2021-09-04 17:52:29
A great woman politician and activist who was born on 13th February 1879. She fought for civil rights of the country, anti-imperialism and raised her voice against British rule in the country. She is fondly called as the nightingale of India. She was the first woman to serve as governor in the Dominion of India. She was an avid writer and has written several poems and stories for children and other categories. Sarojini Naidu was born on 13 February 1879, to a Bengali family in Hyderabad. She wrote poems from a very young age. She later went to England for her higher education, studying in both King’s College and Girton, Cambridge. Her family always had progressive values for her time. So she grew up in those values as well, believing in the power of protest for justice. She grew to become a famous Indian poet and political activist. She stood up for the rights of women as well as against British colonialism in India. She is known to this day as the ‘Nightingale of India’. Sarojini Naidu joined the Indian independence movement in the wake of partition of Bengal in 1905. Between 1915 and 1918, she travelled to different regions in India to deliver lectures on social welfare and nationalism. Sarojini Naidu also helped to establish the Women’s Indian Association in 1917. In 1920, she joined Mahatma Gandhi’s Satyagraha movement. She participated in the 1930 Salt March and was arrested for doing so along with many other prominent leaders. She was one of the significant figures who led the Civil Disobedience movement as well as the Quit India movement. Despite being arrested multiple times, she continued to fight for India’s independence. When India finally achieved it, she was appointed governor of the United Provinces, making her India’s first female governor. Sarojini Naidu began writing from a very young age. When she was in school, she wrote a play in Persian called Maher Muneer, which received praise even from the Nizam of Hyderabad. She published her first poetry collection in 1905, called “The Golden Threshold”. Her poetry is praised even to this day for its variety. She has written children’s poems as well as poems of a more critical nature, exploring themes such as patriotism, tragedy and romance. Her work received praise from many politicians as well. In 1912, she published another poetry collection called The Bird of Time: Songs of Life, Death & the Spring, which contains her most famous poem, In the Bazaars of Hyderabad. Critics praise this poem because of her excellent imagery. After her death, her collection The Feather of The Dawn was published by her daughter to celebrate her memory. Sarojini Naidu died of cardiac arrest on 2nd March 1949 in Lucknow. Many philosophers such as Aldous Huxley have praised her legacy as a poet as well as an activist. He has written that if every politician in India were to be as good-natured and passionate as her, the country would be in good hands. An off-campus annexe to the University of Hyderabad has been named The Golden Threshold, to honour her memory. The building is the former residence of her father. It now houses the Sarojini Naidu School of Arts & Communication of the University of Hyderabad.
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