Women In The Indian Nationalist Consciousness

Abstract

In the nationalist project of constructing the new Indian nation, the nationalist consciousness intersects and interacts with several social axes like the question of ethnicity, caste, religion, language and gender. Despite varied definitions of ‘nationalism’ and obvious disparities in modern nationalist projects since the nineteenth century nation-building era, a common link that runs through all nationalist projects is the idea that the national state is essentially a masculinist institution (Joanne Nagel) and examined through the purview of gender politics. Indian nationalism, like other modern nationalisms, can also be read as a masculinist project. This paper is an attempt to examine how the socio-cultural revolutions posed against British colonial cultural hegemony in the 19^th century Bengal as well as Gandhi’s notions regarding women’s participation in political life of his times inherently posit a deep-rooted masculinist worldview.