Finding Gandhi in Kumudini’s Letters from Lady Sita

Letters from Lady Sita is an epistolary short story by Tamil writer Kumudini. The story, which first
appeared in Ananda Vigadan, a Tamil periodical in 1930s is composed of four short letters that
present a short summary of the Ayodhya Kand of the Ramayana. It’s a portrait of Sita, a newly-wed
bride of Rama, the heir to the kingdom of Ayodhya. Sita throughout the many versions and
adaptations of Ramayana is often portrayed as an embodiment of self-sacrifice, chastity, wifely
devotion, and an overall ideal woman free from the entanglements of the material world. She is
included in the Panchakanya Shloka, a Sanskrit hymn which venerates five mythological women
known for their virtuous-

ahalyā draupadī sītā tārā mandodarī tathā

pañcakanyāḥ smarennityaṃ mahāpātakanāśinīḥ 1

Kumudini successfully humanises the character of Sita by adding the woes of domesticity in her life.
Kumudini’s Sita is not a deified ideal woman, she is a young bride facing all the anxieties that a
newlywed woman has to face in the Indian society. Kumudini’s Sita worries about her clothes, the
latest fashion, and maintaining the status and the decorum of the house of her in-laws and her
parents in the society. She gossips about her father-in-law, complains about domestic chores, and
talks about the intrigues of the women’s chamber. Through Kumudini’s humanised portrayal, we are
allowed to peak into the mind of an imagined Sita and understand her thoughts.

An important aspect of the text is Sita’s woes about changing trends in the world of fashion and her
anxiety to look good and suitable. However, along with these woes, an underlined ethos of the
Swadeshi movement and Khadi is present in the text.

Raganayaki Thatham aka Kumudini and her husband began to follow Mahatma Gandhi’s ideas and
ideals in the early 1920s which is reflected in her works as well as her personal life. This reflection is
also visible in Letters from Lady Sita. The Swadeshi movement popularised and strengthened by
Gandhi espoused the principle of self-reliance by promoting Indian made goods over foreign
products, especially products made in the United Kingdom. This was especially true in the case of
clothes where Gandhi abhorred English cloths preferring the Indian made Khadi over them. He took
a pledge to boycott foreign goods by burning a monstrous pile of English cloths at Elphinstone Mill
Compound, Parel, Mumbai in 1921. English cloth, often inferior in quality stood for subjugation of
the Indian population and culture. Gandhi believed that rejection of English cloth (and other goods)
was the rejection of Western imperialism, which in turn also had material implications as it would
lead to economic independence for the impoverished rural India. He believed that it would also
boost the ideas of national identity and national consciousness. Gandhi was apprehensive about
materialism and promoted a simpler lifestyle instead.

Kumudini, as mentioned earlier was a staunch Gandhian and follower of the Swadeshi principle. She
wore Khadi throughout her life and promoted it as well. Certain incidents in Letters from Lady Sita
reflect the ideological commitments of its author. In her first letter to her mother, Sita talks about
her sister-in-law, Shantha’s sarees imported from various foreign lands. She expresses a desire to
have such sarees made of expensive silk, following the current trends of fashion. However, in her
next letter we find her disillusioned about the foreign goods.
 “After writing to you, I met my sister-in-law Shantha. It seems the blue colour is not fast. Fades
soon.”

Through this quote Kumudini points out the lack of quality of the foreign made goods- a subtle jab at
the English goods in her times. While the incident may seem trivial on the surface, it provides a
deeper insight of the ideological base of the author in just a few simple lines. In the original text
‘yavana’ is used to represent the ‘foreign’2. Ancient Sanskrit texts often used yavana to refer to the
outsiders who came to India including Greeks and various other traders. Over the time the word
flourished and overtook a lot of other meanings. Here Kumudini uses the word to refer to traders,
perhaps a sly remark towards the English traders, who with time turned into rulers.

Throughout the text, except the fourth letter, Sita is shown to be quite anxious about maintaining
the status of her in-laws, her parents, her husband, and her own. This status is strictly based on
material things including her clothes, jewellery, and other similar adornments. Her concern for this
outer reality is her chief focus as she can’t think about anything else but this. However, in the fourth
and last letter we see a change of mind. The fourth letter marks the end of Ayodhya kand where
Rama is exiled for fourteen years. Sita and his brother Lakshmana accompany him. Kumudini’s Sita
finally finds peace with this incident. She asks her mother to send a bark-skin cloth, instead of the
grand clothes that she had been demanding earlier. As she is going to live in a forest, she won’t have
to put up a façade of wealth and can truly be herself. This provides her with much needed peace.

“P.S. There is no need to worry any more about the colour of saris. Peace of mind is now mine. How
helpful it would be if all women were to go to the forest! Half the worries would disappear.”

This ‘P.S.’ constitutes the last section of the story. Here the writer, going back to her ideological
roots, promotes anti-materialism through her celebration of simplicity. Sita’s comment about
women going to the forest can be read as a fictional counterpart to Gandhi’s call to ‘go back to the
village.’

Thus, the short story serves as a vehicle for the Gandhian ideology as followed by the author.

1. अहल्या द्रौपदी सीता तारा मण्डोदरी तथा |

पञ्च कन्या स्मरे न्नित्यं सर्वपातक नाशनम ् ||
2. https://www.manushi-india.org/pdfs_issues/PDF%20Files%20148/Kumudine%20targets
%20final%2022-29.pdf

Reference:

https://www.britannica.com/topic/Sita

https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/opinion/et-commentary/mahatma-gandhi-unlike-keynes-
opposed-an-economic-system-where-materialism-mattered/articleshow/16634924.cms?from=mdr

https://www.manushi-india.org/pdfs_issues/PDF%20Files%20148/Kumudine%20targets%20final
%2022-29.pdf

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2156064/
http://manushi-india.org/pdfs_issues/PDF%20files%20151/Kumudini%20(pg%2018-24).pdf

http://www.telusuna.org/all-articles/letters-seetha.html

https://www.gandhiashramsevagram.org/mind-of-mahatma-gandhi/back-to-the-village.php