Has anything changed for Indian Women in the last 100 years?
Edited by Lopa Patel, 8th March 2011

As we celebrate the centenary of International Women's Day on Tuesday 8th March 2011, my thoughts turned to the women in my own family. For many years, the woman I knew as "ba" (grandmother) was not my grandmother at all but a great aunt who single-handedly brought up my father and his four sisters. As I had met my grandmother only once, I asked my cousin Dr Arun Patel to share with me his memories. He said, "Unfortunately Gangaba's story is sad tale of an Indian widow who slaved all her life for the in-laws for three generations and yet was left to die at her elderly brothers' home. My account is based on what I saw and heard from 1950 when at age 10 I went to live in Bhadran (Gujarat), India".

Gangaba: A symbol of self sacrifice and endless compassion
By Dr Arun Patel

Ganga (the 'ba' is a suffix that means grandmother) was born in Nadiad, Gujarat in a middle income Desai family. She was named after India's holy river, the Ganga (the Ganges). At the age of eleven she married Dahyabhai Zaverbhai Patel (Dhulabhai's elder brother) and came to live in Bhadran, Gujarat. Soon after the marriage Dahyabhai migrated to Africa to pursue better job prospects leaving Gangaba with his mother Hariba. Dahyabhai's family practiced Jainism so Gangaba adopted the practice of that religion. In Africa Dahyabhai was soon struck down by "black water fever" (malaria) and died. This ended Gangba's short married life.

As was the custom at the time, Gangaba entered a life of widowhood and started wearing dark maroon dress (not black - as the picture is black and white, it appears black) and no accessories. She also shaved her head (presumably, this was standard practice for Jain widows as Hariba always shaved her head too). Most of the time, the shaving was performed by a family barber's wife, but often the shaving was performed by plucking each hair individually and rubbing ash onto the head to prevent pain and infection.

A farmer in her own right

When Dhulabhai, the younger brother married Diwaliba and took her with him to Kenya, Africa, Gangaba, who had a house in Laxmikui, Bhadran, moved to live with Hariba and continued to take care of her. Gangaba also looked after the family farm and managed the farming by hiring help and managing the yearly produce. Her own house came in handy to store farm produce during the harvesting season (my recollection is of how this house was stuffed with layers and layers of tobacco leaves - the cash crop that Dhulabhai introduced - which were left there to mature until ready to be sold at a good cash price). The grains were stored in a huge clay pot in the house that they lived in. I had to get in with a ladder to clean the house every year before the grains were due to arrive from the farm - perhaps explaining why we regularly caught mice there!

Both Gangaba and Hariba got up early in the morning and milled, using the two round-stone grinder (Ghhanti), their own flour for rotla, a dry roasted thick chapatti-like bread, for the daily needs. They had two Indian water buffalos and their lives revolved around looking after the buffalos, making fresh butter from the milk and lassi (chhaash) which they would share with neighbours. There were six houses in the immediate neighbourhood and they had very good relationship with the neighbours.

A simple, but hard life

On rare occasions Gangaba would visit her brother Chimanbhai and his wife Bakula at Mahemdawad, Gujarat. Once Hariba lost her eye sight due to cataracts, Gangaba was not able to go anywhere as she could not leave her mother-in-law to anyone else's care. They ate fresh produce from their farm, bartered grains for fresh vegetables from the vendors who visited the streets with seasonal vegetables and used their own milk and butter (maakhann). Their diet was simple and mostly roasted. Oil and sugar were only used during festivals and Diwali time. Rice was only cooked when there was a man (Dhulabhai or one of the uncles visiting from Africa) in the house or the children demanded different food. The only cash they needed or used was for donations (religious and weddings) and buying sugar (sugarcane or molasses - Ghor). They also got their own farm sesame seeds milled in a neighbouring donkey-led milling pan to extract oil for cooking. Their additional groceries (spices and condiments) were purchased from a trader who kept a yearly account which was settled with the farm produce during the harvesting season.

Gangaba accepted her inferior status

Gangaba was a very gentle and loving lady, who had accepted her inferior status due to widowhood. She was grateful for whatever life brought her. She loved children who made her forget her sorrows and made her laugh. She looked after all the household chores for years. She derived strength from practicing Jainism. She would perform daily morning and evening prayers with Hariba. Very often the evening prayers were performed in the nearby Jain Ashram, where a few visiting monks (wearing white face masks, white dress and carrying a cotton swiping broom stick) would reside for a period and gave daily lessons to devotees. Both male and female monks frequented the Ashram as there was a good following of Jainism in Bhadran. Monks depended on the food donations from devotees as alms and Gangaba and Hariba were known for their generosity in the Jain circle.

Both Hariba and Gangaba would wear "mumati" - a white face mask - when conducting prayers, reciting "Namo Arihantanam" and other prayers. They would observe regular fasting on holy days as per the Indian calendar - Var-Tahevar. Occasionally these fasts would go on for four to five weeks with the total absence of eating. When they observed fasting called "posho" (this is not same as Muslim roja where they eat after the sunset), they would not even drink water. These were difficult fasts as they had to perform a lot of prayers throughout the day and wear "mumati" all the time to protect the insects that might die coming into their breathing.

Once a year for whole month they would not eat any greens as green was associated with life and they did not want to kill life to satisfy their hunger. Food grown under the ground like potatoes, onions and ginger were not eaten as that would kill the insects and other little lives that depended on them. They boiled and cooled drinking water to make it tasteless so that they did not entertain taste senses. They ate their dinners before the sunset so that they did not eat germs or insects by mistake when it was dark. Also they did not want to use much energy after the dark (candle light or kerosene lamps).

Gangaba becomes a 'mother' to five children

In Kenya, Diwaliba gave birth to five children. However, she was in poor health and continued to suffer from bouts of asthma. Due to her ill health, her children were brought to stay in India at Bhadran and Gangaba became their mother. She loved the children as her own. She did this duty selflessly knowing very well that one day these children would be on their way to their own lives and that none would look after her in her old age. Diwaliba and Dhulabhai would visit India from time to time. The children would ask Gangaba for a little cash to buy sweets; they would force Gangaba to cook potatoes and rice as they were fed up with "rotla" and milk every day. From time to time they would also demand fried food. With love and a bit of guilt of looking after someone else's children ("paaraki thaapne") she would yield to their pressure. My mother (Kantaben, standing in the middle in the picture above) remembers demanding from Gangaba good things saying "my dad is sending money, why don't you spend for us?" Little did she realise that Dhulabhai was sending money to save for his daughters' marriages. The money he sent was used to buy gold that was safely stored in a locker in a local co-operative bank. As the children grew older and married they too migrated to Kenya, Africa.

But Gangaba's peaceful and religious life got disturbed further when Dhulabhai retired from Kenya and returned to live in Bhadran in 1948. Diwaliba's health was poor and she could hardly do any of the house work, hence the burden of an increased work load fell on Gangaba. Soon Diwaliba was struck down with breast cancer and became very ill, again Gangaba was there to look after her. Dhulabhai (who was not religious) had become accustomed to a lavish Kenyan lifestyle needing regular laundry, a variety of cooking styles and entertaining of guests and that added more work around the house. Though, at the insistence of Hariba, Dhulabhai gave up drinking alcohol, he continued to smoke tobacco heavily and ended up having his legs amputated after complications with diabetes. No servants were hired to cater for this increased work load, Gangaba had to manage by herself. Then came Dhulabhai's other daughter, Chandrabala, who returned from Kenya with a very demanding lifestyle of her own.

Gangaba as a "slave"

The "slavery" of Gangaba continued well into the third generation when Arun (Dhulabhai's daughter, Kantaben's son) was sent to live in Bhadran at the same time as Chandrabala and her three children. Chandrabala regularly returned to Bhadran to take a break from her married life and responsibilities at her in-laws. Each visit added torture to Gangaba as she demanded that Gangaba took care of her and her children, while she was staying at her maternal home. Though the third generation children were fond of Gangaba they could do little to change the minds of their parents who had taken to demanding Gangaba to do things for them as "their right".

Whenever I helped Gangaba with household chores, Gangaba would close the doors lest anyone saw this and scolded her for getting work done by a "boy" of the family. The irony is that when she was stuck down by stroke and became paralysed, she was ultimately looked after by her brother Chimanbhai and his family. None of the others were around or visited her during last years of her life as nearly all had emigrated to overseas. Her prophesy had come true.

It is great privilege to write about Gangaba. I feel sad as I write about this great lady - a symbol of self-sacrifice and endless compassion - who has shaped me into who I am and given me the ideals of respecting and valuing feminism. (Dr Arun Patel).

Gangaba died in 1986. Of Dhulabhai's five children, only Kanta (the mother of Arun, pictured above) is still alive, aged 82. She lives in London. The family farm and home in Bhadran, Gujarat, have since been sold as the third generation family is scattered across the globe in Kenya, UK & USA. Dr Arun Patel lives in England with his second wife and daughter.

So has anything changed for Indian women in the last 100 years? Clearly much has changed, yet, it is with some irony that the one who is remembered the most - by our extended family - is the one who had the least given to her in life. Perhaps that's the real lesson to be learnt?