Indrabai Maydeo

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A brief biography

Dipanita Nath, May 18, 2024: The Indian Express

When Pune went to the polls on May 13, some voters noticed that there were 32 men in the fray and only three women. In the third phase of the elections, Baramati stood out for more than the Pawar vs Pawar turf war. It had the highest proportion of women candidates in the state — and even that was a paltry seven out of 38. In Shirur and Maval, there was one woman candidate each.

Yet, when India conducted its first general elections in 1951-52, Pune elected a woman candidate, Indrabai Maydeo, to the Lok Sabha. “It was an era when the representation of women wasn’t even in the public discourse but we had women like Indrabai Maydeo in Parliament and Dr Sarojini Babar, a folk artist and literary figure, in the legislature. In 1972, out of the 288 MLA seats in Maharashtra, there were 34 women – 5 from socialist parties and 29 from the Congress,” says Ulhas Pawar, a former MLC from the Congress party.

Maydeo was a freedom fighter, who belonged to a family of Gandhians. She was also a keen Bridge and tennis player. Born in 1903, she studied at High School for Indian Girls, Poona, and Fergusson College. An eminent writer and poet on sociopolitical issues, Maydeo was a part of the Maharashtra Provincial Harijan Sevak Sangh as well as the editor of Roshini, a quarterly magazine published by the All India Women’s Conference (AIWC).

AIWC, which Maydeo helped shape as the Hon General Secretary in 1946, is an important institution in the history of the country. It is the oldest national women’s organisation in India and was started in Poona in January 1927.

AIWC’s founding principle can be traced to a prize-distribution ceremony in Kolkata’s Bethune College in 1926, when EF Oaten, the director of Public Instruction, told women in the audience that they alone “can help adequately remedy what is wrong in women’s education…tell us with one voice what they want and keep on telling us till they get it”.

Maydeo’s wide-ranging social activities, which involved the marginalised and farmers besides students, made her an obvious choice for the election. She stood on a Congress ticket from Poona South, one of the 37 constituencies of the Bombay region at the time since the state of Maharashtra was not yet born.

The Congress symbol at the time was two bulls with a yoke on them. Poona Central was another constituency where Narhar Gadgil, also from the Congress, won a decisive victory. Incidentally, Maydeo was up against another woman candidate who also lived in Shiva jinagar like her — Shanta Shankar More of the Peasants and Workers Party of India whose election symbol was the cart. Maydeo defeated her and Shridhar Limaye of the Socialist Party by a wide margin.