‘Not hundreds but tens of thousands wearing white Khaddar Jubbahs and still whiter Gandhi caps were surging forward in massive waves… Akkamma Cherian was leading that white sea, standing in an open jeep, dressed in khaddar and a Gandhi cap, like Goddess Durga crushing beneath her feet evil and injustice; her hair played in the wind like black flags hoisted against autocracy…’. E.M. Kovoor described thus the historical protest march led by Akkamma Cherian in 1938, against the then King and the Dewan of erstwhile Travancore.
Life in Travancore in the 1930s was wrought with discontent, strife and conflict. The State Congress was declared illegal and the law permitted its office bearers, members, and anyone associated with it to be arrested without warrant. Prohibition orders were served to the State Congress leaders forbidding them from participating in public meetings or giving speeches. The Congress working committee was hence dissolved and a Strikers’ Union was formed in its place. The government benignly found place for all the Congress leaders in prison.
The Congress therefore decided to look out for a bold and daring woman who could be made the President of the newly organised Strikers’ Union. The plan was to make her lead a procession to the palace braving all obstacles and submit a memorandum of rights to the Maharaja. Akkamma who was hardly 29 years at the time, writes in her autobiography, ‘I was aware of the seriousness of the assignment and knew what the consequences could be, yet I volunteered to do the job.’
The Congress Party found volunteers to organise the local youth in every nook and corner of Thiruvithamkur from Vadakkan Paravur to Kanyakumari. The Union of Strikers gave instructions to each group of volunteers where exactly to meet at Thampanoor in Thiruvananthapuram on Sunday, October 23, the day of the birthday celebrations of the Maharaja. Right from dawn, the streets of the capital were filled with thousands of soldiers, all in white khaddar and in Gandhi caps. The air was filled with slogans like ‘Bharat Mata ki Jai’, ‘Mahatma Gandhi ki Jai’ and ‘State Congress ki Jai’. Soon, the Thampanoor railway station maidan turned into an ocean of people.
Standing in an open jeep, Akkamma addressed the people. She then proceeded towards the royal palace with the people surging behind her, to present the people’s memorandum to the Maharaja. Ignoring various hurdles and diabolical attempts to stop the march, the protest continued till the government agreed to release the prisoners. Thus ended one of the most momentous people’s struggles staged in Travancore in the pre-independence era.
What happened later to this spirited woman who led the historic protest? How did she come to disappear from the scene altogether? When the prisoners were released, she handed over the President’s title to Pattom Thanu Pillai.
Her autobiography Life: A Protest , mentions two occasions when she was almost offered the position of a minister in independent India. But by then, the highly idealistic freedom fighters had started fighting tooth and nail for positions and titles. Those who made women stand in the forefront of the freedom struggle now stamped over them and rushed forward to snatch positions.
Akkamma’s introduction to her autobiography gives the readers a clear idea of why she was made to vanish altogether – ‘Shakespeare has said that the world is a stage and that all the men and women merely players; but to me this life is a long protest – protest against conservatism, meaningless rituals, societal injustice, gender discrimination, against anything that is dishonest, unjust...when I see anything like this, I turn blind, I even forget who I am fighting....’
(Sreedevi K. Nair is Associate Professor & Head, Department of English, NSS College for Women, Neeramankara, Thiruvananthapuram )
