Making History
Monoroma Basu, an Active Participant of Anti British Movements
Monoroma Basu (1897-1986) is a woman political activist of the then Bengal, now Bangladesh, who directly got involved with Anti-British Movements and contributed to the independence of the Indian Subcontinent from the British Colonial Rule. Popularly known as Monoroma Basu Mashima, she was born in Barisal to Nilkantha Roy and Ramada Sundari. At the age of 14, she was married to Chintaharan Basu, a zamindar of the village of Bakai in Barisal. While living in Barisal, Manorama took an active interest in the freedom movement and set up a branch of Sarojnalini Mahila Samiti for safeguarding women's rights. This was the first women's organization in Bangladesh. In 1930 she became a Congress worker. She joined the Non-Cooperation Movement and was imprisoned for her political activities in 1932.
Though Monoroma Basu did not get any institutional education, she was very liberal in her thoughts and activities. Considering the conservative zamindar family as detrimental for proper upbringing of her children and for her active involvement in political activities, she left the village and started living in Barisal town. Soon after coming to town, she joined the Swadeshi Movement (movement for patronizing home industries and boycotting of foreign goods). When Congress Barisal Branch was set up in 1920 with Aswini Kumar Dutta as the President, she joined the Congress, the political party playing a pivotal role in the Indian independence movement and started working with women activists of the Indian Congress Party.
In 1930, the Civil Disobedience Movement started. Monoroma Basu was arrested for civil disobedience and was kept in jail for six months. During that time, she came in close contact with other prominent women congress leaders, like Urmila Debi (sister of Desh Bondhu Chitta Ranjan) and Jotirmoyee Debi.
Parallel to her direct involvement with mainstream political activities, she also worked for establishing women's rights. She started a branch of Sarojnalini Mahila Samiti, an organization for women's rights. Through this women's association, she worked for establishing economic self-reliance of women by training them on sewing and other small industry related activities. However, after joining the Independence Movement directly, Monoroma Basu changed the pattern of activities of the Samity. Instead of working on sewing, along with samity members, she went door to door to raise funds and started to work on charka (spinning wheel) and handloom (tant) as part of swadeshi movement. She utilized the forum of this women's association to motivate women to join the Anti-British Movement.
However, her political participation didn't stop even after 1947 when British India became independent, as People's aspirations didn't come true. Public life experienced new turmoil with the bad and repressive governance of the new government. In such a time, in 1948, Monoroma Basu led the procession to the District Administrator's office to protest the high rise of daily commodities. Police charged batons on the processions and arrested 4 women leaders including Monoroma Basu. All of them were sentenced to 1 year rigorous imprisonment. Though she was freed after one year imprisonment, she was kept in detention for the period 1948-1952 under the Security Law. Again in 1954, when political turmoil started in the then East Pakistan, government issued arrest order against many political activists. This forced her to go into hiding. When she was able to move about freely, she devoted herself to the work of the Matrimandir Asram for the destitute women of the society that she built earlier. She bequeathed all her property to the Matrimandir to help run its activities after her death in 1986. She also established a model primary school, Pallikalyan Amrta Pathagar, and a playhouse for children. Basu played a prominent role in the people's movements of 1962 and 1964 as well as in the uprising of 1969. She also played a pioneering role in the liberation struggle of Bangladesh. Dedicated to the cause of socialism, she spoke boldly against social and political wrongs.
