Having worked for more than a decade with the United Nations, Kamla Bhasin is still on her toes. The 71-year-old poet and author is more popularly known for being a feminist activist. Having finished her school education in three different villages in Rajasthan, Bhasin completed her M.A. in Economics from Rajasthan University before leaving for Muenster University in West Germany for a fellowship. Though she is popularly known for her thoughts and her work in the field of social work, Kamla Bhasin claims that she is not an academician or thinker.
Where it all started
Talking about school days, Kamla says that she did not learn much. Calling it rote-learning, Ms. Bhasin claims that it was life lessons that school and college taught her, and not academics.
While in school, Kamla started noticing gender bias. “I am not in contact with any of my school friends and that is because the majority of them did not go to college. Even in college, I had very few friends because girls were not allowed to make their own friends. They were instructed to head straight home after college. After college, they were all married,” says Kamla.
She goes on to narrate more events from her school. “There weren’t many girls in my schools. Those who came were dressed in sarees. I was the only one dressed in frocks,” she says. “I used to go out and play with the boys of our neighborhood but no other girl did this till Class X. I realised that girls did not have freedom and I did not like it,” said Ms. Bhasin.
A return home
After school, Kamla put all her efforts into her college grades as she intended to go to Germany for a fellowship programme. After that, she taught at the Orientation Centre of the German Foundation for Developing Countries for about a year.
“It was in Germany that I learnt how to analyse. Spending two years studying in Germany was what made me realise how things work. I became a conscious socialist there. It was then that I got a chance to look at my country,” says Kamla.
Kamla came back to India to implement what she learnt and help the population of India. She worked for four years in Rajasthan — the most drought affected years. At that time, she started working on water. “I realised that while the wells of the poor were being hit by drought, the money being supplied by the government was going to the rich. I understood Karl Marx’s theories at that point of life.” Kamla started her work in India from there and decades later she is still helping people of the country through various organisations.
Message to youngsters
Kamla says that she does not know much about the current education system. However, seeing children carrying such heavy bags and spending their days behind books and nights behind computer screens is something that disheartens her.
When asked if she would like to share some memory of her school days as advice for youngsters, Kamla recalls, “We used to learn Sanskrit from a pundit and Urdu in the next period from a Muslim teacher. We never thought of them as different and that was beautiful. So before you become a Hindu or Muslim or Indian or Pakistani, become a human.”