Women in the Freedom Movement

Women's participation, often under-credited in exam preparation, was central from Phase 1 onward and expanded dramatically from the Civil Disobedience Movement onward, when Gandhi actively called on women to join salt-law-breaking and picketing in large numbers.

• Rani Lakshmibai of Jhansi — the revolt of 1857's most iconic figure, dying in battle defending her state against annexation under the Doctrine of Lapse.
• Begum Hazrat Mahal — directed the defence of Lucknow/Awadh during the 1857 revolt on behalf of her minor son.
• Sarojini Naidu — the "Nightingale of India," poet and orator, the first Indian woman president of the Congress (Kanpur, 1925) and later the first woman governor of an Indian state (Uttar Pradesh, post-independence); an active participant in the Salt Satyagraha, leading the raid on the Dharasana Salt Works in 1930 after Gandhi's arrest.
• Kasturba Gandhi — Gandhi's wife and lifelong companion in activism, herself imprisoned multiple times, including during Quit India, and died in British custody at the Aga Khan Palace in 1944.
• Kamala Nehru — Jawaharlal Nehru's wife, an active organiser of Non-Cooperation and Civil Disobedience activities in Allahabad, including picketing of liquor and foreign-cloth shops, despite persistent ill health; she died in 1936.
• Vijaya Lakshmi Pandit — Jawaharlal Nehru's sister, a Congress leader in her own right, imprisoned multiple times, and later independent India's first woman cabinet minister and, still later, the first woman president of the UN General Assembly (1953).
• Aruna Asaf Ali — hoisted the Congress flag at Gowalia Tank Maidan on the first day of Quit India (August 1942) and then evaded capture underground for years, becoming a legendary symbol of the movement's underground resistance; sometimes called the "Grand Old Lady" of the Independence movement in her later years.
• Matangini Hazra — an elderly Gandhian activist in Midnapore, Bengal, shot dead by police while leading a large Quit India procession in 1942, reportedly continuing to chant "Vande Mataram" and hold the national flag aloft even as she was hit.
• Rani Gaidinliu — a Naga spiritual and political leader from Manipur/Nagaland who, still a teenager, led the Heraka movement against British rule from the early 1930s; imprisoned for over a decade, she was given the title "Rani" (queen) by Jawaharlal Nehru on her release after independence, in recognition of her resistance.
• Captain Lakshmi Sahgal — commanded the all-women Rani of Jhansi Regiment of the Indian National Army.
• Pritilata Waddedar and Kalpana Dutta — Bengal revolutionaries associated with Surya Sen's Chittagong group.
• Bhikaji Cama — an early revolutionary based in Europe who unfurled an early version of the Indian national flag at the International Socialist Congress, Stuttgart, in 1907, one of the first public displays of an Indian flag abroad.
• Annie Besant — though British by birth, a central figure of the Home Rule League and the first woman president of the Indian National Congress (Calcutta, 1917), preceding Sarojini Naidu by eight years.

Mnemonic — women presidents of Congress: "Besant Before Naidu" — Annie Besant (1917) was the first woman to preside over Congress; Sarojini Naidu (1925) was the first Indian woman to do so.

Memory hook — women of 1857 vs women of 1942, a rhyme: "1857: Rani and Begum defended their land; 1942: Aruna and Matangini took their own stand." Rani Lakshmibai and Begum Hazrat Mahal anchor the revolt of 1857; Aruna Asaf Ali and Matangini Hazra anchor Quit India, 85 years later — bookending the whole movement with paired women at each end.

Practice Recall: Match each woman to her single defining act, covering the book: Rani Lakshmibai, Sarojini Naidu, Kasturba Gandhi, Aruna Asaf Ali, Matangini Hazra, Rani Gaidinliu, Captain Lakshmi Sahgal, Bhikaji Cama. Check your answers against the list above.