Damini know she would be defiled in red when she was raped in a moving bus in Delhi?

And this is not the end of the story of red. It continues everyday between friends, families, neighbours across the world inside their very homes.

Boko Haram, ISIS, Taliban, terror groups working closer home and all your comrades around the World, if you’re listening, I want to tell you that I love the colour red. It is the most beautiful colour ever. But I like it on my forehead, on the dresses of beautiful girls, on my shoes, on the cheeks of little children, on flowers and cherries. I definitely don’t like it on a gaping wound of a helpless child, on the mutilated body of a young girl and on anyone who is at your mercy.

My name will always be Angelica and I will always love the colour red!