Sarojini Naidu (née Chattopadhyay; Bengali pronunciation: [ʃɔrod͡ʒini]; 13 February 1879 – 2 March 1949) was an Indian political activist and poet who served as the first Governor of United Provinces, after India's independence. She played an important role in the Indian independence movement against the British Raj. She was the first Indian woman to be president of the Indian National Congress and appointed governor of a state.
Born in a Bengali family in Hyderabad, Naidu was educated in Madras, London and Cambridge. Following her time in Britain, where she worked as a suffragist, she was drawn to the Congress party's struggle for India's independence. She became a part of the national movement and became a follower of Mahatma Gandhi and the idea of swaraj (self-rule). She was appointed Congress president in 1925 and, when India achieved its independence, became the Governor of the United Provinces in 1947.
Naidu's literary work as a poet earned her the nickname the "Nightingale of India" by Gandhi because of the colour, imagery, and lyrical quality of her poetry. Her oeuvre includes both children's poems and others written on more serious themes including patriotism and tragedy. Published in 1912, "In the Bazaars of Hyderabad" remains one of her most popular poems.
Sarojini Naidu was born in Hyderabad on 13 February 1879 to Aghorenath Chattopadhyay. Her father was from Brahmangaon, Bikrampur, Bengal (now in Munshiganj, Bangladesh). Her father was a Bengali Brahmin and the principal of Nizam College. He held a doctorate of Science from Edinburgh University. Her mother, Barada Sundari Devi, wrote poetry in Bengali.
She was the eldest of the eight siblings. Her brother Virendranath Chattopadhyay was a revolutionary, and another brother Harindranath was a poet, a dramatist, and an actor. Her sisters, Sunalini and Mrinalini, were actresses in silent films. Another sister, Suhasini, was an Indian communist leader. Their family was well-regarded in Hyderabad.
Sarojini Naidu passed her matriculation examination to qualify for university study, earning the highest rank, in 1891, when she was twelve. From 1895 to 1898 she studied in England, at King's College, London and then Girton College, Cambridge, with a scholarship from the Nizam of Hyderabad. In England, she met artists from the Aesthetic and Decadent movements.
Chattopadhyay returned to Hyderabad in 1898. That same year, she married Govindaraju Naidu (who hailed from Machilipatnam, Andhra Pradesh), a doctor whom she met during her stay in England, in an inter-caste marriage which has been called "groundbreaking and scandalous". Both their families approved their marriage, which was long and harmonious. They had five children. Their daughter Padmaja also joined the Quit India Movement, and she held several governmental positions in independent India.
Beginning in 1904, Naidu became an increasingly popular orator, promoting Indian independence and women's rights, especially women's education. Her oratory often framed arguments following the five-part rhetorical structures of Nyaya reasoning. She addressed the Indian National Congress and the Indian Social Conference in Calcutta in 1906. Her social work for flood relief earned her the Kaisar-i-Hind Medal in 1911, which she later returned in protest over the April 1919 Jallianwala Bagh massacre. She met Muthulakshmi Reddy in 1909, and in 1914 she met Mahatma Gandhi, whom she credited with inspiring a new commitment to political action. She was the first Indian woman President of the Indian National Congress and first Indian woman to preside over the INC conference.
With Reddy, she helped established the Women's Indian Association in 1917. Later that year, Naidu accompanied her colleague Annie Besant, who was the president of Home Rule League and Women's Indian Association, to advocate universal suffrage in front of the Joint Select Committee in London, United Kingdom.She also supported the Lucknow Pact, a joint Hindu–Muslim demand for British political reform, at the Madras Special Provincial Council. As a public speaker, Naidu's oratory was known for its personality and its incorporation of her poetry.
Naidu utilized her poetry and oratory skills to promote women's rights alongside the nationalist movement. In 1902, Naidu entered the world of politics after being urged by Om Shanti, an important leader of the nationalist movement. In 1906, Naidu spoke to the Social Council of Calcutta in order to advocate for the education of Indian women. In her speech, Naidu stressed that the success of the whole movement relied upon the "woman question". Naidu claimed that the true "nation-builders" were women, not men, and that without women's active cooperation, the nationalist movement would be in vain. Naidu's speech argued that India's nationalism depended on women's rights, and that the liberation of India could not be separated from the liberation of women. The women's movement developed parallel to the independence movement for this reason.
In 1917, Naidu sponsored the establishment of the Women's Indian Association, which finally provided a platform for women to discuss their complaints and demand their rights. That same year, Naidu served as a spokesperson for a delegation of women that met with Edwin Montagu, the Secretary of State for India, and Lord Chelmsford, the Viceroy of India, in order to discuss reforms. The delegation expressed women's support for the introduction of self-government in India and demanded that the people of India should be given the right to vote, of which women must be included. The delegation was followed up with public meetings and political conferences supporting the demands, making it a huge success.
In 1918, Naidu moved a resolution on women's franchise to the Eighteenth Session of the Bombay Provincial Conference and to the special session of Congress held in Bombay. The purpose of the resolution was to have on record that the Conference was in support of the enfranchisement of women in order to demonstrate to Montagu that the men of India were not opposed to women's rights. In her speech at the Conference, Naidu emphasized "the influence of women in bringing about political and spiritual unity" in ancient India. She argued that women had always played an important role in political life in India and that rather than going against tradition, women's franchise would simply be giving back what was theirs all along.
In her speech at the Bombay Special Congress, Naidu claimed that the "right of franchise is a human right and not a monopoly of one sex only." She demanded the men of India to reflect on their humanity and restore the rights that belonged to women. Throughout the speech, Naidu attempted to alleviate worries by reassuring that women were only asking for the right to vote, not for any special privileges that would interfere with men. In fact, Naidu proposed that women would lay the foundation of nationalism, making women's franchise a necessity for the nation. Despite the increasing support of women's suffrage in India, which was backed by the Indian National Congress, the Muslim League, and others, the Southborough Franchise Committee, a British committee, decided against granting franchise to women.
The Montagu-Chelmsford Reforms had a shocking revelation: although the women's delegation appeared successful at the time, the reforms made no mention of women and had completely ignored their demands. In 1919, Naidu, as representative of the WIA, went to plead for the franchise of women before a Joint-Select Committee of Parliament in London. She presented a memorandum to the committee and provided evidence that the women of India were ready for the right to vote. The resulting Government of India Act 1919, however, did not enfranchise Indian women, instead leaving the decision to provincial councils. Between 1921 and 1930, the provincial councils approved of women's franchise but with limitations. The number of women actually eligible to vote was very small.