Raja Ram Mohan Roy, Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar, Mahadev Govind Ranade, Dhondo Keshav Karve, fought against the evils existing in the bygone society.

1. The Need for Incorporating Biographies of Social-Reformists
in Present Curriculum for Instilling Gender Awareness
ANJU A.
STUDENT
KEYI SAHIB TRAINING COLLEGE

2. Michael Crichton


3. AIMS AND OBJECTIVES
To bring out the major iconic figures of social reformists
in India.
To understand the major changes brought about by
these reformers.
To apprehend the need for a gender-fair society.
To understand the concept of gender variance and raise
their voice for the mainstreamed suppressed gender.

4. THE ADVENTEROUS BIRTH OF REFORMISTS
Social reformists are a rare boon to every society,
whose life is sacrificed to humanity and mankind,
rather than anything else.
They are people who are considered to change the
existing state of things for the betterment of the
society; they are people with enlightened thought
process; a person who cannot bear the sufferings of the
weaker section of people.

5. CONTRIBUTIONS OF SOCIAL REFORMISTS

6. architect of Indian Renaissance and
father of modern India.
Belonging to a traditional Brahmin
family.
Roy was married off at a very young
age.

7. One of the greatest social reformers of India.
He was concerned about a number of evil customs
prevalent in Indian society.

8. Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar

9. • Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar was another great social reformer who
sought to improve the condition of widows by legalizing widow
remarriages.
• Since he felt that his own life should set an example for others to
follow, he took a pledge that he would allow his daughters to
study, and married all his daughters after they were 16 years of
age.
• He also pledged that if any of his daughters were widowed and
they wanted to get remarried, he would allow them to do so.

10. • He was also against the prevalent custom of polygamy.
• He opened 35 schools for women throughout Bengal and was
successful in enrolling 1300 students.
• He even initiated Nari Siksha Bhandar, a fund to lend support for the
cause.
• He maintained his support to John Elliot Drinkwater Bethune to
establish the first permanent girls’ school in India, the Bethune School,
on May 7, 1849.

11. • He took his arguments to the British Authorities and his
pleas were heard when the Hindu Widows' Remarriage
Act, 1856 or Act XV, 1856, was decreed on July 26, 1856.
He did not just stop there.
• He initiated several matches for child or adolescent
widows within respectable families and even married his
son Narayan Chandra to an adolescent widow in 1870 to
set an example.

12. Justice Mahadev Govind Ranade
 instrumental in laying down the
foundation of an all Indian organization
to carry on the struggle for social
reform—the Indian National Social
Conference.
 first national institution to carry on
collectively, in an organized way, and on
a national scale the social reform
movement.

13. He took up the problems of widow remarriages and was
an active member of a society, which worked for widow
remarriages.
In fact, the Shankaracharya had excommunicated him for
attending the first widow remarriage in 1869.
Ranade worked toward educating women.
He and his wife started a school for girls in 1884.

14. (Dhondo Keshav Karve)
He showed great concern for the plight of
widows and the problem of widow remarriages.
He established the Widow Remarriage
Association and started the Hindu Widow’s
Home. Karve also made efforts to improve the
education levels of girls as well as widows.

15. He created the Kane Women’s University.
Karve became increasingly concerned with illiteracy among
women, and on his retirement from Fergusson College he
started Shreemati Nathibai Damodar Thackersey Women’s
University in 1916.
His efforts in the movement to liberate the Indian women
are of great significance, and the extensive and successful
work brought about a change in the attitudes of people
towards widows.

16. KANDUKURI VEERESALINGAM
• social reformer, writer of Andhra Pradesh.
• Father of renaissance movement in Telugu.
• encouraged women education, remarriage
of widows and fought against dowry system.
• started a school in Dowlaishwaram in 1874.
• started a social organization called
Hitakarini (Benefactor).
• wrote the first prose for women.

17. THE INSTITUTIONS ESTABLISHED DURING THIS PERIOD

18. S.N.D.T. WOMEN’S UNIVERSITY:
 The first Women’s University in India as well as in South-East
Asia.
founded by Maharshi Dr Dhondo Keshav Karve in 1916 for a
noble cause of Women’s Education.
The first five women graduated in 1921 from this University.
This university was established to meet the needs for higher
education for women in such a manner that women’s
requirements were satisfied.
 It provided education in the mother tongue.
It was established exclusively for the education of women.

19. THE HINGNE WOMEN’S EDUCATION
INSTITUTE (MAHARSHI KARVE STREE SHIKSHAN
SAMASTHA)
This institute was started in 1896 to meet the demand of women,
whether married, unmarried or widowed.
 By imparting training to young unmarried girls in various fields, it
tried to prevent early marriages.
 It tried to impart skills and education to married women to
enable them to carry on domestic life efficiently and
economically.
It also gave training to windows to make them economically
independent.

20. THE INDIAN NATIONAL SOCIAL CONFERENCE:
Founded by M.G. Ranade and Raghunath Rao.
Some of the activities taken up by this organization were—to deal
with disabilities of child marriages, the sale of young girls, and the
issue of widow remarriages.
It also took up the problem of access to education for women. The
Conference advocated intercaste marriages and opposed polygamy.
It launched the famous “Pledge Movement” to inspire people to take
an oath to prohibit child marriage.

21. THE GUJARAT VERNACULAR SOCIETY
(GUJARAT VIDHYA SABHA)
established in 1848 by a British administrator, Alexander Kinloch
Forbes with Dalpatram.
The aim of this institute was to decrease the large-scale illiteracy and
superstitious beliefs that were a feature of the Gujarati society.
 It was associated with all social reform activities concerning women
in Gujarat. It published literature on women’s issues in the vernacular
press.
The society worked for the cause of women through education.
It started a number of co-educational schools.
It tried to organize elocution competitions and provide a platform for
women to talk about their issues and problems.

22. The Ramakrishna Mission:
founded by Ramakrishna's chief disciple Swami
Vivekananda on 1 May 1897.
It sets up homes for widows and schools for girls.
 It also gave refuge to invalid and destitute women, ante
and postnatal care for women, and provide training for
women to become midwives.

23. Importance of including these biographies
When we include biographies of social reformists who are mainly male,
students of present generation will also understand that they should also
work for having a gender-fair society, and also when they realize that
then they fought for the rights of then oppressed gender women,
nowadays they need to work for the upliftment of now sidelined gender
not only women, but also minor men, transgender people like LGBT
category.

24. SUGGESTIONS
As part of creating a gender-fair society, the significant episodes
from the life of the social reformists in India should be included
in the syllabus beginning from UP as it is the best time to create
awareness.
Gender awareness should be inculcated right from the lower
classes itself, which will help the students to have a broader idea
of the concept of gender. Total gender equality must be made
one of the major aims of education.

25. Students should be involved in debates and discussions on how
the reformers in India has worked towards equality in pre-
independent and post-independent period and also in the
modern era.
The different movements initiated by these great people and
their struggle and hard work for the realization of women
emancipation should not be forgotten. And each and every
citizen of India who enjoys these rights fought out by the
struggles of many great personalities should learn this with
utmost significance

26. CONCLUSION
Nelson Mandela,
“Education is the most important
weapon which you can use to
change the world”.