• Two hundred years ago the lives of women were totally different from what it is today. There were so many restrictions imposed on women.
• Widows were praised and called ‘satis’ meaning ‘virtous’ if they chose to by burning themselves on the funeral pyres of their husbands.
• People were also divided along lines of caste. Brahmins and Kshatriyas considered themselves in upper caste, after them traders and moneylenders referred to as Vaishyas and the lower caste were Shudras and included peasants, artisans, weavers, and potter.

• The attitude towards women & social customs started changing from the early 19th century.

Working Towards Change:

(i) In early 19th century things changed because of the development of new forms of communication.

(ii) Social reformers like Raja Rammohan Roy founded Brahmo Samaj in Calcutta.

iii) Raja Ram Mohan Roy pioneered this reform movement. He opposed social practices such as discrimination on the basis of caste, untouchability, superstitions and the custom of ‘sati’. He wanted to spread the knowledge of western education and bring about freedom and equality for women.

Changing the Lives of Widows:

(i) Raja Rammohan Roy set up the Brahmo Samaj to fight social evils. He began a campaign against the practice of sati. Many British officials criticised Indian traditions and customs. They supported him and in 1829, sati was banned. He also supported women’s education. In the religious field, he opposed idol worship and meaningless rituals.

(ii) Ishwarchandra Vidyasagar was one of the most famous reformers who suggested widow remarriage. In 1856, British officials passed the law permitting widow remarriage.

(iii) Swami Dyanand Saraswati founded the Arya Samaj in 1875, and also supported widow marriage.

Girls begin going to School:

(i) Many reformers felt that to improve the condition of women, education for girls was necessary.

(ii) Many reformers in Bombay and Vidyasagar in Calcutta set up schools for girls.

(iii) With the inaugration of first school in mid-19th century, many people feared that school would take the girls away from home and prevent them from doing domestic duties.

iv) Many people believed that girls should be kept away from public spaces as they believed that they can get corrupting influence.

(v) In aristocratic Muslim families in North India, women learnt to read the Koran in Arabic. They were taught by women who came home to teach.

Women write about Women:

(i) Muslim women like Begums of Bhopal promoted education among women and founded a primary school for girls at Aligarh.

(ii) Begum Rokeya Sakhawat Hossain started schools for Muslim girls in Patna and Calcutta.

(iii) Indian women began to enter universities by 1880s. Some of them trained to be doctors and teachers.

(iv) Tarabai Shinde got education at home at Poona, published a book, Stripurushtulna (A Comparison between Women & Men), criticising the social differences between men & women.

(v) Pandita Ramabai was a great scholar of Sanskrit, wrote a book about the miserable lives of upper-class Hindu women. She founded a widows’ home at Poona to provide shelter to widows who had been treated badly by their husbands’ relatives.

(vi) Later, women were trained to support themselves economically.

(vii) Orthodox Hindu & Muslim Nationalists were worried as women started adopting western cultures and according to them that could corrupt and erode family values.

(viii) Women started working for reforms. They wrote books, magazines, founded schools & training centres, and set up womens’ associations.

(ix) Women formed political pressure groups to push through laws for female suffrage ( the right to vote).

(x) Jawaharlal Nehru and Subhash Chandra Bose gave their support to demands for greater equality and freedom for women.

Caste and Social Reform:

(i) Social reformers criticized caste inequalities. Paramhans Mandali was founded in 1840 in Bombay to work for the abolition of caste.

(ii) The Prarthana Samaj adhered to the tradition of Bhakti that believed in spiritual equality of all castes.

(iii) Christians missionaries began setting up schools for the tribal groups and ‘lower’-caste children.

(iv) There were availability of jobs in cities in factories. Many poor people from the villages & small towns who belonged to low castes got the jobs as labour.

(v) The work was hard enough. But the poor had got a chance to get away from the control of upper-castes landowners who exercised daily humiliation over them.

(vi) Army was another option in jobs. A number of Mahar people, who were regarded as untouchables, found jobs in the Mahar Regiment.

Demands for Equality and Justice:

(i) By the second half of the 19th century, people from within the ‘lower’ castes began organizing movements against caste discrimination and demanded social equality and justice.

(ii) The Satnami movement in Central India was founded by Ghasidas who came from a low caste, organised a movement to improve their social status.

(iii) In eastern Bengal, Haridas Thakur’s Matua sect worked among low caste; Chandala cultivators. Haridas questioned Brahmanical texts that supported the caste system.

(iv) Shri Narayan Guru, a guru from Ezhava caste given his views on caste system as “one caste. one religion, one god for humankind”.

Gulamgiri:

(i) Jyotirao Phule, born in 1827 was known as one of the ‘low-caste’ leaders.

(ii) He attacked the Brahmans claim that they were superior to other, since they were Aryans.

(iii) According to Phule, the ‘upper’ caste had no right to their land and power, the land belonged to indigenous people who were called as low castes.

(iv) Phule proposed that Shudras and Ati Shudras should unite to challenge caste discrimination.

(v) The Satyashodhak Samaj was founded by Phule to propagate caste equality.

(vi) Phule wrote a book named “Gulamgiri”, meaning slavery. He established a link between the conditions of the “lower” castes in India & the black slaves in America.

(vii) In 20th century, the movement for caste reform was continued by Dr. B.R. Ambedkar and E.V. Ramaswamy Naicker.

Who Could enter Temples:

(i) Ambedkar was born into a Mahar family. As a child he experienced caste prejudice; In school, he was forced to sit outside the classroom on the ground & was not allowed to drink water from taps that upper-caste children used.

(ii) In 1919, when he came back from the USA, he wrote about “upper” caste power in contemporary society.

(iii) In 1927, Ambedkar started a temple entry movement. His aim was to make everyone see the power of caste prejudices within the society.

The Non-Brahman Movement:

(i) The Non-Brahman Movement in the early 20th century was initiated by non-Brahman castes that had acquired access to education, wealth and influence. They challenged Brahmanical claims to power.

(ii) E.V. Ramaswamy Naicker, known as Periyar was from middle-class family. He founded the Self Respect Movement.

(iv) He inspired the untouchables and asked them to free themselves from all religions in order to achieve social equality.

(v) Periyar was an outspoken critic of Hindu scriptures.

(vi) The forceful speeches, writings and movements of lower caste leaders led to rethink and self-criticism among upper caste nationalist leaders.

Important Dates

Question 1. What social ideas did the following people support:

Answer:
These people supported the following ideas:

1. Spread of education among women.
2. Widow remarriage.
3. Caste equality and justice.
4. Abolition of child marriage.
5. Social equality for untouchables.

Question 2.State whether true or false:

1. When the British captured Bengal they framed many new laws to regulate the rules regarding marriage, adoption, the inheritance of property, etc.
2. Social reformers had to discard the ancient texts in order to argue for reform in social practices.
3. Reformers got full support from all sections of the people of the country.
4. The Child Marriage Restraint Act was passed in 1929.

Answer:

1. True
2. False
3. False
4. True

Question 3.How did the knowledge of ancient texts help the reformers promote new laws?
Answer:The reformers tried to convince people that widow burning, caste distinctions, child marriage, etc had no sanction in ancient texts. Their knowledge of ancient texts gave them immense confidence and moral support which they utilised in promoting new laws. They did not get feared when people raised voice against the reforms they had brought.

Question 4. What were the different reasons people had for not sending girls to school?
Answer: Vidyasagar in Calcutta (now Kolkata) and many other reformers in Bombay. (now Mumbai) set up schools for girls.

•  When the first schools were opened in the mid-nineteenth century, many people were afraid of them.
• They feared that schools would take girls away from home.
• They would prevent them from doing their domestic duties.
• Girls had to travel through public places in order to reach school. This would have a corrupting influence on them.
• GMs should stay away from public spaces.

Question 5. Why were Christian missionaries attacked by many people in the country? Would some people have supported them too? If so, for what reasons?
Answer: Christian Missionaries were attacked in the country by many people because they suspected that they were involved in forced conversion and conversion using money power of poor and tribal people from Hinduism to Christianity. If some people supported them, that was because they felt this might improve the economical condition and education of the poor and tribals.

Question 6. In the British period, what new opportunities opened up for people who came from castes that were regarded as “low”?
Answer: With the expansion of cities, new demands of labor created. Drains had to be dug, roads laid, buildings constructed and cities cleaned. This required coolies, diggers, carriers, bricklayers, sweepers, rickshaw pullers, etc. This labour came from people who belonged to the “low” caste. They left their villages and small towns and shifted to the cities to get work. Some went to work in plantations in Assam, Mauritius, Trinidad, and Indonesia. Although it was not easy to work in the new locations, poor people saw this an opportunity to get away from the exploitations of the upper-caste.

(v) Periyar founded
(a) Self Respect Movement
(b) Temple Entry Movement
(c) Paramhans Mandali
(d) Dalit Movement

(vi) The Mohammedan Anglo-Oriental College was opened by
(a) Khizr Khan
(b) Maulana Abul Kalam Azad
(c) Sayyid Ahmed Khan
(d) Khan Abdul Gaffar Khan
Answer:
(i) (b), (ii) (d), (iii) (b), (iv) (b), (v) (a), (vi) (c).

Question 2.Fill in the blanks with appropriate words to complete each sentence.

1. According to the Child Marriage Restraint of ……….. and woman below the age of ………….. could marry.
2. …………. were an important Act no man below the age untouchable caste of present-day Andhra Pradesh.
3. Tarabai Shinde Published a book named …………..
4. Raja Rammohun Roy was well versed in …………, …………… and several other Indian and European languages.
5. The Satnami movement was founded by ……………. who belonged to a low caste family.
6. In 1873, Jyotirao Phule wrote a Book Gulamgiri meaning …………………..
7. The Begums of………….. played a vital role in promoting education among women.

Answer:

1. 18, 16
2. Madigas
3. Stripurushtulna
4. Sanskrit, Persian
5. Ghasidas
6. Slavery
7. Bhopal

Question 3.State whether each of the following statements is True or False.

1. Raja Rammohun Roy founded the Arya Samaj in 1875.
2. Pandita Ramabai was a great scholar of Sanskrit and she founded a widow’s home at Poona to provide shelter to widows.
3. The Begums of Bhopal started schools for Muslim girls in Patna.
4. Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar strongly criticized widow remarriage.
5. The Arya Samaj was an association that attempted to reform Hinduism.
6. Dr. B.R. Ambedkar and E. V. Ramaswamy Naicker continued the movement for caste reform in the 20th century.
7. Dr. Bhimrao Ambedkar is popularly known as Periyar.

Answer:

1. False
2. True
3. False
4. False
5. True
6. True
7. False

Question 4. Match the items given in Column A correctly with those given in Column B.

Answer:
(i) (c), (ii) (a), (iii) (e),(iv) (b), (v) (d)

Very Short Answer Type Questions

Question 1. Why are social reformers described so?
Answer:Social reformers are described so because they felt that some changes were essential in society and unjust practices needed to be rooted out.

Question 2.How did reformers bring changes in society?
Answer:They brought changes in society by persuading people to give up old practices and adopt a new way of life.

Question 3. What do you mean by ‘sati’?
Answer:Widows who chose death by burning themselves on the funeral pyre of their husbands were known as ‘sati’, meaning virtuous woman.

Question 4.Who was known as Vaishyas?
Answer:Traders and moneylenders were known as Vaishyas.

Question 5.Who was Raja Rammohun Roy?
Answer:Raja Rammohun Roy was a learned social reformer. He was well versed in Sanskrit, Persian, and several other Indian and European languages. He raised voice against the practice of Sati and got it rooted out.

Question 6.What was the hook swinging festival?
Answer:It was a popular festival in which devotees underwent a peculiar form of suffering as part of ritual worship. With hooks pierced through their skin, they swung themselves on a wheel.

Question 7. Who was Mumtaz Ali?
Answer:Mumtaz Ali was a social reformer who reinterpreted verses from the Koran to argue for the education of women.

Question 8.Who published the book named Stripurushtulna? What is it about?
Answer:Tarabai Shinde published Stripuru-shtulna. It is about the social differences between men and women.

Question 9.How did the widow’s home at Poona help the widows?
Answer: It trained them so that they could manage financial support for themselves.

Question 10.What was the contribution of Christian missionaries in spreading education among tribal groups and lower castes?
Answer: These missionaries set up schools for tribal groups and lower caste children. Here, they were equipped with some skills to make their way into a new world.

Question 11.Why do people view leather workers with contempt?
Answer: Leather workers work with dead animals which are seen as dirty and polluting. Hence, people see them with contempt.

Question 12.Who was Madigas?
Answer:They were experts at cleaning hides, tanning them for use, and sewing sandals.