Madam Bhikhaiji Cama | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Born | (1861-09-24)24 September 1861 |
| Died | 13 August 1936(1936-08-13) (aged 74) |
| Organisation(s) | India House, Paris Indian Society, Indian National Congress |
| Movement | Indian independence movement |
| Spouse | |
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Bhikhaiji Rustom Cama[n 1] (24 September 1861 – 13 August 1936) or simply as,Madam Cama, was one of the prominent figures in theIndian independence movement.[1] She unfurled one of the earliest versions offlag of independent India on August 22, 1907 and she was the first person to hoist an Indian flag in a foreign nation, at the International Socialist Conference atStuttgart.[2]
Bhikaiji Cama was born in Bombay (nowMumbai) in a large, affluentParsiZoroastrian family.[3] Her parents, Sorabji Framji Patel and Jaijibai Sorabji Patel, were well known in the city, where her father Sorabji—alawyer by training and amerchant by profession—was an influential member of the Parsi community.
Like many Parsi girls of the time, Bhikhaiji attendedAlexandra Girls' English Institution.[4][5] Bhikhaiji was by all accounts a diligent, disciplined child with a flair for languages.[1] She also excelled at cricket.[6]
On 3 August 1885 at Bombay,[7] she married Rustomji Cama, who was the son ofK. R. Cama,[8] and from a loyalist family.[9] Her husband was a wealthy, pro-British lawyer who aspired to enter politics. It was not a compatible or happy marriage,[7] and Bhikhaiji spent most of her time and energy in philanthropic activities and social work.[10]
In October 1896, theBombay Presidency was hit first by famine, and shortly thereafter bybubonic plague. Cama joined one of the many teams of nurses working out ofGrant Medical College (which would subsequently becomeHaffkine's plague vaccine research centre), in an effort to provide care for the afflicted, and (later) to inoculate the healthy. Cama subsequently contracted the plague herself but survived. As she was severely weakened, she was sent to Britain for medical care in 1902.[1]
She was preparing to return to India in 1904 when she came in contact withShyamji Krishna Varma, who was well known in London's Indian community for fiery nationalist speeches he gave inHyde Park.[1] Through him, she metDadabhai Naoroji, thenpresident of theBritish Committee of the Indian National Congress and a strong critic of the British’s economic policy in India. She work as Naoroji's private secretary.[1] She also campaigneed with other nationalists such as Bipin Chander Pal,Lala Hardayal andVinayak Damondar Savarkaar.[11]
Together with Naoroji andSingh Rewabhai Rana, Cama supported the founding of Varma'sIndian Home Rule Society in February 1905.[1] InLondon, she was told that her return to India would be prevented unless she refrained from continuing these nationalist activities in India.[12] She refused.[10]
That same year Cama relocated to Paris, where, together with Rana andMunchershah Burjorji Godrej, she co-founded theParis Indian Society.[1] Together with other notable members of the movement for Indiansovereignty living in exile, Cama wrote, published (in the Netherlands and Switzerland) and distributed revolutionary literature for the movement,[13] includingBande Mataram (founded in response to theCrown ban on the nationalist poemVande Mataram)[12] and laterMadan's Talwar (in response to the execution ofMadan Lal Dhingra).[7] These weeklies were banned in Britain and India,[10] and were smuggled into India through the French colony ofPondichéry.[11] Cama also sent revolvers concealed in Christmas toys to patriots in India.[14][6]
On 22 August 1907, Cama attended thesecond Socialist Congress at Stuttgart,Germany, where she described the devastating effects of a famine that had struck the Indian subcontinent. In her appeal for human rights, equality and autonomy from Great Britain, she was the first person to unfurl what she called the "Flag of Indian Independence".[9][12][n 2] It has been speculated that this moment may have been an inspiration to African American writers and intellectualsW. E. B. Du Bois in writing his 1928 novelDark Princess.[15] Cama's flag, a modification of theCalcutta Flag, was co-designed by Cama, and would later serve as one of the templates from which the currentnational flag of India was created.
After the second Socialist Congress at Stuttgart, Cama travelled to America to raise awareness of the Indian nationalist campaign and non-cooperation movement. Her activities in the United States included addressing members of theMinerva Club in New York.[16] She returned to England in 1908.[14]
In 1909, following Dhingra'sassassination ofWilliam Hutt Curzon Wyllie, an aide to theSecretary of State for India,Scotland Yard arrested several key activists living in Great Britain, The BritishGovernment requested Cama'sextradition, but the French Government refused to cooperate. In return, the British Government seized Cama's inheritance.Lenin reportedly invited her to reside in the Soviet Union, but she declined.[17]
Influenced byChristabel Pankhurst and thesuffragette movement, Cama was vehement in her support forgender equality and she often stressed on the role of Indian women in building the nation.[1][6] Speaking inCairo,Egypt in 1910, she asked, "I see here the representatives of only half the population of Egypt. May I ask where is the other half? Sons ofEgypt, where are the daughters of Egypt? Where are your mothers and sisters? Your wives and daughters?" and "the hand that rocks the cradle is the hand that moulds the character. That soft hand is the chief factor in the national life."[14] Cama's stance with respect to the vote for women was, however, secondary to her position onIndian independence; in 1920, upon meetingHerabai Tata andMithan Tata, twoParsi women outspoken on the issue of the right to vote, Cama is said to have sadly shaken her head and observed: "'Work for Indian's freedom and [i]ndependence. When India is independent women will not only [have] the right to [v]ote, but all other rights.'"[18]
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With the outbreak ofWorld War I in 1914, France and Britain became allies, and all the members of Paris India Society except Cama and Singh Rewabhai Rana left the country (Cama had been advised by fellow-socialistJean Longuet to go to Spain withM.P. Tirumal Acharya). She and Rana were briefly arrested in October 1914 when they tried to agitate amongPunjab Regiment troops that had just arrived in Marseilles on their way to thefront. They were required to leave Marseilles, and Cama then moved to Rana's wife's house inArcachon, nearBordeaux. Cama continued to maintain active contacts with Indian, Irish, and Egyptian revolutionaries as well as with French Socialists and Russian leadership.[1]
In January 1915, the French government deported Rana and his whole family to theCaribbean island ofMartinique, and Cama was sent toVichy, where she was interned. In bad health, she was released in November 1917 and permitted to return toBordeaux provided that she report weekly to the local police. Following the war, Cama returned to her home at 25, Rue de Ponthieu in Paris.
Cama remained in exile in Europe until 1935,[9][11] when, gravely ill and paralyzed by a stroke that she had suffered earlier that year, she petitioned the British government throughSir Cowasji Jehangir to be allowed to return home. Writing from Paris on 24 June 1935, she acceded to the requirement that she renounce seditionist activities. Accompanied by Jehangir, she arrived in Bombay in November 1935 and died nine months later, aged 74, at Parsi General Hospital on 13 August 1936.[19][16]
Cama bequeathed most of her personal assets to the Avabai Petit Orphanage for girls, now the Bai Avabai Framji Petit Girls' High School, which established a trust in her name.[1] Rs. 54,000 (1936: £39,300; $157,200) went to her family'sfire temple, the Framji Nusserwanjee Patel Agiary atMazgaon, in South Bombay.[21]
Several Indian cities have streets and places named after Cama, or Madame Cama as she is also known. On 26 January 1962, India's 11thRepublic Day, the Indian Posts and Telegraphs Department issued a commemorative stamp in her honour.[20]
In 1997, theIndian Coast Guard commissioned a Priyadarshini-class fast patrol vesselICGS Bikhaiji Cama after Bikhaiji Cama.
A high-rise office complex in the posh location of South Delhi which accommodates major Government Offices and companies such as Punjab National Bank,EPFO, Jindal Group,SAIL,GAIL,EIL etc. is named as Bhikaji Cama Place in tribute to her.
Following Cama's 1907 Stuttgart address, the flag she raised there was smuggled intoBritish India byIndulal Yagnik and is now on display at the Maratha and Kesari Library inPune, Maharashtra. In 2004, politicians of theBJP, India's political party, attempted to identify a later design (from the 1920s) as the flag Cama raised in Stuttgart.[22] The flag Cama raised – misrepresented as "original national Tricolour" – has an (Islamic) crescent and a (Hindu) sun, which the later design does not have.
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