Remains of Those Days

This is the story, in her own words, of Yashodabai Joshi, married as a girl of six to a boy aged thirteen, and how the couple grew up to par...

This is the story, in her own words, of Yashodabai Joshi, married as a girl of six to a boy aged thirteen, and how the couple grew up to participate in the movement for India’s freedom, and to build their own lives on the principles of freedom and equality. It is a remarkable memoir of the period between 1868 and 1948, those decades of the rise and fall of the British Raj and the growth of Indian nationalism; it is also the moving and perceptive story of a woman’s quest to find herself.

And what strange days they were. Listen to the chapter titles: “Your mother-in-law is watching you”, “Women should walk softly” and — most moving of all — “Let us not be born again as women”. Here was this six-year-old girl child playing Phugdi, whirling around with a friend, when someone came and whispered to her that her mother-in-law was watching her — to make sure, realised Yashodabai later, that her future daughter-in-law was neither deaf nor lame. “Ten days later, I was married. Of the wedding itself, I remember absolutely nothing.”

Both husband and wife were children, and the one incident she recalls was of riding an elephant: “The fireworks and crackers accompanying the procession made our elephant sway more than usual, and I was frightened. But my husband took up a banana from the platter of fruits with us, peeled it and gave it to me. I promptly forgot my fright and my tears.”

Story continues below this ad

It was only at the age of ten that she went to her husband’s house; until she was fourteen years old, her husband spoke to her only once. While Annasaheb was studying at the Deccan College at Pune and thereafter at the Elphinstone College in Bombay, she had a different routine of her own: “Get up before dawn, sprinkle water on the courtyards, prepare the items needed for worship for my in-laws, check the clothes washed by the maids.” When Yashodabai had not borne a child even at the “advanced age of eighteen”, her mother-in-law began telling women visitors that her son would have to marry again. Annasaheb, however, assured his wife that he would do no such thing, and consulted the family doctor instead. By this time, he had started teaching his wife to read and write, and kept up her lessons despite his growing involvement with social and nationalistic movements. Finding that she too wanted to participate, Yashodabai decided to work for the uplift of women while her husband involved himself in social and national reform. They decided that the same integrity would be required in their personal life. Not surprisingly, their first child grew up to become one of the country’s first women doctors, and a social reformer.

While it is fascinating to read of one family’s life unfolding against the larger backdrop of a nation’s destiny, the little details of Yashodabai’s memoir are most compelling: being sharply reprimanded by her mother-in-law because the loose end of her sari has fallen off, leaving her back bare while she is drawing water from the well; going for morning walks with her husband, wearing socks and shoes and with her hair in a plait; tending to a house guest who is diagnosed with bubonic plague.

A Marathi Saga is the story of a gracious life lived with integrity and courage. It has been translated into English by her grandson, once a soldier and now in constructive retirement at the age of 81.

Delhi Traffic Police issue advisory for Dussehra, Ramlila from today: Check timing

Cities12 min ago

As the festival season sets in with Dussehra, and devotees are expected to flock to Ramleela Ground and the Red Fort areas, the Delhi Traffic Police issued an advisory Sunday, saying they will close some routes from Monday until October 3.

View all shorts

Live Blog