SAROJINI NAIDU

 

SAROJINI NAIDU

Sarojini Naidu (13 February 1879 – 2 March 1949) was an Indian political activist and poet who served as the first Governor of United Provinces, after India's independence. She played an important role in the Indian independence movement against the British Raj. She was the first Indian woman to be president of the Indian National Congress and appointed governor of a state.

Born in a Bengali family in Hyderabad, Naidu was educated in Madras, London and Cambridge. Following her time in Britain, where she worked as a suffragist, she was drawn to the Congress party's struggle for India's independence. She became a part of the national movement and became a follower of Mahatma Gandhi and his idea of swaraj (self rule). She was appointed Congress president in 1925 and, when India achieved its independence, became Governor of the United Provinces in 1947.

Naidu's literary work as a poet earned her the nickname the "Nightingale of India" by Gandhi because of the colour, imagery and lyrical quality of her poetry. Her œuvre includes both children's poems and others written on more serious themes including patriotism and tragedy. Published in 1912, "In the Bazaars of Hyderabad" remains one of her most popular poems.

Personal life:

Sarojini Naidu was born in Hyderabad on 13 February 1879 to Aghorenath Chattopadhyay.^[2] Her father was from Brahmangaon, Bikrampur, Dhaka, Bengal (now in Bangladesh).^[3] Her father was a Bengali Hindu and the principal of Nizam College. He held a doctorate of Science from Edinburgh University. Her mother wrote poetry in Bengali.

She was the eldest of the eight siblings. Her brother Virendranath Chattopadhyay was a revolutionary, and another brother Harindranath was a poet, a dramatist, and an actor. Their family was well-regarded in Hyderabad.

Education:

Sarojini Naidu passed her matriculation examination to qualify for university study, earning the highest rank, in 1891, when she was twelve. From 1895 to 1898 she studied in England, at King's College, London and then Girton College, Cambridge, with a scholarship from the Nizam of Hyderabad. In England, she met artists from the Aesthetic and Decadent movements.

Marriage:

Chattopadhyay returned to Hyderabad in 1898. That same year, she married Govindaraju Naidu, a physician whom she met during her stay in England, in an inter-caste marriage which has been called "groundbreaking and scandalous". Both their families approved their marriage, which was long and harmonious. They had five children. Their daughter Padmaja also joined the Quit India Movement, and she held several governmental positions in independent India.

Political career:

Early oratory:

Beginning in 1904, Naidu became an increasingly popular orator, promoting Indian independence and women's rights, especially women's education. Her oratory often framed arguments following the five-part rhetorical structures of Nyaya reasoning. She addressed the Indian National Congress and the Indian Social Conference in Calcutta in 1906. Her social work for flood relief earned her the Kaisar-i-Hind Medal in 1911, which she later returned in protest over the April 1919 Jallianwala Bagh massacre.^{[citation needed]} She met Muthulakshmi Reddy in 1909, and in 1914 she met Mahatma Gandhi, whom she credited with inspiring a new commitment to political action.  She was the first woman President of the Indian National Congress and first Indian woman to preside over the INC conference .  As a public speaker, Naidu's oratory was known for its personality and its incorporation of her poetry.

Women's movement:

Naidu utilized her poetry and oratory skills to promote women's rights alongside the nationalist movement. In 1902, Naidu entered the world of politics after being urged by Gopal Krishna Gokhale, an important leader of the nationalist movement Nonviolent resistance:

The British jailed Naidu again in 1942 for her participation in the Quit India Movement. She was imprisoned for 21 months.

Governor of United Provinces:

Following India's independence from the British rule in 1947, 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).

Writing career:

Naidu began writing at the age of 12. Her play, Maher Muneer, written in Persian, impressed the Nizam of Kingdom of Hyderabad.

Naidu's poetry was written in English and usually took the form of lyric poetry in the tradition of British Romanticism, which she was sometimes challenged to reconcile with her Indian nationalist politics.^[5] She was known for her vivid use of rich sensory images in her writing, and for her lush depictions of India. She was well-regarded as a poet, considered the "Indian Yeats".

Her first book of poems was published in London in 1905, titled "The Golden Threshold". The publication was suggested by Edmund Gosse, and bore an introduction by Arthur Symons. It also included a sketch of Naidu as a teenager, in a ruffled white dress, drawn by John Butler Yeats. Her second and most strongly nationalist book of poems, The Bird of Time, was published in 1912. It was published in both London and New York, and includes "In the Bazaars of Hyderabad".  The last book of new poems published in her lifetime, The Broken Wing (1917). It includes the poem "The Gift of India", which exhorted the Indian people to remember the sacrifices of the Indian Army during World War I, which she had previously recited to the Hyderabad Ladies' War Relief Association in 1915. It also includes "Awake!", dedicated to Muhammad Ali Jinnah, which she read as the conclusion to a 1915 speech to the Indian National Congress to urge unified Indian action. A collection of all her published poems was printed in New York in 1928.  After her death, Naidu's unpublished poems were collected in The Feather of the Dawn (1961), edited by her daughter Padmaja Naidu.

Naidu's speeches were first collected and published in January 1918 as The Speeches and Writings of Sarojini Naidu, a popular publication which led to an expanded reprint in 1919 and again in 1925.

Works:

·        1905: The Golden Threshold, London: William Heineman

·        1915: The Bird of Time: Songs of Life, Death & the Spring, London: William Heineman and New York: John Lane Company.

·        1917: The Broken Wing: Songs of Love, Death and Destiny

·        1919: "The Song of the Palanquin Bearers", lyrics by Naidu and music by Martin Shaw, London: Curwen

·        1920: The Speeches and Writings of Sarojini Naidu, Madras: G.A. Natesan & Co.

·        1922: Editor, Muhammad Ali Jinnah, An Ambassador of Unity: His Speeches & Writings 1912–1917, with a biographical "Pen Portrait" of Jinnah by Naidu, Madras: Ganesh & Co.

·        1928: The Sceptred Flute: Songs of India, New York: Dodd, Mead, & Co.

·        1961: The Feather of the Dawn, edited by Padmaja Naidu, Bombay: Asia Publishing House

Death:

Naidu died of cardiac arrest at 3:30 p.m. (IST) on 2 March 1949 at the Government House in Lucknow. Upon her return from New Delhi on 15 February, she was advised to rest by her doctors, and all official engagements were canceled. Her health deteriorated substantially and bloodletting was performed on the night of 1 March after she complained of severe [headache]. She collapsed following a fit of cough. Naidu was said to have asked the nurse attending to her to sing to her at about 10:40 p.m. (IST) which put her to sleep. She subsequently died, and her last rites were performed at the Gomati River.

Legacy:

Naidu is known as "one of India's feminist luminaries". Naidu's birthday, 13 February, is celebrated as Women's Day to recognise powerful voices of women in India's history.

Composer Helen Searles Westbrook (1889–1967) set Naidu's text to music in her song "Invincible."

As a poet, Naidu was known as the "Nightingale of India". Edmund Gosse called her "the most accomplished living poet in India" in 1919.

Naidu is memorialized in the Golden Threshold, an off-campus annex of University of Hyderabad named for her first collection of poetry. Golden Threshold now houses the Sarojini Naidu School of Arts & Communication in the University of Hyderabad.

In 2014, Google India commemorated Naidu's 135th birth anniversary with a Google Doodle.

Works about Naidu:

The first biography of Naidu, Sarojini Naidu: a Biography by Padmini Sengupta, was published in 1966. A biography for children, Sarojini Naidu: The Nightingale and The Freedom Fighter, was published by Hachette in 2014.

In 1975, the Government of India Films Division produced a twenty-minute documentary about Naidu's life, "Sarojini Naidu – The Nightingale of India", directed by Bhagwan Das Garga.

In 2020, a biopic was announced, titled Sarojini, to be directed by Akash Nayak and Dhiraj Mishra, and starring Dipika Chikhlia as Naidu.

Palanquin Bearers

 

Lightly, O lightly we bear her along,
 She sways like a flower in the wind of our song;
 She skims like a bird on the foam of a stream,
 She floats like a laugh from the lips of a dream.
 Gaily, O gaily we glide and we sing,
 We bear her along like a pearl on a string.

 Softly, O softly we bear her along,
 She hangs like a star in the dew of our song;
 She springs like a beam on the brow of the tide,
 She falls like a tear from the eyes of a bride.
 Lightly, O lightly we glide and we sing,
 We bear her along like a pearl on a string.

 

Analysis : This poem employs imagery of nature to convey the gentle and graceful movement of a palanquin carried by bearers. The bearers describe their task as light and effortless, comparing the occupant to a flower swaying in the wind, a bird skimming the water, or a laugh floating from a dream.

The poem's rhythm and rhyme scheme contribute to its lilting and melodious tone. The repetition of the refrain "Lightly, O lightly we bear her along" and "We bear her along like a pearl on a string" reinforces the idea of the bearers' collective and harmonious effort.

Stylistically, the poem reflects the influence of Romanticism, with its emphasis on nature, emotion, and the imagination. Compared to other works by Sarojini Naidu, this poem exhibits a lighter and more playful tone, focusing on the beauty and joy of the moment rather than on themes of social injustice or national identity.