1/19/2018 Dakshayani Velayudhan, the first and only Dalit woman in the Constituent Assembly | The Indian Express

Home GenderAnd Dakshayani Velayudhan, the rst and only Dalit woman in the Constituent Assembly

Dakshayani
Velayudhan, the first
and only Dalit
woman in the
Constituent Assembly
Women Behind the
Constitution, a #GenderAnd
Special series will explore
the life, beliefs and politics
of 15 women who helped
draft the Constitution of Ishita Sengupta

India.

Updated: January 19, 2018 12:06 pm

Popular narratives of history have led us to believe that it was men alone who
were architects of the Indian Constitution. Among the 299 members of the
Constituent Assembly, 15 were women. Very little is known about them. They
came from different walks of life—lawyers, freedom fighters, politicians, and

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1/19/2018 Dakshayani Velayudhan, the first and only Dalit woman in the Constituent Assembly | The Indian Express

suffragettes. Led by Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar they discussed, debated and pu

forth their opinions while defining the principles that would guide the then
recently Independent India. The first in our series, Women Behind the
Constitution—Dakshayani Velayudhan, one of the youngest and the only Dalit
woman who helped shape the Constitution of India.

“Different points of history, of locations and identities define the life of my

mother,” says Meera Velayudhan, the 61-year-old daughter of Dakshayani
Velayudhan who is working on a yet to be published autobiography written by
her mother.

Dakshyani Velayudhan with members of the Constituent Assembly. (Source: Centre for Women’s Studies)

Born in 1912, in Mulavukad, a small island off the coast of Kochi, Velayudhan’s
life and politics was influenced and defined by the rigid caste system in Kerala
She belonged to the Pulaya community—considered to be the early inhabitant
Kerala, but subject to acute discrimination by the upper caste in the princely
states of Travancore and Cochin, in pre-Independence  India. According to Ash

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1/19/2018 Dakshayani Velayudhan, the first and only Dalit woman in the Constituent Assembly | The Indian Express

Mathew’s thesis Labour Participation And Social Mobility Among the Pulaya
Women of Rural Kerala, the Pulayas were mainly agricultural labourers. Sever
restrictions were imposed on them. They were prohibited from walking on the
public road and drawing water from the public well. Pulaya women could not
wear an upper garment. They were permitted to wear bead-necklaces to cover
their breasts. According to Report on Slavery by Indian Law Commissioner in
1841, societal restrictions imposed on them were so stringent that whenever
members of the community went out, they had to make their presence felt by
uttering a particular cry at every four or five paces. If answered by someone,
belonging to a superior caste, the former had to turn back.

By the time Velayudhan was born, movements against this virulent casteism h
begun. Pulaya reformers like Ayyankali had emboldened the community, but i
was a still long road ahead. Velayudhan has written about her early childhood
the forthcoming autobiography—“not born in a poor Pulaya family” and was
loved and favoured by her father in a family of five children. The change
Velayudhan would later come to be known for— being the first Dalit girl to we
an upper cloth and the first Dalit woman graduate in India — had already star
with her birth. At a time when Dalit girls were given “peculiar names like Azh
Poomala, Chakki, Kali, Kurumba, Thara, Kilipakka,” her parents named her
Dakshayani, meaning Durga or daughter of Daksha. “Pulaya and other Dalit
castes could only use certain kind of names,” Meera says, adding how her mot
mentions this facet in the book. “She wrote about about how Pulaya women us
to tell her that she had been given an Ezhava girl’s name.” Ezhava, though a
backward class, was considered above the Pulayas.

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The women in the Constituent Assembly (Source: Centre for Women’s Studies)

In her project, “Woman Architects of the Indian Republic”, Priya Ravichandran

writes about the discrimination and ill-treatment Velayudhan faced while
completing her Bachelor’s degree from the Madras University. She was the onl
girl student in the entire science department and an upper caste teacher refus
to show her the experiments. Velayudhan, who graduated in 1935, learnt it by
observing from a distance. This defiance and grit marked much of Velayudhan
life.

In her book, Velayudhan writes about an incident when as a teacher at a

government high school in Trichur district she met a Nair woman on the road
who demanded that Velayudhan make way. Owing to the way people from the
Pulaya community were treated this was still prevalent. There were paddy fiel
on both sides along the road. Velayudhan refused and remained defiantly
steadfast. “I told her directly on her face, if you want to go past me, you may g
down into the field and go,” she writes. The field was four to five feet below th

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road level.” The woman was ultimately compelled to get down on the field and
walk,” she writes.

Dakshyani with her husband (Source: Meera Velayudhan)

In 1942, she was nominated to Cochin Legislative Council seat and in 1946 to th
Constituent Assembly becoming the first and the only Dalit woman in the
gathering.  Her belief was that “a Constituent Assembly not only frames a
constitution, but also gives the people a new framework of life.” A staunch
follower of Gandhi, she strongly opposed untouchability but believed that as lo
as it was practised, the word Harijan (popularised by Gandhi ) would remain
irrelevant. She refused to view Dalits as minorities and believed that “[t]he
Harijans are Indians and they have to live in India as Indians and they will liv
India as Indians.”  Velayudhan placed the struggles of her community ahead o
her gender, unmistakably evident in her impassioned speech at the Constituen
Assembly where she didn’t speak as a Pulaya woman but hoped to see “no
barriers based on caste or community” in the Indian Republic. She was
vociferous in her support for Article 17 of the Constitution of India that abolish

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1/19/2018 Dakshayani Velayudhan, the first and only Dalit woman in the Constituent Assembly | The Indian Express

untouchability and forbids its practice in any form. Often told by other membe
that she asked too many questions, Velayudhan’s presence among other femal
members in the Constituent Assembly, like Vijaylakshmi Pandit, Sarojini Naidu
many of whom came from privilege, was a telling sight in itself.

Velayudhan’s political, social and personal realm was dotted by independent

thought and opinion. Unlike her mother and her elder siblings, she did not
convert to Christianity. In 1940 when she married Dalit leader Raman Kelan
Velayudhan, the ceremony, attended by Mahatma Gandhi and Kasturba, was
officiated by a leper as a priest.

Wedding photograph of Dakshyani Velayudhan with Dalit leader R Velayudhan (Source: Meera Velayudhan)

A firebrand, Velayudhan, was deeply involved in her home and family. She wr
long letters to her daughter, that were a guiding force. “I was always proud of
background, confident of my abilities and never felt downtrodden, ” Meera say
while recollecting the impact her mother’s fearless thinking had on her . “Whe
started my menstruation, I was nine, during holidays, she sketched and

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1/19/2018 Dakshayani Velayudhan, the first and only Dalit woman in the Constituent Assembly | The Indian Express

explained what was happening to the body and asked my father to get some
sanitary pads to take to school,” Meera says.

Velayudhan did not actively pursue electoral politics. “She was more comforta
working in the slums of Munirka (Delhi) among sweeper women. After holdin
one of the early national conference of Dalit women in Delhi, mainly
Ambedkarites, she formed a women’s organisation, Mahila Jagriti Parishad
(1977),” the daughter adds.

At five feet, Velayudhan was “unassuming and serious” and walked with a slig
slouch, Meera says. It came during the early years in Mulavukad, when she an
others from her community walked with their head down and backs hunched
But the value of standing tall, head held high and striving in the face of great
adversity was never lost on her. Meera remembers an innocuous incident, wh
studying at night, “ I was preparing for an exam, possibly all slouched, with a
flask of coffee to keep awake. When she saw me sitting like that, she patted me
the back and said sit straight.” And perhaps, therein lies Dakshayini Velayudha
greatest contribution, not just for the Dalit community, but for a nation, standi
one’s ground and holding our head high.

(#GenderAnd is dedicated to the coverage of Gender across intersections. Follo

our work here)

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