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2021-04-25T07:51:44Z

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{{short description|19th-century Indian lawyer and activist}}
'''Sudhanshubala Hazra''' was a 19th-century Indian lawyer, who fought a notable case and campaign to enable women in India to enroll as lawyers. She was the adopted daughter of [[Madhusudan Das|Madhusudhan Das]], a lawyer, politician, and Indian independence movement leader, and the sister of noted educator and politician [[Sailabala Das]].

== Life ==
Sudhanshubala Hazra's parents were [[Bengali Christians]]. Her father, Ambika Charan Hazra, was a friend of [[Madhusudan Das]], a lawyer, politician, and [[Indian independence movement]] leader. Hazra's daughters, Sudhanshubala and [[Sailabala Das|Sailabala]], were adopted by Das after Hazra's death.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Chand|first=Somarani|date=Feb-Mar 2016|title=Madhusudan Das and Women Uplift|url=http://magazines.odisha.gov.in/Orissareview/2016/Feb-Mar/engpdf/43-48.pdf|journal=Odisha Review|pages=42–47}}</ref>

== Career ==
Hazra initially began her career as a teacher, becoming the headmistress at Ravenshaw Girls' School in [[Cuttack]] while attending evening classes to earn her law degree.<ref name=":0">{{Cite web|title=The Indian Women Who Fought Their Way Into the Legal Profession|url=https://thewire.in/law/women-lawyers-history-india|access-date=2020-12-04|website=The Wire}}</ref> In 1917, she applied to sit for the Bachelor of Law exam at [[University of Calcutta|Calcutta University]], which had previously allowed [[Regina Guha]] and [[Hannah Sen]] to sit the exam and earn their Bachelors in Law. She was not permitted to do so as she had not studied in Calcutta, and her application was transferred back to [[Patna University]], which also declined to allow her to sit the exam. In 1919, she was ultimately permitted to sit the exams in [[University of Calcutta|Calcutta University]], and she qualified in 1920.<ref name=":0" />

In 1921, Hazra filed a petition before the [[Patna High Court]], seeking permission to be enrolled as a lawyer under the [[Legal Practitioners Act 1879]]. A previous petition filed by [[Regina Guha]] in the Calcutta High Court on similar grounds had failed. Meanwhile, the Allahabad High Court had differed on this, allowing [[Cornelia Sorabji]] to enroll as an advocate. Hazra cited the example of Sorabji, as well as the recently enacted British [[Sex Disqualification (Removal) Act 1919]], to persuade the court to allow her to enrol. However, the Patna High Court ruled in ''In Re Miss Sudhansu Bala Hazra'' that they were bound by the Calcutta High Court's reasoning, and the term 'person' in the Legal Practitioner Act did not include a "female". They accordingly barred her from enrolling.<ref name=":0" /><ref>{{Cite journal|last=Mishra|first=Saurabh Kumar|date=2015-12-15|title=Women in Indian Courts of Law: A Study of Women Legal Professionals in the District Court of Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh, India|url=http://journals.openedition.org/eces/1976|journal=E-cadernos CES|language=en|issue=24|doi=10.4000/eces.1976|issn=1647-0737|doi-access=free}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal|last=Mossman|first=MaryJane|date=2020-06-06|title=Cornelia Sorabji (1866–1954): a pioneer woman lawyer in Britain and India|url=https://doi.org/10.1080/09612025.2019.1702791|journal=Women's History Review|volume=29|issue=4|pages=737–747|doi=10.1080/09612025.2019.1702791|s2cid=213366627|issn=0961-2025}}</ref>

Hazra's sister and father, [[Sailabala Das]] and [[Madhusudan Das|Madhusudhan Das]], and lawyer and writer, [[Hari Singh Gour]] assisted her in initiating a campaign to allow women to enroll as lawyers, beginning with a successful petition to the Privy Council.<ref name=":0" /> In 1923, the Legal Practitioners (Women) Act was passed and Hazra enrolled as a lawyer in Patna.<ref name=":0" /> Hazra later published a memoir of her life, titled ''Woman at Law''.<ref>{{Cite web|last=जैन|first=Arvind Jain अरविंद|date=2019-06-12|title=No place for women in temples of justice|url=https://www.forwardpress.in/2019/06/no-place-for-women-in-indian-judiciary/|access-date=2020-12-04|website=Forward Press|language=en-US}}</ref>

== Additional Reading ==

* ''[https://indiankanoon.org/doc/1246400/?__cf_chl_jschl_tk__=ebe90af269eef8d4f73e94b7d01c5943b13a9b18-1607097053-0-AfI_jDG3n-wDTD9HtOMRTeToanhTb31AWIYJ-QV2XKLW4f3dkfwik8DWgcz1Ci-gs6VYw_QU9wCJm8Ap5l3Q4xrIQkhil7sCVjkJtbj0G0gL2tesG5JiA3RgnzATG04XCa7HWsxG1aqbH0TiKoEmffuPYWv0gXW_YmOHfCv2kph-SF1nr-3ir0tyXdw-xw0cLgH6ceDuQsIi-YJ2-7co3zMXVMWascnpiyArC7nDbV_0UH23Vix6AWgtdw553IU1JObkzbJP1KTGF_q8XwiFfM_aARJbh8IQyaOdh16TWYcYZPgum_1KuGjaVtlKdA6ddfm2ZLe0AjM-RH8_-0Ph4zaSsrkg9Ftc65ws1bO20H6Pbd0l3L80GA6iQNhvUcFnpw In Re Miss Sudhansu Bala Hazra]'', 64 Indian Cases 636 (1921)

== References ==
{{Reflist}}

[[Category:Year of birth missing]]
[[Category:Year of death missing]]
[[Category:20th-century Indian lawyers]]
[[Category:20th-century Indian women lawyers]]
[[Category:Indian educators]]
[[Category:People from West Bengal]]
[[Category:University of Calcutta alumni]]

Sudhanshubala Hazra - Revision history

>BrownHairedGirl: −Category:Indian lawyers; + 2 categories; ± 2 categories using HotCat