Story of Savitribai Phule

Savitribai Phule

Savitri Jyotirao Phule was a social worker from Maharastra who fought against social discrimination in the nineteen century.

She was born into a farmers family in the year 1831 in Nalgaon. She had to accept the evil of child marriage at the age of nine to Jyotiroa Phule who was only twelve. Though she did not get the chance to go to school her husband who completed his education taught her to read and write and became the first teacher of the school that he opened to educate girls and the untouchables.

She is one of the few literate women of her times and the most famous social reformer of the 19th century who fought against gender bias and caste discrimination. Today she is known as the 'first generation modern Indian Feminist' worldwide as she was the one who brought the isolated weaker sex(girls who became widows in their childhood and had to lead a life of seclusion)into the mainstream and educated them. She advocated remarriage of these child widows for which she had to tolerate tough opposition from the orthodox high caste society.  

As she was childless, she adopted Yashwantrao the son of a brahmin widow who later grew up to be a doctor and served the people of his area. On the occasion of a plague epidemic that had gripped Nallaspora, Maharastra in the year 1897, both mother and son brought the patients to the clinic and Savitribai herself looked after them. While serving these patient she contacted the disease and died the same year.

She still lives in 'The Savitribai Phule award' that is given to women social reformers in Maharastra and in her poetries that cries against gender and caste discrimination. The University of Pune has been named after her as 'Savitribai Phule Pune University'. The 19th century woman social reformer has left behind a legacy of good reforms that still continues.