India’s Women Unsung Heroes of Freedom Struggle

India’s Women Unsung Heroes of Freedom Struggle

Part of: Prelims and Mains GS-I: Modern India, India’s Freedom movement

In news: A pictorial book on India’s 75 Women Unsung Heroes of Freedom Struggle as part of Azadi ka Mahotsav has been released in partnership with Amar Chitra Katha.

• Rani Abakka, the Queen of Ullal, Karnataka fought and defeated the mighty Portuguese in the 16th century.  
• Velu Nachiyar, the queen of Sivaganga was the first Indian queen to wage war against the British East India Company.  
• Jhalkari Bai, was a woman soldier who grew to become one of the key advisors to the Rani of Jhansi and a prominent figure in the First War of Indian Independence, 1857.
• Matangini Hazra was a brave freedom fighter from Bengal, who laid down her life while agitating against the British. 
• Gulab Kaur was a freedom fighter who abandoned her own hopes and dreams of a life abroad to fight for and mobilise the Indian people against the British Raj. 
• Chakali Ilamma was a revolutionary woman who fought against the injustice of zamindars during the Telangana rebellion in the mid-1940s. 
• Padmaja Naidu, the daughter of Sarojini Naidu and a freedom fighter in her own right, who would later become Governor of West Bengal and a humanitarian after Independence.
• Bishni Devi Shah, a woman who inspired large number of people in Uttarakhand to join the freedom movement. 
• Subhadra Kumari Chauhan was one of the greatest Hindi poets, who was also a prominent figure in the freedom movement. 
• Durgawati Devi was the brave woman who provided safe passage to Bhagat Singh after the killing of John Saunders and much more during her revolutionary days. 
• Sucheta Kripalani, a prominent freedom fighter, became independent India’s first woman Chief Minister of UP Government.
• Accamma Cherian, an inspirational leader of the freedom movement in Travancore, Kerala, she was given the name ‘Jhansi Rani of Tranvancore’ by Mahatma Gandhi. 
• Aruna Asaf Ali was an inspirational freedom fighter who is perhaps best remembered for hoisting the Indian National flag in Mumbai during the Quit India Movement in 1942. 
• Durgabai Deshmukh, a tireless worker for the emancipation of women in Andhra Pradesh, she was also an eminent freedom fighter and member of the Constituent Assembly.  
• Rani Gaidinliu, the Naga spiritual and political leader, led an armed uprising against the British in Manipur, Nagaland and Assam. 
• Usha Mehta was a freedom fighter from a very young age, who is remembered for organizing an underground radio station during the Quit India Movement of 1942.
• Parbati Giri, one of Odisha’s most prominent women freedom fighters, was called the Mother Teresa of Western Odisha for her work in the upliftment of her people. 
• Tarkeshwari Sinha, a prominent freedom fighter during the Quit India Movement, she went on to become an eminent politician in the early decades of independent India. 
• Snehlata Varma, a freedom fighter and tireless worker for the education and upliftment of women in Mewar, Rajasthan. 
• Tileshwari Baruah, one of India’s youngest martyrs, she was shot at the age of 12 by the British, during the Quit India Movement, when she and some freedom fighters tried to unfurl the Tricolour atop a police station.

News Source: PIB