Anandibai Joshee

Retrieving a Fragmented Feminist Image

Meera Kosambi Anandibai Joshee was the first Maharashtrian woman to leave Indian shores in the latter half of the 19th century for higher studies abroad to becOme the first Indian woman to qualify as a medical doctor. The Maharashtrian psyche remains captivated by the image of Anandibai as a submissive and obedient girl-wife who fulfilled her husband's visionary ambition for her. However, the series of images sketched by Anandibai's own words produce a self-portrait in which the submissive wife coexists with an intelligent woman dispassionately perceptive of herself and her society. This essay attempts to reach the 'real' Anandibai and reclaim her fragmented feminism.
WOMEN'S voices from the past, sometimes and support, was a personal commitment cogent and sometimes hesitant in articulating aimed at serving her fellow women, which the feminine experience and the feminist she defended publicly and sustained through protest, make it possible for us to contest perseverance against heavy odds. Hidden by the received history of the late 19th century these foregrounded events was her less Maharashtra. This history has consistently publicised personal life, itself a continuous represented the reformist men as the sole struggle on many fronts, which ended crusaders against gender injustice in orthodox abruptly a little short of her 22 birthdays.3 Hindu society, successful in wresting If Anandibai captured, the popular emancipatory privileges for the benefit of imagination during her lifetime (and even women, posited as passive, mute objects a hundred years after her death), it was as who participated neither in the protest nor a young woman at the very threshold of life, in the struggle. The discrepancy between the who ventured into the unknown beyond the available evidence and the conclusion which seas at the behest of her loved and revered disregards it is a matter of the hitherto largely reformer husband; who mastered the uncharted politics of gender reform [Kosambi demanding vocation of a physician in order 1995b]. As part of the same politics, the to heal her suffering and neglected sisters; feminist voices themselves have been and who died prematurely in her.prime, effectively stilled and obscured by official sacrificed at the altar of these reformist history as well as mainstream society, through aspirations - thereby lending herself all too a variety of strategies - by simply ignoring easily to the roleof a tragi-romantic heroine. their existence, as in the case of Tarabai Thus the Maharashtrian psyche remains Shinde's booklet on women and men,' and captivated by the image of Anandibai Joshee Rakhmabai's published letters on child as a submissive and obedient girl-wife who marriage and enforced widowhood;2 or by fulfilled her husband's visionary ambition totally marginalising extraordinary women for her and who died even as she attained and their contribution, as in the case of the glorious destiny he had outlined for her. Pandita Ramabai;5 or by co-opting a partial However, the series of images sketched feminist into the pantheon of traditional by Anandibai's own words jigsaw into a female role models, as in the case of self-portrait - a somewhat fragmentary, Anandibai Joshee. Explored here is this last sometimes contradictory, but always a case - an exemplar of the subversive process distinct, identifiable and cohesive selfwhich transmuted an intelligent and portrait - in which the submissive, obedient independent woman and a potential threat wife coexists with an intelligent young to convention into a popular incarnation of woman who is dispassionately perceptive of a traditional husband-worshipping wife, herself and her society, independent in her shorn of her individual achievements. reasoning about contemporary genderreform Anandibai Joshee's life (1865-1887) was issues, fearless in articulating the obstacles the stuff that legends are made of. The child to women's education in India, and firmly of an orthodox brahmin family, she was the anchored to an Indian cultural and first - and at the age of 18, also the youngest nationalistic identity. Through this - Maharashtrian woman to leave the Indian fragmentary selfrportrait made up of a shores in 1883 for higher studies abroad.4 multiplicity of images, we try to reach the She was also the first Indian woman to 'real'Anandibai and reclaim her fragmented qualify as a medical doctor, having received feminism. an American medical degree in 1886, before This essay aims to contribute to the completing 21 years, during an era which rewarding exercise of reconstructing forbade even simple vernacular literacy to women's 'doubly refracted' history,6 and women. Her choice of a medical career, situates Anandibai within the emergent though made partly with her husband's help feminismin 19thcentury Maharashtra.7 After sketching the contours of Anandibai's life, the essay analyses the internal tensions and fragmentation in her views on a variety of gender issues, contextualises her within the contemporary feminist thought, and assesses the impact of her public stance on the women' s cause in Maharashtra." It concludes by contrasting Anandibai's 'retrieved' image with her popular image, and underscores the need to free real-life women from a fictionalised portraiture, as an essential part of the feminist agenda.

I A Life-Sketch
The initially conventional parameters of the life of Anandibai Joshee, nee Yamuna Joshi, gave little indication of her future trials, tribulations and triumphs.9 Born on March 30, 1865 in an impoverished aristocratic Brahmin family of Kalyan near Bombay, Yamuna was one of the four children who survived out of the total of nine born to Ganpatrao Joshi and his second wife Gangabai. The proverbial unwanted daughter suffered an attack of smallpox in childhood which left faint marks on her face, doing little to improve her plain wheatcomplexioned looks. However, thanks to the unusual pampering by her maternal grandmother who stayed with the family, Yamuna grew up sturdy and even earned the nickname of 'wrestler' after defeating a somewhat older male cousin in a friendly fight. Prompted by vaguely progressive ideas which penetrated through the family's otherwise orthodox lifestyle, Ganpatrao enrolled Yamuna in the school held in a part of the family mansion, where she picked up rudimentary literacy, though preferring to play truant and spend her time in games with the neighbourhood girls. The indulgent father boasted about Yamuna's ability to read, to his much shocked visitors who shared the mainstream society's opposition to women's education. At the same time, in a reversal of the usual parental roles, Yamuna's mother treated her

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with a harshness which far exceeded the conventional maternal discipline through the accepted methods of verbal and physical chastisement. Yamuna recalled i n later years:

result of early sexual intercourse and early pregnancy, was frequently discussed during the Age of Consent controversy of the late 1880s [Kosambi 1991], but seems not to have been identified in Anandibai's case. My mother never spoke to me affectionately. Gopalrao's avowed reformist aim of When she punished me, she used not just a small rope or thong, but always stones, educating his wife" seemed sure of fulfilment sticks and live charcoal. Fortunately, my through his bright and receptive child-wife's body does not bear any scars, and her severe rapid progress in Marathi, and rudimentary beatings did not leave me maimed, crippled Sanskrit and English. He ensured freedom or deformed. By the grace of God, my limbs from her family's possible interference and survived intact! But oh! the sheer agony quietude for studies, through a transfer to of those memories! 1 don't say this as a result Alibag on the Konkan coast. But he alienated of the emotional distancing which follows the conventional small town by not only the passage of childhood. Truly, she never educating his wife at home, thereby understood the duties of a mother, nor did transgressing the rules of sex-segregation in I experience the love which a child naturally 12 feels for its mother. This memory hurts me daytime domestic activities, but also taking her for evening walks - behaviour hardly a great deal. A child which harbours fear for its parents cannot possibly feel affection tolerated even in large cities. Tired of this social isolation and even for them, and a child which feels love for its parents does not fear them. Unfortunate harassment, and attracted by better indeed is the child which has missed a educational opportunities for his wife, happy childhood. Because I understand Gopalrao obtained further transfers, first to the problem, I feel sure that 1 also possess Bombay and then to Kolhapur. However, the solution. If I ever have a child, I will Anandibai' s attendance at the highly regarded teach people by my own example how missionary schools at both the places children should be brought up [Kanitkar remained problematic in the face of social 1912:12-13*]."' pressure, and lack of special encouragement That little Yamuna looked old for her age expected from the missionaries for this was a source of acute anxiety to her parents venture. Gopalrao.'s vicarious personal who subscribed to the contemporary norm ambition, coupled with his acquaintance with of mandatory pre-pubertal marriage for girls. American missionaries, ignited the radical The desperate Ganpatrao, additionally plan of taking Anandibai to America for handicapped by his inability to afford a higher studies. He appealed for help to the dowry, was greatly relieved at his family Rev Wilder of Princeton, New Jersey, in priest's discovery of Gopalrao Joshee as a September 1878, projecting himself as a potential match. Gopalrao, a 27-year old progressive brahmin struggling against caste widower, was postmaster at the nearby town persecution to educate his wife, and of Thane where he lived alone while his enlightened enough to value the message of parental family lived at Nashik. Known to Christ. The covering letter by Goheen of the be an eccentric, with reformist ideas (which American Mission in Kolhapur sketched an he aspired unsuccessfully to implement by enthusiastic scenario of the converted marrying a widow), he finally agreed to Brahmin couple as valuable propagators of marry Yamuna alter extracting an unwilling Christianity. The far less sanguine Wilder promise that he be allowed to educate her merely advised Gopalrao to stay on in India after marriage. Hasty preparations were made and confess Christ immediately. Severely for the wedding, when Gopalrao gave the disappointed, Gopalrao sought yet another Joshis their first taste of his eccentricity by transfer, this time to Bhuj in the Gujarat not appearing for the event. Frantic region of the Bombay Presidency. An entirely unexpected global connection negotiations were undertaken afresh, and the wedding was finally consecrated a few developed at this juncture. In the spring of 1880, B F Carpenter of Roselle, New Jersey, days later, on March 31, 1874. The customary change of personal name came across this correspondence published turned Yamuna Ganpatrao Joshi into earlierin the Missionary Review of Princeton; Anandibai Gopalrao Joshee. A couple of and, overcoming her initial hesitation, wrote years later, the immediate post-pubertal to offer Anandibai her whole hearted support. consummation of marriage was performed The letter heralded a regular and copious with all ceremony demanded by orthodox correspondence leading to an unusual custom, obviously without protest from the bonding between the 15-year old Anandibai 'progressive' Gopalrao. Anandibai's and the American lady old enough to be her experience of motherhood at the age of 12, mother, whom she viewed in the light of an rendered additionally painful by the loss of affectionate aunt. In a letter dated January herinfant son, was followed by an impercepti- 20, 1881, Anandibai wrote: ble but steady decline in her health and her I already wish and feel that I should call you inability to bear more children. Such longmy aunt. There is a saying among us, "it does lasting physiological damage, as a typical not matter much if a mother dies, but let not

an aunt die". This expression will show you in what respect and estimation a maternal aunt is held among us. If you allow me, I wish to look upon you as such. Carpenter's prompt consent cemented the surrogate blood relationship.13 With the American avenue blocked, Gopalrao's ambitions for his wife turned towards making her the first Maharashtrian woman to take up paid government employment; and in April 1881 he obtained a transfer to the Bengal Presidency which offered women jobs in the postal department. .Life in Calcutta came as a culture shock to the Joshees. Though in the vanguard of social reform, theBengali society was strictly sex-segregated, with "'zenana' too rigidly observed", as Anandibai commented to Carpenterin June 1881. Duringtheir evening walks, the couple were rudely stared at and laughed at by both Indians and Europeans, and even harassed by a policeman once,, so unusual was the sight. As further aggravation, the climate affected the health of both, and Anandibai took to her bed for several days. The crowning misery came when Gopalrao lost an important dispatch from the Viceroy to the Governor of Bengal, for which he was arrested and even temporarily suspended from his duties.14 However, life finally resumed some normalcy, a rudimentary socialnetwork was established (to include mainly the few Maharashtrian brahmins inCalcutta), and contact was made with the Brahmo Samaj, and also the Theosophical Society of which both became members. The socio-cultural link with Maharashtra was nurtured throughout this time and during Gopalrao's subsequent transfer to Barrackpore and then to Serampore in 1882. Marathi newspapers were read regularly, and in April 1882, the Kesari of Pune published Anandibai's letter and verses mourning the untimely death of the well known nationalistic but anti-reform writer Vishnushastri Chiplunkar [cited in Kanitkar 1912:326-27]. It was also during this stay at Serampore that Anandibai made an offer of hospitality to the prematurely widowed PanditaRamabai, then living in Bengal [Dall 1888:vi-vii]. In the meanwhile, plans for Anandibai's future had crystallised: she was to enrol at an American medical college with Carpenter's help. In fact, she was to sail to America alone, with suitable female company, and Gopalrao, prevented by financial constraints from accompanying her, was to join her later. The wildfire news whipped up a storm of protest which Anandibai decided to still through a wellreceived and well-publicised public address at the Serampore College in February 1883, on the subject of "My future visit in America and public inquiries regarding it."

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Finally, on April 7, 1883, the 18-year old Anandibai sailed from Calcutta under the nominal escort of American missionary women, and finally met her American aunt. After spending the summer with her at, Roselle, Anandibai joined the Women's Medical College of Pennsylvania (currently the co-educational Medical College of Pennsylvania) at Philadelphia in October 1883. The Dean, Rachel Bodley, warmly welcomed the lonely young Indian woman both to the College and to her home for the next three years during which Anandibai completed the full course of studies. However, illness continued to dog Anandibai even here. The combined effect of the cold climate, the burning of anthracite coal in the heaters, and the rigours of the demanding medical studies took a heavy toll, and Anandibai graduated from the College already a victim of consumption. On March 11, 1886 Anandibai, now almost 21-year old, received her medical degree amidst an ovation at a splendid ceremony at which Pandita Ramabai was a guest of honour.15 Also present at the graduation ceremony was Gopalrao who had resigned his job in 1884 and travelled cheaply to the US (via Burma, Siam and China), working his way as a labourer. Immediately on arrival at San Francisco, he acquired dubious publicity through anti-American speeches which he continued to give at all the stops on his way to Roselle, while Anandibai hid her embarrassment as diplomatically as her friends - who had extended financial help to both - hid their resentment. Compelled by failing health to abandon her initial plan of spending another year in the US to gain experience of medical practice, Anandibai accepted the fortunate offer of a newly created post for a lady doctor in the princely state of Kolhapur in the Bombay Presidency. Gopalrao reluctantly gave up his plan to travel further within the US and also to visit England, and accompanied his wife to India on October 8, 1886, reaching Bombay five weeks later. The Joshees were warmly welcomed by the people and the press in Maharashtra as much for Anandibai' s success in education as for her conformance to conventional dress and diet, and for Gopalrao's nobility in sending his wife abroad for medical education. However, it soon became apparent that Anandibai' s rapidly deteriorating health responded to the treatment of neither western doctors nor Indian Ayurvedic vaidyas consulted at Bombay and at Pune where she was shifted in December 1886. On February 29,1887, Anandibai breathed her last in a house of her mother's relatives - the same house where she was born less than 22 years earlier. She was cremated at Pune, but her ashes were sent to Carpenter and are buried in her family lot in the

Poughkeepsie Rural Cemetery, New York. of the distorted way of presenting women, The black stone grave marker bearing the to aquestioningofthe (patriarchal) tradition, inscription: "Dr Anandabai Joshee, MD, to the final reaching out to other women in 1865-1887, First Brahmin Woman to Leave search of sisterhood [Lernerl 992: xxi-xxii]; India to Obtain an Education"16 keeps her and also in the "feminist perspective" which memory alive in an alien iand which became is an attempt "to describe women's her home for the three fateful years which oppression, to explain its causes and changed her life as it did the subsequent consequences, and to prescribe strategies for women's liberation" [Tong 1992:1]. social history of Maharashtra. The feminism which erupted spasAfter Anandibai's death, Gopalrao did not remarry, and spent the rest of his life mostly modically on the social scene of Maharashtra at Nashik and Pune, occasionally gaining in the early 1880s manifested most of these notoriety for his well-publicised activities. crucial elements, while stopping short of the The first of these, with the greatest nuisance notion of forming a sisterhood or engaging value, was the tea party he helped to organise in collective action (except for Pandita at the Panch Houd Mission at Pune in October Ramabai's Arya Mahila Samaj set up in 1882 as a definite attempt in this direction). 1890, to which about 40 prominent citizens (including BG Tilak and MG Ranade) were This was hardly surprising, given the severe invited. Although only some of the guests constraints on women's gatherings, except drank tea served by Christians, Gopalrao for religious and family festivities. Nor did had the entire list published in a newspaper, the isolated feminist voices which were raised with a demand that they be required to from time to time form a discourse, in spite perform the requisite expiation or be of personal networks and an exchange of excommunicated for having lost caste letters among some of them."1 What is (Mahratta,Ju\y 5,1891:4). The case dragged significant, however, is the fact that the on for over a year and caused a great deal women's protests were qualitatively different of harassment, without serving its ostensible from the contemporary male reformist purpose of exposing the reformers' discourse (conducted within a partially liberal hypocrisy. The second incident was a but firmly patriarchal framework), and marriage of two donkeys perfomed in questioned many aspects of the patriarchal December 1890, supposedly as a comment value system and the social institutions which on child marriages performed by so-called it undergirded. reformers. The third incident involved One of the earliest challenges came from Gopalrao's conversion to Christianity at the Tarabai Shinde in her militant Marathi end of June 1891, though he retained his booklet Stree-Puruslia Tulana published in sacred thread and the mark on his forehead, early 1882, attacking the male double contending that "although he has accepted standards of morality, and the male prejudices Christ as his Saviour, he does not cease to against and abuse of women. In June 1882 be a Hindu" (Mahratta, July 5, 1891:3); was published Pandita Ramabai's Marathi after about a month, he returned formally Stree-Dharma Neeti - an exhortation to to the Hindu fold. In 1892 he made a short women (from a male reformer's perspecti ve) and unsuccessful trip to England as a trader to cultivate self-reliance, and obtain in Indian handicrafts, and published a Marathi education and skills in household duties and travel description, with a rather unbalanced child care - whose generally anti-feminist commentary. In September 1912, he died at tone was punctuated by brief but strongly Nashik, penniless, without family or friends worded protests against male hypocrisy and [Vaidya 1985]. His sporadic notoriety androcentric Hindu scriptures [Kosambi notwithstanding, he left no permanent mark 1995a]. It was during her highly publicised on the social scene of Maharashtra, and testimony before the Hunter Commission on remains best-known as Anandibai's Education in September 1882 at Pune that husband.17 Ramabai made a spirited stand for women's education, including medical education, and for the need to appoint female teachers and II inspectresses for girls' schools because of A Fragmented Feminism the male jealousy and tendency to obstruct Through wide-ranging temporal and cross- women's education [Kosambi 1995a]. In cultural shifts, three elements seem to emerge 1885 appeared Rakhmabai's letters to The as pivotal to the myriad connotations of Times of India under the pen-name of 'A feminism: the belief that women qua women Hindu Lady', in which she attacked the are subordinated to and oppressed by men, custom of child marriage for exposing the the ideal of gender equality, and action (either girl-bride to emotional harassment and private or public) towards the achievement physical violence, while simultaneously of this ideal [Kramarae and Treichler depriving her of education and the chance 1989:158-61]. The same themes surface in of personality development; and alsodetailed the "feminist consciousness" which is said the variety of oppression experienced by to haveevol ved historically from a perception widows in different age-groups; ending with

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reformist recommendations [cited in Varde 1991:190-208]. Theextent of Anandibai's familiarity with any of these writings remains unknown. Although away in Bengal and later in America throughout these years, she did keep in touch with the socio-cultural developments in Maharashtra through Indian newspapers which reported and commented on many of these events and related debates. It must be remembered, however, that Pandita Ramabai's The High-Caste Hindu Woman, almost an Indian feminist manifesto, published in the US in 1887, post-dated Anandibai's death by a few months. This chronology assumes significance here because many of Anandibai' s comments cited below date from 1880-81 when she was 1516 years old - younger than Rakhmabai who was 19 at the time of writing her 'Hindu Lady' letters, and then Pandita Ramabai who was 24 when she made her meteoric appearance in Maharashtra in 1882. That Anandibai was at all able to arrive independently at her views on what would now be called feminist issues, at that relatively young age and in the absence of an ongoing feminist discourse, is remarkable. Heryoung age could be considered a significant factor in explaining the occasional hesitation apparent in her views, although she lived in an era when emotional maturity came early, as did family responsibilities, and when a 15-year old girl was regarded as a grown woman, often a mother (as Anandibai herself would have been). Further, there is no indication of a noticeable change in her views as she grew older and was exposed to a substantially different culture. The problems of presenting a fair and just interpretation of Anandibai's positions are obvious: the paucity of material and the resultant danger of reading too much into a chance remark; the inevitably heavy reliance on private correspondence not intended for the public gaze19 - not even for the biographer's unwillingly inquisitive gaze - and therefore not formulated as wellreasoned statements, although she obviously put a lot of thought into her various discussions with Carpenter; and the long interval between successive segments of a discussion (as a letter took about five weeks to reach, even an immediate reply involved a delay of ten weeks). Equally importantly, Anandibai was struggling to express complex ideas in a foreign language which she was still in the process of mastering, and doing so in a way which would give a stranger a fair picture of unfamiliar and much criticised Indian customs. The broad gender-related foci of Anandibai's privately expressed views and public statements were: women' s subordinate position in marriage, family, and society; the custom of child marriage; the neglect of

women's health; the need for training women doctors to treat women patients; and the obstacles to women's general education as well as professional medical education. These views are conspicuously moulded by her strong nationalism and loyalty to the Hindu culture. Her universalised personal experience of asymmetrical gender relations within the typical Hindu marriage were unequivocally expressed in the 37-year old Anandibai's letter (dated about 1884) from America to her 37-year old husband: It is not at all my intention to distress your dear heart or to cause a rift in our love by raking up old memories... It is very difficult to decide whether your treatment of me was good or bad. If you ask me, I would answer that it was both. It seems to have been right in view of its ultimate goal; but, in all fairness, one is. compelled to admit that it was wrong, considering its possible effects on a child's mind. Hitting me with broken pieces of wood at the tender age of ten, flinging chairs and books at me and threatening to leave me when I was 12, and inflicting other strange punishments on me when I was 14 - all these were too severe for the age, body, and mind at each respective stage. In childhood the mind is immature and the body undeveloped. And you know how I acted on these occasions. If I had left you at that immature age, as you kept on suggesting, what would have happened? I would have been lost. (And any number of girls have left their homes because of harassment from mothers-inlaw and husbands.) I did not do so because I was afraid that my ill-considered behaviour would tarnish my father's honour... And I requested you not to spare me, but to kill me. In our society, for centuries there has been no legal restraint between husbands and wives; and if it exists, it works against women! Such being the case, I had no recourse but to allow you to hit me with chairs and bear it with equanimity. A Hindu woman has no right to utter a word or to advise her husband. On the contrary, she has a right to allow her husband to do what he wishes and to keep quiet. Every Hindu husband can, with advantage, learn patience from his wife. (I do understand that without you I would never have become what I am now, and I am eternally grateful to you; but you cannot deny that I was always calm.) I was born to endure all that. But I am quite content now [Kanitkar 1912:188-89*]. This clear indictment of Gopalrao' s verbal and physical (and perhaps also sexual) violence and autocratic behaviour as well as her admission of her own helplessness as a Hindu wife, are framed within the sociolegal norms which sanctioned both. Here the paradox surfaces again. The extract also underscores the fact that Gopalrao's one mitigating 'virtue', that of providing his

wife with basic education and with the opportunity to go abroad for higher studies, was so rare at the time as to compensate for everything else. As Anandibai wrote to Carpenter from Bhuj on November 15,1880: I do not expect much encouragement from the other members of my family. They are, properly speaking, orthodox to the letter, and cannot be expected to sympathise with me. But as my husband is so much in favour of... [giving women] emancipation, no one dares turn his face against me. Anandibai's views on gender relations and her own awareness of their complexity (and possible contradictions) become clearer in another letter to Carpenter [Bhuj, December 15, 1880]: [W]hen I ponder over the subject of the connection between man and woman, I generally side with the so-called orthodox ideas. So long as woman is not on equal terms with man, it is better for her to be under certain social restrictions, such as "not to marry again", "To be subservient to man", "To look upon her husband as God". These are the enjoinments of our Shastras. On the other hand, when I think over the sufferings to which woman is subjected in all ages and at all times, I grow impatient to see the western light dawn upon us as the harbinger of emancipation and future good. Here I feel my inability to express myself as fully as I think. I am led to believe that man and woman should be self-protecting and that one should not depend upon the other for maintenance and other necessaries of life. Then and only then, all family discords and social humiliation will cease. I am very sorry to see that there are many ladies among Europeans in India who are educated and accomplished for the purpose of marriage. Alas! how mischievous it is for a lady to adorn and change dress every hour in order to allure bachelors (emphasis added). The line of argument here develops from a pragmatism (which appears like antifeminism), to a belief in ultimate gender equality through western influence and individual self-reliance, and further to a nationalistic expose of the obverse side of European society. To begin with, the woman's subservient role as a husbandworshipping wife, being an imperative of the firmly entrenched patriarchy in Hindu society, is best observed through customs which reduce or eliminate her psychological tensions and conflicts. In short, women, handicapped with a lack of options, should consenttotheirown subordination. However, as these customs did entail a heavy cost to women, it was hoped that patriarchy itself would be challenged by the spread of western civilisation, with its liberal value system and institutions, thus emancipating women and relieving their suffering. Ultimately, the relationship of dependence and dominance

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should be done away with altogether; in fact, gender equality would become a distinct possibility if its precondition, self-reliance, was realised. In the meanwhile, it was unfortunate that while Indian women were hankering after the potentially emancipatory gift of western education, European women were frittering it away by short-sightedly preferring to remain within the bondage of marriage. By implication, European society was not as advanced or as superior to Indian society as was claimed. In her above-cited letter of November 15, 1880, Anandibai also makes a somewhat oblique and sarcastic reference to the universal son preference in Indian families: We have no polygamy to speak of... Our people, if they at all take more than one wife, marry for the sake of sons if they do not have any by first or second wife. So you see how fond we are of sons socially and religiously. The Heavens are open to the man who has a son, but not otherwise. Women's social inferiority translated into the general neglect of their needs, regarding which Anandibai says, in one of her earliest letters to Carpenter [Bhuj, July 19, 1880)] We have the same dress for all the seasons. We never put on warm clothes as it is considered indecent, nor do we wear shoes or boots as we seldom go outdoors. In short, all these luxuries are for men, who feel cold, warm and autumn [weather] and not for women who are supposed to be impervious to all these changes of climate. Should we not envy you then? Thecustomof child marriage,increasingly challenged in India and already under attack in the west, drew a somewhat vacillatory response from Anandibai. Basically, it seemed to be a dilemma of societal wisdom which sanctioned the practice, as against lived experience which protested against it - a dilemma further complicated by her unwillingness to condemn an Indian custom to a westerner. In her letter to Carpenter [Bhuj, August 23, 1880], she resolved the dilemma by insisting, first, that all marriage systems - Indian and western - were faulty, and secondly that their alleged role in causing women's health problems was doubtful as even unmarried women had poor health: I, of late, have been ill with something or the other. In higher classes women generally are very weak in India. I ascribe the cause to the custom of early marriage prevailing in all India but as you complain of the same I think there is some wrong in the marriage system. The discussion on the effects of child marriage was long drawn out, and Anandibai was almost aggressive in her insistence that women's health problems arose not from child marriage alone, but from the institution of marriage itself, or from independent

causes which affected even unmarried women. Almost a year later she wrote [Kalyan, March 1881]: Early marriage is no doubt a bane. When we deviate from the laws of nature, we must suffer the consequences. The practice of early marriage is not prevalent in many countries and yet the women there often are weak and ill-constituted as we are. I know of one lady (who was a spinster) who was always complaining of some thing or the other and never appeared in good health. So there are many European ladies in India, old and young, whose faces are pale and gloomy. There is no bloom on their countenances. I do not know the cause. If it is early marriage, as many of us suppose, I shall feel obliged if you will kindly account for the same condition perceptible in all civilised countries20 in which there is no such thing as early marriage. Early marriage will no doubt be one of the causes which lead to this havoc, and destruction of life. I admit - that the condition of Indian women is miserable and deplorable,... [But it would be undesirable] if we try to destroy all the old institutions as pernicious without having some thing better to substitute for them. The European mode of life and delicacy of manners and customs are not... [worthy of appreciation] as they appear on the very face, are expensive and not within the reach of the masses. Anything that cannot be enjoyed by the masses must be bad. I however hope that you will kindly enlighten me on the subject I have so rudely and without regard to logic or reasoning handled above. My defence of our present customs and manners will at least show you how ignorant we are and how prejudiced are our opinions against anything that is now prevalent. You say that Nature has designed us to mate at an early age and therefore infer that we must be earlier married but not before puberty... [B]ut it is neither Nature nor religion to blame for introducing early marriage. There must be something else which I leave it to you to solve. Surprisingly, Carpenter seems to have supported early though not pre-pubertal marriage, and possibly imagined that Hindu child marriages were consummated before puberty. Somewhat abruptly, Anandibai's vacillation ended in her very next letter (Calcutta, April 1881) which made an explicit and radical statement endorsing British legislation for introducing social reform: We have many societies for the prevention of early marriages, but they cannot exercise a powerful influence over the irresistible tendencies of the generality of people. Almost all the rich and influential people are orthodox to the letter, and cannot be prevailed upon to put a stop to heinous customs and manners unless the strong ruling force interferes. The custom of 'suttee' has been forcibly abolished and the early marriage requires

a similarly deadly blow before it can give way. It is only against this background that one can appreciate the nationalistic compulsions in Anandibai's public defence of the custom of child marriage at a meeting of American missionary women in the spring of 1884. Her American friends, unawareof her private misgivings, saw this as an inevitable result of her social conditioning: Dean Bodley, for example, sought to dispel "the feelings of disappointment and regret engendered that April afternoon" by stressing "how absolutely impossible it was for a Highcaste Hindu wife to speak otherwise" [Bodley 1981:ii-iii]. A deep concern for women's health and an urgently felt need for women doctors underpinned Anandibai's career decision, as she eloquently conveyed to Carpenter (Bhuj, November 1, 1880): I am late this time by 15 days to mail this letter. It is on account of my serious illness, which confined me to bed for nearly 3 weeks. This sickness confirms me in my desire to study medicine. Though my sickness was not of a serious nature, yet I was at one time so much affected that I had passed some days and nights without the least relief until we had recourse to professional medical advice and treatment. As a rule we Indian women suffer from innumerable trifling diseases, unnoticed till they grow serious. The internal diseases to which women are naturally liable are never known to anybody except the sufferers. It is thought indecent to let them go to the knowledge of the other sex, much more [so to be] examined by male doctors. You may therefore imagine the mortality among Indian women. If I make no exaggeration, fifty percent die in the prime of their youth of diseases arising partly through ignorance and loathsomeness to communicate of the parties concerned, and partly through carelessness on the part of their guardians or husbands. It is not a calamity if a father loses a daughter or two as he is thereby spared much trouble and embarrassment to which he is exposed by abominable customs and manners (emphasis added). In articulating this particular universalised personal experience of the gynaecological and other health problems of women, Anandibai made no distinction between private and public expression, as seen from her public address at Serampore: I go to America because I wish to study medicine. I now address the ladies present here, who will be the better judges of the importance of medical assistance in India. I never consider this subject without being surprised that none of those societies so laudably established in India for the promotion of sciences and female education have ever thought of sending one of their female members into the most civilised parts

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of the world to procure thorough medical knowledge, in order to open here a college for the instruction of women in medicine. There is probably no country so barbarous as India that would not disclose all her wants and try to stand on her own feet. The want of female physicians in India is keenly felt in every quarter. Ladies both European and Native are naturally averse to expose themselves in cases of emergency to treatment by doctors of the other sex. There are some female doctors in Indiafrom Europe and America, who being foreigners and different in manners, customs and language, have not been of such use to our women as they might. As it is very natural that Hindu ladies who love their own country and people should not feel at home with the natives of other countries, we Indian women absolutely derive no benefit from these foreign ladies. They indeed have the appearance of supplying our need, but the appearance is delusive. In my humble opinion there is a growing need for Hindu lady doctors in India, and 1 volunteer to qualify myself for one [cited in Dall 1888:83-84]. In the early 1880s, before the introduction of the Dufferin scheme,21 medical education was practically impossible for women to obtain in India; where the opportunity existed in theory, it was effectively negated in practice by the male jealousy and hostility towards women's professional education. Even ordinary education was fraught with difficulties because of the vocal social opposition to Hindu women's school attendance, as Anandibai described vividly to her audience at Serampore: I do not mean that there are no means [for a woman to study in India], but the difficulties are many and great. There is one college at Madras, and midwifery classes are opened in all the presidencies; but the education imparted is defective and not sufficient, as the instructors who teach the classes are conservative, and to some extent jealous.22 I do not find fault with them. That is the characteristic of the male sex. We must put up with this inconvenience until we have a class of educated ladies to relieve these men. I am neither a Christian nor a Brahmo. To continue to live as a Hindu and go to school in any part of India is very difficult. A convert who wears an English dress is not so much stared at. Native Christian ladies are free from the opposition or public scandal which Hindu ladies like myself have to meet within and without the zenana. If I go alone by train or in the street some people come near to stare and ask impertinent questions to annoy me. Example is better than precept. Some few years ago, when 1 was in Bombay, I used to go to school. When people saw me going with books in my hands, they had the goodness to put their heads out of the window just to have a look at me. Some stopped their carriages for the purpose. Others walking in the streets stood laughing,

and crying out [derisive remarks] so that I could hear [them]... Passers-by, whenever they saw me going, gathered round me. Some of them made fun and were convulsed with laughter. Others, sitting respectably in their verandahs, made ridiculous remarks and did not feel ashamed to throw pebbles at me. The shopkeepers and vendors spat at the sight of me, and made gestures too indecent to describe. I leave it to you to imagine what was my condition at such a time, and how I could gladly have burst through the crowd to make my home nearer! [cited in Dall 1888:84-86]. This social resistance was aimed not only at the fact of a woman encroaching upon the field of education long treated as a male preserve, but also at her attempting to cross the domestic threshold to enter the public sphere, as Anandibai was quick to point out: Yet the boldness of my Bengali brethren cannot be exceeded, and is still more serious to contemplate than the instances I have given from Bombay. Surely it deserves pity! If I go to take a walk on the strand, Englishmen are not so bold as to look at me. Even the soldiers are never troublesome;buttheBabus lay bare their levity by making fun of everything. "Who are you?" "What caste do you belong to?" "Whence do you come?" "Where do you go?" are, in my opinion, questions that should not be asked by strangers. There are some educated native Christians here in Serampore who are suspicious; they are still wondering whether I am married or a widow; a woman of bad character or excommunicated! Dear audience, does it become my native and Christian brethren to be so uncharitable? Certainly not. I place these unpleasant things before you, that those who have never thought of the difficulties may see that I am not going to America through any whim or caprice [cited in Dall 1888:86-87]. The society which denied women the opportunity to study and practise western medicine presumably excluded them also from the traditional Ayurvedic medicine monopolised by conservative Brahmin men. However, Anandibai's staunch nationalism prompted her to retrieve ancient Hindu knowledge, as she declared to Carpenter (November 15, 1880): The Europeans are under the impression that there is nothing worth knowing in Hindu scriptures and I have therefore taken up Sanscrit to show them how sublime, useful and instructive are the precepts in Hindu Shastras. More specifically, this preoccupation was reflected in Anandibai's medical dissertation submitted for her MD, on 'Obstetrics among the Aryan Hindoos' [Joshee 1886] - a topic which she justified in these words: As the importance of obstetrics can be measured only by the value of life and health,

and both being of paramount consequence, it is deserving of most careful study. When we realise how difficult and vast the subject is, it is not surprising to find so many great minds thoroughly absorbed in its magnitude, from the time immemorial. Since our study naturally embraces, the cause and effect, race habits, climatic influences and means of assisting Nature in her operations, we must not entirely overlook the history of past ages and consider the superior minds, which laboured, with marked success in the same field of investigation, under the promptings of the same motives, as far back as 15 Century B.C. They may enable us to the better appreciation of the science and pay due respect to the discoveries, theories and mode of application of remedies of minds of different nations at different times. I therefore need not apologise for choosing this subject... The dissertation outlined in detail the "good rules laid down by Manu the great aryan legislator, Susruta, and other physiologists", regarding the hygiene of pregnancy, causes of abortion, preparation for lying in, accidents of labour, and, briefly, the diseases of infancy and was concluded with these lines: I have not mentioned those principles, theories and treatment in this paper which are entirely out of practice in India, though there are many valuable things with perhaps as many ridiculous ones in our ancient medical and surgical literature (concerning obstetrics) that are not in practice. I have said too little to do justice to what is taught . and practised among the brahmins but on account of the rarity of valuable time and space I am obliged to say no more. That Anandibai's interest in ayurvedic medicine transcended mere nationalistic pride into genuine belief in its efficacy is indicated by the fact that she was under ayurvedic and not western medical treatment during her last days (provided the choice was hers and not her husband's).2' Had she lived longer, she might even have been able to forge a gradual entry into this orthodox male-dominated science.

Ill Articulations, Actions and Social Repercussions

If Anandibai's conformist image overshadowed everything non-conformist about her, it was for rather complex reasons. Tensions were inherent within the totality of her partially feminist private beliefs, and between these and her largely conventional actions. If she made a progressive feminist statement through her medical studies in America to help ailing women back in India, she also made an emphatically conventional and anti-feminist statement by conforming to the orthodox image of the ideal Hindu wife - which probably originated partly in

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genuine belief, partly in the need to keep her reservations to herself in a society which allowed no space for woman's protest against the patriarchal family institution, and partly in the nationalistic spirit which would not allow her to criticise Indian society to nonIndians. However, given the wide spectrum of her contemporary feminist expression (with various permutations and combinations), these tensions may not necessarily have resulted in a "cognitive dissonance". The fragmentation obvious to us from our very different vantage point may not have been experienced as problematic by her or her contemporaries. In her private letters Anandibai acknowledged the general subordination of Indian women, their oppression within marriage and family, and implicitly also their sexual oppression, as well as the religious and socio-legal endorsement of these. In public, however, she never touched upon these issues and even defended the custom of child marriage. Incidentally, Gopalfao himself, for all his reformistimage, was a staunch supporter of child marriages which, for him, was a matter of national pride. In a letter to the editor of The Index of Boston (April 1,1886), he defended child marriages as "simple and innocent", born out of the Indian "abhorrence of lottery in love", because "late or choice marriages... are made and unmade according to the demands of lust". He insisted that Indians did not want to adopt "this substitute for early and permanent marriage" which was a "cheap commodity from Europe", adding: "Let England and America preserve it as an emblem of independence and liberty". Gopalrao's clinching arguments were that: "Wherever the child marriage does not prevail, there prostitution is carried on on an extensive scale" and that "We have no such divorce system as you have in the United States". Whether Anandibai used any of these arguments during her talk on child marriage remains unknown. It was only on one part of women's subordination, namely the denial of education and health care, that Anandibai's private and public views coincided. At the same time, her very visible deference and obedience to her husband's wishes served to negate her feminist stand, reinforce the conventional ideal of womanhood, and resist all social institutional change. Her respect for convention, especially her insistence on retaining a Maharashtrian brahmanic diet and dress (with the only change that the nine-yard sari was worn in the Gujarati style, as more suitable to the cold climate) underscored the traditional role of women as the chief repositories of culture, and received disproportionate attention. It is possible that her behaviour stemmed more from a mooring to her cultural anchorage

than any intended anti-feminism, but to the contemporary Maharashtrian mind, this achievement seemed as great as her medical degree. The Mahraita welcomed the Joshees to India by emphasising that "the difficulties of Mrs Anandibai were such as no man or woman of ordinary moral and physical strength could have overcome", but that happily she and Gopalrao overcame them all and returned to India "with western culture but without a taint of western vice. Mrs Joshee has preserved her Hindu habits and customs and that too at no small personal inconvenience"; and invited "the orthodox people as well as reformers" to "duly appreciate the worth of. Anandibai's heroic act" (November 21, 1886:4). Anandibai' s public vow to "go to America as a Hindu and return as a Hindu", which she fulfilled in-letter and spirit, was cause for great relief and reassuarance to a society which had just Most' Pandita Ramabai to Christianity in 1883 during her muchopposed visit to England. Predictably this aspect of Anandibai's life received exaggerated publicity, favourably contrasted with Pandita Ramabai. Given the fact that other educated women like Ramabai and Rakhmabai had attacked Hindu social customs and even religion, it was natural for conventional society to seize the opportunity to claim Anandibai as its own, more in spite of than because of her medical degree. After all, presenting Anandibai as a role model had the advantage of pressing home the ideal of the devoted wife without the fear that any other woman would be inspired to emulate her educational achievement - simply because none would be allowed to, either by her husband or her marital family. It is significant that the next woman to become a medical doctor was Rakhmabai who left for England in 1889, a year after she was formally released by her husband from the marriage which she had repudiated, and with full support from her parental family [Kosambi 1995c]. Obviously, not many other women of the educated class would have such freedom. Thus the social repercussions of Anandibai's fragmented feminism were predictably complex and contradictory. Even while her 'submissive wife' image valorised the patriarchal ideal and indicated the limits to women's achievements, this very conformity to convention enabled her to carve out a new emancipatory space for women within this constricting social structure [Kosambi 1994:191. IV Popular Image and Retrieved Image It is ironical, though perhaps not surprising, that Anandibai's original image as an achiever, projected by her feminist biographers Kashibai Kanitkar and Carolyn

Dall, came to be effectively subverted by her popular image created by a male novelist, S J Joshi (1970). Kashibai Kanitkar's biography of Anandibai is unique as the very first biography of a Maharashtrian woman written by a contemporary, herself a woman, and, moreover, in Marathi. In her Preface, Kashibai records her feminist idealistic determination that the biography of such a great woman should be written by a woman, and not by one of the many willing men a determination which ultimately compelled her to undertake the task herself, with an aim spelt out in these words: If this book ignites, in the mind of even a single one of my sisters, a spark of the patriotic fire which forever burnt in Anandibai's great heart, I shall consider myself blessed and the happiest person in the universe [Kanitkar 1912, Preface:4*]. In elucidating Anandibai's greatness, Kashibai identifies the obstacles confronting her and the resultant tensions: Aiming at the general progress of her sisters, Anandibai was able to display several achievements, such as constantly battling with obstacles in her path; working out a compromise between the old and new viewpoints with wisdom, far-sightedness and maturity; pleasing the modern impatient reformers without hurting the old-fashioned people; not adopting a foreign religion even after spending three years in a totally Christian country; cherishing her own cultural practices without offending the foreigners achievements which no man has so far been capable of! What does our country need? The answer is - determined and courageous individuals like Dr Mrs Anandibai [Kanitkar 1912, Prefaced*]. Kashibai's biography, intended to serve the dual purpose of inspiring women to great achievements, and inducing men to support them, is consciously used as a platform for making public statements on the problems of women, invariably accompanied by suggested liberal reformist solutions. Her perception of Anandibai as a role model forms the very basis of the biography, written as a 'modest commemoration' of her extraordinary efforts for national welfare [Kanitkar 1912:322]. This reformist stance stemmed from Kashibai's unstated but obvious empathetic understanding of women's problems, within a shared socio-cultural context. At ihe same time, being situated in a society in transition also created inner tensions and contradictions in Kashibai's ideological position. Her conscious tussle with the power of patriarchy and her occasional submission to it are reflected in an ambivalence (also shared by Anandibai) which result in her projection of Anandibai,

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alternately as an independent agent and a creation of her husband to whom she owed a heavy debt of gratitude. / Predictably, only one part of Anandibai's image, that of a devoted wife who followed her reformer husband's dictates and was propelled into fame as his creation, gained ground during her own lifetime when Gopalrao Joshee was much lionised as a reformer who outpaced others to make his wifeintoarole model for Indian womanhood. Endorsed by an ambivalent Kashibai Kanitkar herself, this image assumed a life of its own as the real Anandibai Joshee half a century later in S J Joshi' s gripping Marathi novel Anandi Gopal (1968,1970). The novel weaves an imaginary world around an authentic and very selective biographical core taken from Kashibai (creating a misleading impression of it being genuinely historical source material), and has enjoyed immense popularity, together with its stage adaptation. But, for all its appeal and occasional insights into a bygone age, it remains a work of fiction - which becomes problematic mainly for its subversive androcentric projection of a passive nonfeminist image of Anandibai. The same holds true of its abridged English translation Anandi Gopal (1992). Ironically, S J Joshi also claims empathy with the Joshees, born out of a shared middle class Brahmin culture and life-style of preWorld War II Pune, which according to him had remained unchanged for a hundred years [Joshi 1970: Preface]. Joshi imposes this cultural ethos, built around the mainstream Brahmin society's strongly patriarchal values, preferences and frustrations, on the narrative of the Joshees' lives, but is unable to grasp the socio-political transitions of the late 19th century, or the distance travelled by the Joshees (especially Anandibai) from the shared brahmanical culture. In fact, the novel's protagonist is not really Anandibai who is portrayed as a tragic and almost defeated figure rather than a courageous one facing life's challenges, but Gopalrao who is portrayed as a frustrated visionary whose mischievous eccentricities (some of which the author has located before Anandibai's death as a matter of artistic licence) are presented as justifiable or even heroic. In fact, the novel reaches its climax with Anandibai's realisation and admission, on her death-bed, that Gopalrao is far ahead of their society which is incapable of understanding his true worth. Thus an 'empathetic' subjective interpretation, unfounded on facts, distorts an intelligent, self-sufficient, independent, young Anandibai - outspoken about the need for women's education and health care, staunchly nationalistic but open-minded about matters of religion, and possessing a quiet sense of humour - into a pathetic

puppet living in constant dread of her husband's fiery temper and venomous tongue. As one perceptive critic of the novel has pointed out, Gopalrao's undoubted courage in sending Anandibai alone to America need not be accorded inflated importance, nor is there any justification for his blatantly publicity-hungry behaviour or his jealousy of his wife's achievements which made him constantly upstage and humiliate her through verbal attacks on her and everything associated with her success - the American society, women's education, and finally even western medicine [Dhond 1994J. In misrepresenting Gopalrao, S J Joshi has also misrepresented Anandibai whose sadly short but eventful life has been reduced to a melodrama, whose agency has been buried under her alleged submissiveness, and whose innovative coping mechanisms [Kosambi 1992] have been completely obscured. Unfortunately it is this image which has captured the Maharashtrian psyche. Arguably then, Anandibai's real tragedy is to live on through a false popular image as an intelligent but dependent and obedient wife of an allegedly visionary husband rather than as an independent agent with a will of her own - a popular image which has successfully eclipsed heremergent feminism, however fragmented and contradictory.

Notes
[This article is based on the material collected during the last few years towards a forthcoming book on Anandibai Joshee. I would like to acknowledge my gratitude to the following individuals: William Cobb of Ridgewood, New Jersey, US, the great-grandson of B F Carpenter, for giving me a copy of a near-complete set of Anandibai's letters from India to Carpenter in the US; Arvind Tikekar, former librarian of the Jawaharlal Nehru Library of Bombay University, for making available a copy of Anandibai Joshee's medical dissertation; and Aroon Tikekar, editor of the Loksatta, for sharing a copy of Dall (1888) before I had access to it in the New York Public Library. It should be clarified that the wide variation seen in Anandibai's style of writing has arisen because some of her letters are available in the original, some (along with the manuscript of her speech) are available in Dall's edited version, and some have been translated by me from the Marathi originals (or translations) in Kanitkar (1912).] 1 Tarabai Shinde's booklet Stree-Purusha Tulana (1882) was resurrected by G S Malshe in 1975. 2 Rakhmabai's court case was first discussed by Y D Phadke in an article in 1977, and further details together with her letters

(published under the pseudonym 'A Hindu Lady' in The Times of India in 1884) were publicised in Mohini's Varde's biography of her (1982). For a further discussion of Rakhmabai's court case and the controversy surrounding it, see Kosambi (1995c). 3 The only writings of Pandita Ramabai currently available are The High-Caste Hindu Woman (1887) reprinted in 1981 by the government of Maharashtra, and ,4 Testimony periodically reprinted by the Ramabai Mukti Mission at Kedgaon (10th ed, 1977). For a discussion of Ramabai's contribution and marginalisation, see Kosambi (1988, 1992, 1995a). 4 Anandibai sailed on April 7, 1883 from Calcutta for New York via London, under the nominal escort of European missionary ladies, but alone for all practical purposes. A few days later, on April 20,1883, Pandita Ramabai sailed for London from Bombay with her baby daughter and a woman companion. 5 Short lives are often seen as a biographical handicap: "It may be romantic to die young, but poets aside, it's not much of abiographical proposition" [Roe 1992:5]. Anandibai's short life had complex effects: while the biographical material is rich enough to overcome the handicap, her early death (with the obvious and oft-drawn comparison with Keats) served to romaticise and popularise her, for better and for worse. 6 Gerda Lerner (1992:xix) discusses the existing documentation of women's history as "refracted doubly -through the lens of men's records and observations; through the application to it of male values". 7 This has been partly done in Kosambi (1995a), while discussing Pandita Ramabai's evolution towards feminism. 8 Anandibai's views and their effect on Maharashtra have been partly examined in Kosambi (1994), in comparison with those of Rakhmabai and Pandita Ramabai. However, new material has since come to light, in the form of Anandibai's letters mentioned above. 9 These biographical details have been collected largely from Kaniikar(l912)and supplemented with Dall (1888). Anandibai's parental family spelt the surname as 'Joshi' and her husband as 'Joshee'; the same spellings are retained here. Maharashtrian names are written starting with the personal name, followed by the father's or husband's name, and lastly by the surname. 10 All quotations marked with an asterisk (*) are my own translations from the Marathi. 11 The few young women who managed to get an education did so at home from their reformer husbands; it was nol considered 'proper' to send girls to school; in any case, girls' schools existed only in large towns and cities. 12 The tutoring of wives was done at night, when the couple could legitimately spend time together. A case in point is Ramabai Ranade's experience of her lessons done in the early hours of the morning, and her

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harassment by the older women in the family for even agreeing to be educated [Ranade 1910]. An excellent and representative statement of the daytime sex-segregation within the house is the remark by Anandibai's contemporary, Yashodabai Joshi: "During the whole day, the menfolk and the womenfolk in our house did not even see each other except at mealtime; then what possibility was there of talking to each other or spending time together?" [Y Joshi 1985:17*]. 13 The urge to convert a close friendship into a surrogate blood relationship was conspicuous in other contemporary cases as well. Pandita Ramabai, for example, called her elderly spiritual preceptress Sister Geraldine 'Ajeebai' (grandmother) [Pandita Ramabai 1977]. 14 This particular experience of the British official attitude to Indians seems to have considerably reinforced Anandibai's antisocial stance which surfaces in some of her letters - a stance which contrasts with an affinity to Americans who were perceived to be free from colonial biases (though not from the bias of racial/cultural superiority to which Anandibai did react sharply in her private letters to India). The same triangular IndoBritish-American relationship also played an important role in Pandita Ramabai's life and career. 15 Bodley had written a special letter of invitation to Pandita Ramabai (then in England) for this occasion, acknowledging that it would greatly benefit Anandibai if Ramabai "gave your sanction to her act and enfolded her and her work in your own future leadership" [Pandita Ramabai 1977:165]. 16 Anandibai's name was sometimes spelt 'Anandabai' by her American friends, including her biographer Dall, though not by the Carpenters, which makes the discrepancy noticeable in this case. The grave marker features as a landmark on the 'walking tour' offered by the Poughkeepsie Rural Cemetery. My first sight of it on a cold and snowy day in December 1995 was almost overwhelming in its symbolism. 17 Gopalrao's only other lasting contribution was the education of his late brother's only child, a daughter named Sat, later married to Wrangler R P Paranjape of Pune. Saibai was the mother of Shakuntalabai Paranjape, famous for her writings and pioneering work in family planning (as an associate of R D Karve, son of D K Karve), and the grandmother of Sai Paranjape, the well-known playwright and film-maker. This is another link across time which brings Anandibai and Gopalrao closer to us. 18 In the early and mid-1880s, Pandita Ramabai corresponded with both Anandibai Joshee and Rakhmabai (who had been the secretary of the Bombay branch of the Arya Mahila Samaj [Varde 1991:132], and possibly also Ramabai Ranande (who, however, was hardly a feminist) and Kashibai Kanitkar with both of whom she was well acquainted. Anandibai Joshee corresponded also with

Ramabai Ranade and possibly Kashibai Kanitkar. 19 Anandibai registered her strong displeasure in a letter to Gopalrao from America (January 9, 1884) about his habit of sharing her letters with acquaintances, and explicitly requested him not to give them for publication as he was planning to do (Kanitkar 1912:224-29). At that time he had already had extracts from her letters published in newspapers (e g, The Theo.wphi.ti, August 1883, October 1883; Kesari, November 6, 1883). 20 Anandibai's frequent usage of terms such as 'civilised countries' for Western countries and 'Natives' for Indians was in conformity with contemporary practice. 21 A landmark in this field, the Dufferin scheme (more accurately 'The National Association for Supplying Female Medical Aid to the Women of India', popularly known after its president, the Countess of Dufferin) was launched in 1885 with the objective of bringing "skilled medical women from Europe and America" to provide medical relief to Indian women; training Indian women as doctors, nurses and midwives; and opening women's hospitals and "female wards". The first Indian beneficiary of this scheme was Anandibai, and the second, Dr Rakhmabai. Before the introduction of this scheme, English girls in India surmounted the difficulty by returning to Europe or going to the US to study medicine. It is interesting to note that among the women who graduated with Anandibai in March 1886 was one Jessica R Carleton from India (The Philadelphia Evening Bulletin, March 11, 1886:6). 22 The clearly feminist reference to the male jealousy of female achievement as a major obstacle for women also occurs in Pandita Ramabai's testimony before the Hunter Commission on Education in 1882. 23 Kashibai Kanitkar claims that Anandibai herself had insisted on Ayurvedic treatment. However, she admits to having generally relied on Gopalrao's testimony even while questioning its veracity. This inconsistency remains a weakness in her otherwise excellent account of Anandibai's life and letters.

Joshi, Yashodabai (1965) (1985): Amelia JeevanPravas, Venus Prakashan, Pune. Kanitkar, Kashibai (1912): Pa Va Sau Dr Anandibai Joshee yanclie Charitra va Patre,

Manoranjan Grantha Prasarak Mandali, Bombay, 2nd ed. Kosambi, Meera(1988): 'Women, Emancipation and Equality: Pandita Ramabai's Contribution to the Women's Cause',
Economic and Political Weekly, Vol XXIII, No 44, October 29, Review of Women Studies, pp WS 38-49). -(1991): 'Girl-BridesandSocio-LegalChange: The Age of Consent Bill (1891)

Controversy', Economic and Political

Weekly, Vol XXVI, Nos 31 and 32, pp 1857-68, August 3-10. - (1992): 'Women's Reality and Reflections: Two Personal Narratives from Nineteenth Century Maharashtra', paper presented at the Seminar on Women's Studies at Shimla, September, mimeographed. - (1994): 'The Meeting of the Twain: The Cultural Confrontation of Three Women in Nineteenth Century Maharashtra', Indian Journal of Gender Studies, Vol 1, No 1, pp 1-22. - (1995a): Pandita Ramabai's Feminist and Christian Conversions. RCWS, SNDT Women's University, Bombay. -(1995b): 'The Politics and Premises of Gender Reform in Nineteenth Century Maharashtra', paper presented at the Seminar on Forms of Social Consciousness in 19th and 20th Century India, at Chandigarh, January, mimeographed. - (1995c): 'Gender Reform and Competing Controls over Women: The Rakhmabai Case

(1884-1888)', Contributions to Indian

Sociology, Vol 29, Nos 1 and 2, pp 265-90. Kramarae, Chens and Treichler A Paula (1989): A Feminist Dictionary Pandora, London.

Lerner, Gerda (ed) (1992): The Female

Experience: An American Documentary, Oxford University Press, New York. Pandita Ramabai (1887) (1981): The High-Caste Hindu Woman, Maharashtra State Board of Literature and Culture, Bombay. - (1977): The Letters and Correspondence of Pandita Ramabai, Maharashtra State Board for Literature and Culture, Bombay. Phadke, Y D (1977): 'Kahani Rakhmabainchi' in Shodh Bal Gopalancha, pp 113-23, Shree Vidya Prakashan, Pune. Ranade, Ramabai (1910): Amchya Ayushyantil Kahi Athavani. Roe, Jill (1992): 'The Appeal of Biography' in Susan Magarey (ed) Writing Lives: Feminist Biography and Autobiography, Australian Feminist Studies Publication, Adelaide. Shinde, Tarabai (1882) (1975): Stree-Purusha Tulanaedited by S G Malshe, Mumbai Marathi Grantha-Sangrahalaya, Bombay. Tong, Rosemarie (1992): Feminist Thought: A Comprehensive Introduction, Routledge, London. Vaidya, Sarojini (1985): 'Trishanku' in Sankraman Shreevidya Prakashan, Pune. Varde, Mohini (1982) (1991): Rakhmabai: Ek Arta, Popular Prakashan, Bombay, 2nd ed.

References
Bodley, Rachel (1887) (1981): 'Introduction' to The High-Caste Hindu Woman by Pandita Ramabai. Dall, Caroline Healey (1888): The Life of Dr Anandibai Joshee, Roberts Brothers, Boston. Dhond, M V (1994): Anandi Gopal in Jalyantil Chandra, Rajahans Prakashan, Pune. Joshee, Anandibai (1880-1883): 'Letters', xerox copy of originals. - (1886): 'Obstetrics among the Aryan Hindoos', photocopy of manuscript. Joshi, S J (1968) (1970): Anandi Gopal, 2nd ed, Majestic Book Stall, Bombay. - (1992): Anandi Gopal, translated and abridged from the Marathi by Asha Damle, Stree, Calcutta.

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