Women educators have redefined history worldwide. Be it Anne Sullivan, who taught Helen Keller, or Maria Montessori and Mary Mcleod Bethune, who established new educational methods.
India’s education canvas too bears masterly strokes from path-breaking women who fought for women’s education and cultural uplift. Savitribai Phule (first woman schoolteacher in mid-1800s), Durgabai Deshmukh (established vocational training schools for women) and Begum Zafar Ali (first woman matriculate of Kashmir) are examples.
Our personal experience unravels the story of one such unspoken hero, R. Lilavati. A child widow, she refused remarriage and fought for an education, becoming an educationist for 35 years during the British Raj, creating an army of Indian educators and finally serving as the Deputy Director of School Education, Tamil Nadu, in 1974.
Leela, as she was known, was born in Madras in 1919. In 1930, this timid 11-year-old was married before knowing what marriage meant. Three months later, before she formally lived with her husband, he died. As her father consoled her, Leela said, “Send me to school”, with unassuming calm. Those four words changed the arc of multiple generations of families. Perhaps, she drew inspiration from R.S. Subbulakshmi, a child widow who founded Sarada Vidyalaya in the 1920s to educate young widows, where Leela would later start her teaching career.
Change-maker
For Leela, this was just the beginning. After schooling in Madurai, she had her vision to be a change-maker within and beyond the classroom underpinned by her teachers at Queen Mary’s College from 1935 to 1939, and Lady Willingdon Training College in 1940 in Chennai. Leela instilled similar experiences and discipline in her students. Students recall headmistress Leela leading Government Girls’ High Schools in Vellore and Chidambaram from 1944 to 1959, dressed in crisp white saris and hair tied in a firm bun, while she transformed a dilapidated wedding hall into a school fit for young girls. Going door-to-door, she would debate with parents to let their children become a graduate before becoming a wife. One of her students reminisces, “India had just gained Independence. Schools had a tall order to shape a new generation of Indians, and teachers were considered role models. Leela taught us self-empowerment and leadership, much before it was described in management books. Several of us became educators, inspired by her.”
Positive thinking and a feisty spirit accompanied Leela as a single working woman from the 1940s to 1970s.
She proudly became the only woman in Tamil Nadu selected for the Madras English Literature Teaching (MELT) Campaign in the 1950s. In 1965, the British Council gave her a rare honour in selecting her to visit England and Wales for a Language Laboratory programme. “We discussed regional challenges in English teaching, which I brought home to strengthen pedagogical techniques at the Regional Institute of English, South India [where she was a lecturer],” she recalled.
When her father insisted on the marriage of her younger sister, Leela whisked her away, boarded an overnight train, and admitted her to Queen Mary’s College.
On her 100th birthday last year, Leela quipped, “Sachin Tendulkar often gets dismissed at 99, but I made a 100!” Leela passed away in Bengaluru in August at 101. Her vision, fearless spirit, and love for literature live as her legacy. What sweet irony then that Leela’s birthday is on March 8, International Women’s Day.
(The authors are nieces of R. Lilavati)
archana.srivatsan@gmail.com
