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Later life

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{{distinguish|Sarala Devi}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=August 2016}}
{{Use Indian English|date=August 2016}}
{{Infobox person
| name = Sarala Devi Chaudhurani
| image = Sarala Devi Chaudhurani.jpg
| image_size = 200px
| caption = Sarala Devi Chaudhurani
| birth_name = Sarala Ghosal
| birth_date = {{Birth date|df=yes|1872|09|09}}
| birth_place = [[Kolkata]], [[Bengal Presidency|Bengal]], [[British India]]
| death_date = {{Death date and age|df=yes|1945|08|18|1872|09|09}}
| death_place = [[Kolkata]], [[British India]]
| occupation = Educationist, political activist
| spouse = {{marriage|Rambhuj Dutt Chaudhuri|1905|1923|end=his death}}
| nationality = [[British India|Indian]]
| children = Dipak (son)
| relatives = [[Swarnakumari Devi]] (mother) Janakinath Ghosal (father) [[Debendranath Tagore]] (maternal grandfather) [[Rabindranath Tagore]] (maternal uncle) [[Indira Devi Chaudhurani]] (maternal cousin) [[Surendranath Tagore]] (maternal cousin)
}}
{{Anushilan Samiti}}

'''Sarala Devi Chaudhurani''', born '''Sarala Ghosal''',<ref name="Ray2012">{{cite book|last=Ray|first=Bharati|title=Early Feminists of Colonial India: Sarala Devi Chaudhurani and Rokeya Sakhawat Hossain|date=13 September 2012|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=978-0-19-808381-8|page=2|chapter=Sarala and Rokeya: Brief Biographical Sketches|chapter-url=http://www.oxfordscholarship.com/view/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198083818.001.0001/acprof-9780198083818-chapter-1|via=[[Oxford Scholarship Online]]}}{{Subscription required}}</ref> (9 September 1872 – 18 August 1945) was an educationist and political activist, who founded [[Bharat Stree Mahamandal]] in [[Allahabad]] in 1910. This was the first women's organization in [[India]]. One of the primary goals of the organization was to promote [[female education]]. The organization opened several offices in [[Lahore]] (then part of unpartitioned India), Allahabad , [[Delhi]], [[Karachi]], [[Amritsar]], [[Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh|Hyderabad]], [[Kanpur]], [[Bankura]], [[Hazaribagh]], [[Midnapur]], and [[Kolkata]] to improve the situation of women all over India.

==Biography==

===Early life===
Sarala was born in [[Jorasanko]], Kolkata on 9 September 1872 to a well known Bengali intellectual family. Her father [[Janakinath Ghosal]] was one of the first secretaries of the Bengal Congress. Her mother [[Swarnakumari Devi]], a noted author, was the daughter of [[Debendranath Tagore]], an eminent Brahmo leader and father of poet [[Rabindranath Tagore]]. Her older sister, Hironmoyee, was an author and founder of a widow's home. Sarla Devi's family was a follower of [[Brahmoism]], a religion founded by [[Ram Mohan Roy]] and later developed by Sarala's grandfather Debendranath Tagore.<ref name="ODNB">{{Cite ODNB|id=94958|title=Chaudhurani, Sarala Devi|first=Bharati|last=Ray}}</ref>
[[File:Sarala and Hironmoyee.jpg|thumb|Sarala and her sister Hironmoyee|left|upright=0.8]]

In 1890, she earned her [[Bachelor of Arts|BA]] in English literature from [[Bethune College]]. She was awarded the college's first Padmavati Gold Medal<ref>{{Cite web|title=Bethune College - Banglapedia|url=http://en.banglapedia.org/index.php?title=Bethune_College|access-date=13 October 2020|website=Banglapedia}}</ref> for being the top female candidate in her BA examinations.<ref name="ODNB"/> She was one of the few women of her time to participate in the [[Indian independence movement]]. During anti partition agitation she spread the gospel of nationalism in Punjab and maintained secret revolutionary society.{{citation needed|date=March 2019}}

===Career===
Upon completing her education, Sarala went to [[Mysore State]] and joined the Maharani Girls' School as a teacher. A year later, she returned home and started writing for ''Bharati'', a Bengali journal, while also beginning her political activities.<ref name="Ghosh2019">{{cite journal |last=Ghosh |first=Sutanuka |title=Expressing the Self in Bengali Women's Autobiographies in the Twentieth Century |year=2010 |journal=South Asia Research |volume=30 |issue=2 |pages=105–23 |doi=10.1177/026272801003000201|pmid=20684082 |s2cid=19756923 }}{{Subscription required}}</ref>

From 1895 to 1899, she edited ''Bharati'' jointly with her mother and sister,<ref name="Neogi1985">{{cite journal|last=Neogi|first=Goutam|title=Bengali Women in Politics : The Early Phase (1857-1905)|journal=Proceedings of the Indian History Congress|volume=46|year=1985|pages=487|publisher=Indian History Congress|jstor=44141393}}{{closed access}}</ref> and then on her own from 1899 to 1907, with the goal of propagating patriotism and to raise up the literary standard of the journal. In 1904, she started the Lakshmi Bhandar (women's store) in Kolkata to popularize native handicrafts produced by women. In 1910, she founded the Bharat Stree Mahamandal (All India Women's Organization),<ref name="ODNB"/> which is regarded by many historians as the first All-Indian organization for women.<ref>{{cite journal|last=Majumdar|first=Rochona|title="Self-Sacrifice" versus "Self-Interest": A Non-Historicist Reading of the History of Women's Rights in India|url=https://muse.jhu.edu/article/191247|journal=Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East|year=2002|volume=22|issue=1–2|publisher=Duke University Press|page=24|doi=10.1215/1089201X-22-1-2-20|via=[[Project MUSE]]}}{{Subscription required}}</ref> With several branches around the country, it promoted education and vocational training for women without consideration of class, caste and religion.<ref name="ODNB"/>

===Personal life===
In 1905, under family pressure, Sarala Devi married [[Rambhuj Dutt Chaudhary]] (1866–1923), a lawyer, journalist, nationalist leader and follower of [[Arya Samaj]], the Hindu reform movement founded by Swami [[Dayananda Saraswati]].<ref name="Neogi1985"/><ref name="ODNB"/>

After her marriage, she moved to [[Punjab]]. There, she helped her husband edit the nationalist [[Urdu]] weekly ''Hindusthan'', which was later converted into an English periodical. When her husband was arrested for his involvement in [[Non-cooperation movement]], [[Mahatma Gandhi]] visited her home in [[Lahore]] as a guest; and Gandhi fell for her. Gandhi-Saraladebi became a talk-of-the-town in Lahore on the account of their closeness. Gandhi lapped up her poems and writings, and used them in his speeches, and in Young India and other journals. She travelled with him all over India. When apart, they frequently exchanged letters.<ref>{{Cite magazine |last=Kapoor|first=Pramod|date=13 October 2014|title=When Gandhi Nearly Slipped|url=https://magazine.outlookindia.com/story/when-gandhi-nearly-slipped/292132|magazine=Outlook India}}</ref> According to Rabindra Bharati University Vice-Chancellor Professor Sabyasachi Basu Ray Chaudhury, the relationship between the two, although close, was nothing more than mutual admiration.<ref>{{Cite news |date=8 March 2020|title=Sarala Devi: From Tagore's family, a leading light of the swadeshi movement|url=https://indianexpress.com/article/lifestyle/sarala-devi-tagore-family-swadeshi-movement-bengali-revolutionary-6302759/|access-date=24 November 2020|work=The Indian Express|language=en}}</ref> Her only son, Dipak, married Gandhi's granddaughter Radha.<ref name="ODNB" />

===Later life===
After her husband's death in 1923, Sarala Devi returned to Kolkata, and resumed editing responsibilities for ''Bharati'' from 1924 to 1926. She established a girls' school, Siksha Sadan in Kolkata in 1930. She retired from public life in 1935 and indulged religion, accepting [[Bijoy Krishna Goswami]], a [[Gaudiya Vaishnavism|Gaudiya Vaisnava]], as her spiritual teacher.<ref name="ODNB"/>

She died on 18 August 1945 in Kolkata.<ref name="ODNB"/>

Her autobiography ''Jivaner Jhara Pata '' was serialized in ''Desh'', a Bengali literary magazine, during the later period of her life, in 1942–1943. It was later translated into English by Sikata Banerjee as The Scattered Leaves of My Life (2011).<ref name="Mookerjea-Leonard2017">{{cite book |last=Mookerjea-Leonard |first=Debali |title=Literature, Gender, and the Trauma of Partition: The Paradox of Independence |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=L0AlDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA188 |year=2017 |publisher=Taylor & Francis |location=New York |isbn=978-1-317-29389-7 |page=188}}</ref><ref name="McDermott2014">{{cite book |editor1-last=McDermott |editor1-first=Rachel Fell |editor2-last=Gordon |editor2-first=Leonard |editor3-last=Embree |editor3-first=Ainslie |editor4-last=Pritchett |editor4-first=Frances |editor5-last=Dalton |editor5-first=Dennis |title=Sources of Indian Traditions: Modern India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh |chapter-url=https://www.degruyter.com/view/product/464294 |year=2014 |publisher=Columbia University Press |isbn=978-0-231-13830-7 |page=283 |chapter=Radical Politics and Cultural Criticism, 1880–1914: The Extremists |via=[[De Gruyter]]}}{{Subscription required}}</ref>

==References==
{{reflist}}

==Further reading==
* {{cite book|last=Chaudhurani|first=Sarala Devi|translator-last=Ray|translator-first=Sukhendu|title=The Many Worlds of Sarala Devi: A Diary : Translated from the Bengali Jeevaner Jharapata|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=U2pDxinD28AC|year=2010|publisher=Social Science Press|location=New Delhi|isbn=978-81-87358-31-2}}

==External links==
* {{Gbooks-author|Sarala Devi Chaudhurani}}

{{Tagore family}}
{{authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Chaudhurani, Sarala Devi}}
[[Category:Bengali people]]
[[Category:Indian feminists]]
[[Category:Indian women educational theorists]]
[[Category:1945 deaths]]
[[Category:1872 births]]
[[Category:Bethune College alumni]]
[[Category:University of Calcutta alumni]]
[[Category:19th-century Indian educational theorists]]
[[Category:20th-century Indian women scientists]]
[[Category:20th-century Indian scientists]]
[[Category:20th-century Indian educational theorists]]
[[Category:Founders of Indian schools and colleges]]
[[Category:Women scientists from West Bengal]]
[[Category:Women writers from West Bengal]]
[[Category:19th-century Indian women scientists]]
[[Category:19th-century Indian scientists]]
[[Category:Women educators from West Bengal]]
[[Category:19th-century women writers]]
[[Category:20th-century women writers]]
[[Category:19th-century women educators]]
[[Category:20th-century women educators]]

Sarala Devi Chaudhurani - Revision history

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135.180.109.53: /* Later life */