22/12/2021
What's so special about two women playing Table Tennis?
Close to the end of the nineteenth century, an eleven-year-old girl was married to a man twenty-one years her senior, as per the norms of the time. The girl was Ramabai Ranade. Her husband, MG Ranade, an active social reformer who believed in the importance of education.
Once married, formal education began. Marathi, Social Studies, English, Science. An English instructor was employed for her.
It wasn't easy, you see, education was forbidden for women. So, while she worked hard, the women in the extended family castigated her.
Yet, she persisted.
Within 8 years of beginning her education, that is, by 1880, Ramabai had started addressing crowds of women about the importance of education and learning skills.
How did she get her audiences? Who would listen to a woman orator?
Well, her husband belonged to a society, Prarthana Samaj, which held for female members.
Other avenues included women oriented religious ceremonies that women attended in large numbers. That was how Ramabai was able to get her word across.
But it isn’t enough to talk. Ramabai started a ladies’ club where she taught knitting and public speaking. At the start of the 19th century in India, saw few women getting an education or having the freedom to move out freely. Women who were widowed or struggling in poverty were the worst affected. Her initial focus was on divorced and widowed woman, over time, the organisation has spread to include vocational training for the mentally challenged.
Ramabai set up spaces for women in difficult conditions to learn as well as, play.
That's what the photograph is about, two women, who were being educated at Ramabai's Seva Sadan in Pune, dressed in traditional wear, playing a game of table tennis. Can you imagine the flutter it must have created?
Ramabai Ranade remains an icon for women. She used all the means she could get to deliver her point and showed how to make it happen.
https://feminisminindia.com/2017/06/12/ramabai-ranade-essay/
