Jerusha Jhirad

A doctor with laser focus on maternal health

The career path of Jerusha Jhirad (1891-1984) in obstetrics and gynaecology is a clear indication of how early influences in one’s life affect the choices one makes in later years, often subconsciously. This is the story of a physician and a pioneer of maternal health in India who forged her way at a time when deaths due to preventable causes were appallingly high. 

Jerusha Jhirad

Many firsts to her credit

Jerusha was the first recipient of a Government of India scholarship to study medicine in England. Dr. Jhirad was the first Indian to serve as Medical Officer at The Cama and Albless Hospitals for Women and Children, Mumbai from 1928 to 1947, the previous incumbents had only been British. 

Early life

Jerusha Jhirad was from the minuscule community of Bene Israel Jews in India. She was born in Shivamogga, Karnataka in 1890 in a family of six children. Her father managed his father-in-law’s coffee estate and Jerusha’s early idyllic childhood was spent there amidst nature.

She was homeschooled with her siblings by her parents but was soon on her way for higher classes to a boarding school in Pune, Huzurpaga School for Girls.

 

At home, in the meanwhile, disaster struck in the form of the insect called ‘Planter’s Pest’ that decimated the coffee estate, which had to be abandoned. Jerusha’s family moved, with her father finding employment in the Railways and her mother and siblings living in Pune. 

The silver lining in the dark cloud hovering over the family was that Jerusha’s grandfather sponsored her education while she was at school. But soon she won enough scholarships to pay her own way through her education. Jerusha’s single-minded aim ensured she was motivated to excel at school, at Grant Medical College in Mumbai and her medical studies in England.  

As a child Jerusha had vowed to herself to work as an obstetrician and gynaecologist at the Cama Hospital at Mumbai where her older sister’s life had been saved, even as her newborn twins had died. Cama Hospital for Women was also entirely staffed by women. 

Another incident that impacted Jerusha was when her brother-in-law’s sister bled to death after childbirth, because of a lack of female doctors. The patient’s mother would not admit the male doctor into the room and he could only verbally instruct the midwife and the nurse from another room, which was inadequate care. This episode brought home to Jerusha the vital need for female obstetricians and gynaecologists.

Stellar academic record and work experience

Jerusha graduated from Grant Medical College in 1912. Her superb academic record ensured she won a majority of the prizes at college that year. Jerusha had now become the first woman from the Bene-Israel community to become a doctor.

After graduation Jerusha set up private practice in Mumbai since Resident positions were not open for women. In her rented rooms her first patients were Arab women. As her practice grew because of her medical skills, so did her confidence.  

 

Her aim was to get an MD degree from London but the qualification for that was that she had to be a Medical Officer. Also scholarships for MD was only available for male students. A Tata loan scholarship for MD at the London School of Medicine for Women came to her rescue. Six months into the programme she got a scholarship from the Bombay government of 200 pounds per annum for five years, as a special case.

Jerusha was in London studying medicine as World War I raged. Due to the war there was a shortage of doctors, who had signed up and were at the war front. This opened up rare work opportunities for qualified female doctors, even if they were Indian. Jerusha worked as obstetric assistant and house surgeon at hospitals in England, gaining experience. She could now apply for MD since the condition of at least 6 months residential post could now be fulfilled.

Wider outreach than only medical help

Upon graduating she returned to India in 1920 and was felicitated by a group of Bene-Israel women for her accomplishments. 

Many of these women were living largely isolated lives in the restrictive confines of a traditional family structure with their in-laws, without avenues to explore their personalities and talents. Jerusha created a Stree Mandal, women’s association. It became a venue for informal meetings, lighthearted entertainment, daily afternoon classes of cooking, languages, needlework which led to employment opportunities for many of the women who had not studied further due to marriage or poverty. Stree Mandal was open to all women.

Unexpected stumbling block

Now she was back in India with an MD in Obstetrics and Gynaecology from the University of London, a first for an Indian woman. Jerusha applied at the one hospital in which she had always aspired to work - Cama Hospital - but was rejected. They did not hire Indians. 

Undeterred at being rejected for her nationality in her own country inspite of all her qualifications and work experience Jerusha worked at other hospitals in Mumbai, Delhi and Bengaluru. At Bengaluru she developed services for pregnant women, trained nurses and midwives. Some wealthy patients donated for a labour room and an operation theatre. Some even volunteered to work with mothers and babies. 

Jerusha reapplied at Cama Hospital in 1925. This time, her stellar reputation at work saw her being accepted. Three years later she was Medical Officer at Cama Hospital. Medical officers are senior physicians who manage all aspects related to patient care within their departments.  

Her life’s work - at Cama Hospital and elsewhere

Dr. Jhirad was at Cama for nearly 20 years. In addition to her regular duties at the hospital, Jerusha was deeply involved in improving medical facilities in slums to lower infant mortality. In 1937 and 1938 she published a study on maternal mortality in Mumbai. She had lived through the daily experiences of a young female medical student, so Jerusha was instrumental in improving hostel facilities for them so they would be encouraged to pursue their medical studies in Mumbai. She was among the first in India to insist upon international safety regulations in hospitals here.

Dr. Jhirad advocated for training traditional midwives and dais in modern medicine for the safety of the mother and child. These women were an asset in rural areas where medical facilities were non-existent. She was against blindly following the practices of western medicine and felt methods had to be evolved to accommodate Indian ways.

On her 80th birthday, a post-graduate library was established at Cama in her name. This was befitting since she had always been particular about doctors and nurses at Cama being up to date with the latest medical information. She had also persuaded the government to give grants for subscriptions to journals and books.

 

In 1934 Dr. Jhirad provided medical assistance during the earthquake in Bihar which was among the worst in Indian history. Of the magnitude of 8.0 on the Richter Scale it flattened entire towns in Bihar and Nepal. She was contacted by Dr. Rajendra Prasad, later President of India, to help women in purdah. Dr. Jhirad and her team spent a month in Bihar.

Dr. Jhirad was fond of teaching so held special classes on weekday evenings and the weekends. She was on the medical faculty of the universities of Mumbai, Vadodara and Pune. She was an examiner for MBBS and MD exams at Mumbai, Chennai and Pune universities. 

Even after retirement, and living with her sister Leah in Dahisar in Mumbai, Dr. Jhirad continued to consult a few days in a week. Her concerns and work for maternal health, childcare centres, maternity leave, rescue homes and child aid societies continued unabated.

Dr. Jhirad’s published on topics close to her heart - maternal mortality, obstetrics, gynaecology and careers in medicine for Indian women.

Dr. Jerusha Jhirad's contemporaries mentioned that high standards of professional work, tact, sympathy, administrative ability and surgical skill were her hallmarks.

Much-deserved recognition

Dr. Jerusha Jhirad was founding member and elected president of Bombay Obstetric and Gynaecological Society, president of the Federation of Obstetric and Gynaecological Societies of India (FOGSI), and from 1947 to 1957 president of the Association of Medical Women in India (AMWI). In 1947, she was elected a Fellow of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists. In 1950 she presided at the 6th All India Obstetric and Gynaecological Congress, held in Chennai. 

She was awarded Padma Shri (civilian award of the Republic of India) for her services to society and MBE (a British honour given by their monarch for a particular achievement).

Interests apart from medicine

Dr. Jhirad was a pioneer of Progressive Judaism in India, having learnt about it when she was in England. This was Judaism adapted to modern times in which women could participate more than in traditional Judaism. She founded a religious congregation and a reform synogogue with her sister Leah in Mumbai, and organised activities for Jewish teenagers. 

Dr Jhirad passed away at the grand old age of 93 in 1984 after a lifetime of breaking barriers of race and gender, and creating a path for young Indian women doctors after her.

And here’s something unique befitting a pioneer such as Dr. Jerusha Jhirad. The International Astronomical Union, the worldwide union of astronomers names astronomical bodies after women who have made significant contributions in their fields. Venus now has a crater 50 kilometers wide named Jhirad.

Ref:

1. Women Scientists in India: Lives, Struggles and Achievements - Anjana Chattopadhyay

2. Fabulous Female Physicians - Sharon L. Krish

3. Unstoppable - Gayathri Ponvannan

4. https://nbtindia.gov.in/writereaddata/freebooks/pdf/Women.pdf

5. Ramanna M. A pioneer of maternal health: Jerusha Jhirad, 1890–1983. Natl Med J India 2019;32:243-246

Perin Naoroji Captain - A Life Dedicated to India's Freedom

Family Background
Perin Naoroji Captain was the granddaughter of the scholar-politician Dadabhai Naoroji, the Grand Old Man of India. He was one of the founders of the Indian National Congress, and thrice its president. Naoroji was a British MP as a member of the House of Commons. 

Perin was born at Mandvi in Kutch, Gujarat on 12 October 1888. Her father Ardeshir was a doctor and Dadabhai Naoroji’s son. He died when she was yet five years old. Perin came from a large family of eight children, many of whom took up the nationalist cause. She married the eminent lawyer DS Captain in 1925. The couple did not have children. 

Perin Naoroji Captain

The Beginnings 

As a student at Sorbonne in Paris Perin met the nationalist Bhikaiji Cama who lived there in self-exile, and was a close associate of VD Savarkar. At the time Cama was deeply involved in trying for the release of Savarkar who was in prison at London for defying the British. Perin became a close friend of Kamala Nehru there. 

Later Perin and Savarkar attended the first Egyptian National Congress at Brussels. In London Perin and her sister Gosi worked with Polish organisations against Czarist Russia and learnt from a Polish revolutionary to use firearms and assemble bombs. This activity brought her under surveillance by the British, but that did not deter her. It is interesting that despite this early exposure to how violence was being used in other parts of the world Perin, Gosi and another sister Nurgis (the Captain sisters who married three brothers) turned completely to non-violence as the path to follow under the influence of Mahatma Gandhi.

In 1911 Perin returned to India. She met Mahatma Gandhi in 1915 and became convinced that his approach to securing India’s freedom from British rule was the right one. From 1920 she took to wearing khadi and began working for the nationalist cause in right earnest. In 1921 she was one of a group that established the Rashtriya Stree Sabha, a nationalist wormen’s organisation run on Gandhian principles.  

Public Life

The Civil Disobedience Movement

The Civil Disobedience Movement in 1930 was a watershed moment in the history of the struggle for freedom in India. This movement was the method that the Indian National Congress decided was the means to attain Purna Swaraj (complete independence). The movement spread all over India. In Bengal Matangini Hazra was one of the prominent activists.

Perin Captain’s leadership qualities saw her playing an active role in many other areas, but the Civil Disobedience Movement was a defining episode in her public life.

Perin Captain addressing a political meeting on Chowpatty Beach in Bombay, 1930 Source: Women of India, Tara Ali Baig

Perin had had a long association of social and political work with stalwarts working in the field, well before the call for Civil Disobedience by Gandhi. Although from an influential family and well known to the leading lights of the era, Perin was a Congress worker who served the country by taking part in the big issues of the day. She was a hands-on political worker, did not shy away from the hurly-burly of public engagement and underwent multiple jail terms like most national leaders at the time.

During the Civil Disobedience Movement Perin with several other women under Desh Sevika Sangh played a prominent role in going from shop to shop in Bombay asking the owners not to sell imported cloth. Thus far the colonizers had crippled Indian weavers and the textile segment by exporting raw cotton and importing textiles into India. This boycott of British textiles in India was a direct hit at manufactured goods from Britain. The group also made continuous appeals to shoppers to participate in the Swadeshi movement and not buy imported fabric. In the first ten months of 1930 as many as 17,000 women were convicted for this activity. Closing shops was unlawful, and now shopkeepers were also arrested along with the women for boycott of foreign goods.

Her Arrest and its Aftermath

3rd July 1930 was the fourth day of Boycott Week in Bombay. There were crowds on the streets shouting boycott slogans, lorryloads of volunteers passing around flags and pamphlets to boycott British goods, house to house collection of Swadeshi pledges (2,00,000 pledges had been signed thus far). Mahatma Gandhi sent Perin a cable to “alert Congress to scrupulously avoid all violence, direct indirect passive or active” by any of the picketers. Perin replied that the instruction would be carried out. The Bombay Chronicle of 4 July 1930 reported the arrest of Perin that morning as she was setting out to the Congress office for a day’s work. She ‘cheerfully submitted to the officers’ who came to her home. 

Once the news of her arrest spread, the Municipal Corporation of Bombay adjourned, the Sugar Merchants’ Association passed an unanimous resolution to boycott British refined sugar,  and other merchant associations went with the boycott. 

The Municipal Corporation of Bombay passed a resolution that “Mrs. Captain was an accomplished lady and was a grand-daughter of the late Dadabhai Naoroji popularly known as the Grand Old Man of India. Mrs. Captain was a lady of sound and sober views and took her education in England. It was Mr. Dadabhai Naoroji who first started the idea of swaraj for India and Mrs. Captain took her education in England under the guidance of her revered grandfather. Self sacrifice and service were the mottos of her life and she was acting upto her honest conviction with courage.” 

When Perin and other women activists were released from prison, a mile long chain of about 5,000 women led by Sevikas welcomed them back. There were crowds of women reportedly 10,000 strong at both ends of the parade. Such active participation of women in the freedom struggle was in part possible because of the example and the leadership of Perin and her compatriots.  

The struggle for freedom - The Implications for women

The wholehearted participation of women gave as much a fillip to the women’s emancipation movement as it did to the struggle for freedom. The women volunteers in the non-cooperation and civil disobedience movements had a huge impact on the general perception about women’s capabilities. The menfolk were in prison so the women took charge. Women from the most aristocratic and orthodox families to the poorest participated. They took not just the British administration but even their own menfolk by surprise. This participation opened up avenues for social and political rights for women. 

As the Congress party was in the forefront of the struggle, Perin and her sisters were in the thick of all party activities in Bombay (now Mumbai). Perin became the first woman president of the Bombay Provincial Congress Committee in 1932. 

For better clarity of purpose and organisation, many smaller bodies were merged into the Gandhi Seva Sena of which Perin became the Honorary General Secretary, a post she held until her death. The Gandhi Seva Sena promoted khadi by selling rural and khadi products from their stores. One store is still in business in Mumbai selling herbal cosmetics, oil and pulses.

Khadi, also known as khaddar, was originally from Eastern India but eventually was woven by people from all over the country. It is handwoven cloth made of natural fibre, mainly cotton, but also to a lesser degree of silk and wool. It is traditionally woven with the spinning wheel, the charkha. During the freedom movement Khadi became the symbol of India’s resistance to imported cloth and of self-reliance. Today Khadi has had a rejuvenation and is also used by fashion designers in high-end clothing. 

Greater Responsibility

In 1937 the Congress Party came to power in eleven provinces in the provincial elections held under the Government of India Act 1935. These were Madras, The Central Provinces, Sindh, Punjab, Bengal, Bihar, Orissa, NWFP, Assam, Bombay Presidency and United Provinces. This development raised expectations of a greater role for the party in the future and the need to prepare for it. The Indian National Congress formed a National Planning Committee with Jawaharlal Nehru as Chairman. Perin was member of the sub-committee ‘Women’s Role in a Planned Economy’ with several others who were active in the freedom movement and in women’s associations. The committee  debated and planned policy for issues such as women’s social, economic and political status, education, marriage, maternity and succession. The committee’s report was absolutely clear that the position of women should be on an equal footing to that of men in the India of the future. 

After India’s Independence

Perin was appointed Chief Commissioner of Bharat Guides and had a hand in voluntary social welfare work among young girls. She was honoured with the Padma Sri in 1954, the first batch of civil awards presented in independent India. 

Perin Naoroji Captain died in Jahangir Nursing Home, Pune in 1958.

Reference 

1. Gandhi, Women and the National Movement 1920-47 - Anup Taneja

2. Women in Satyagraha - Aparna Basu

3. Gandhi’s Passion. The life and legacy of Mahatma Gandhi - Stanley Wolpert

4. The Bombay Chronicle, 4 July 1930

5. https://dinyarpatel.com/naoroji/family/

Saalamarada Thimmakka - The Power of One for the Environment

Environment Crusader

The environment is the focus all over the world like never before. Greening our surroundings, halting climate change are no longer buzzwords about the future, but the need of the present, here and now. Here is one individual who did not start her mission of planting trees with any lofty ideals or with any thoughts of grabbing headlines or making a statement. Thimmakka is known today for the nearly 400 Saalamara, Banyan Tree in Kannada, that she planted for a length of 4-5 kilometers from her village Hulikal to Kudur in Karnataka. But that is not all. Thimmakka has planted about 8,000 trees in over 80 years.  

Saalamarada Thimmakka

A difficult beginning

For many years, the tree planting was a joint effort by her and her husband Bekal Chikkayya. Thimmakka never went to school and had begun to work even as a ten year old. Soon, as was the custom she was also married. Thimmakka and her husband Bekal Chikkayya spent their lives in poverty as labourers at a quarry. They remained childless after many years of marriage. The thought of planting trees and looking after them like children grew from wanting to nurture, to parent.

Why the Banyan of all the trees? Because it’s saplings were easily available at the time and it was a hardy, local species that could be easily grafted. The Banyan is a shade-giving tree and hosts bird life and insects that love its deep foliage and its fruit, the Fig. Thimmakka and her husband planted the saplings in the monsoon. They looked after the young saplings by carrying water for them in two pots from their well, twice a week. It was a walk over four kilometers each time. They then built a thorny fence around each sapling to ward off animals. Some of those trees are now over 70 years old. This level of care for over 80 years is surely nothing but a labour of love.

At the time there was no value for the work the couple had put in. They often had to face the unkind jibes of others in the village over their childlessness and their care for the trees. In 1996, Thimmakka's life again took a dip. Chikkayya passed away and she was left with no assets and no support. But she had her ‘children’, all the trees she had planted over the decades. 

Recognition for her work

A journalist heard of her tree-planting efforts and wrote about her work in the Kannada daily Prajavani, which came to the attention of Prime Minister Deve Gowda. She received the National Citizens Award from him in New Delhi and then set up the Saalumarada Thimmakka Foundation, now run by her foster son. The Foundation works in the area of environment initiatives. Several other awards also came her way. An organisation for environmental conservation in the USA has been renamed Thimmakka's Resources for Environmental Education.

So today, some 24 years after her husband passed away, the wheel has turned a full circle. Her work has become well-known and she is recognised as a sterling example of a green crusader.  When one school child showed her what was written about her in their textbook, she discovered she was now Saalamarada Thimmakka - ‘Thimmakka of the Banyan Tree’.

Thimmakka was awarded the Padma Sri in 2019 by the President of India, Ram Nath Kovind, for ‘distinguished service in the field of environment’. The unforgettable image of this cheerful and diminutive lady blessing the President as he handed her the award comes to mind immediately. Her simplicity and sincerity shone through in the glittering ceremony at Ashoka Hall, Rashtrapati Bhavan in New Delhi.

At the ceremony at Rashtrapati Bhavan, New Delhi 

Next on the wish-list

Thimmakka’s wish-list now is not long. She only desire is to plant more trees and that the trees she has planted all these years not be cut. And that her village gets a hospital so that villagers don’t have to travel the distance for medical aid.

Thimmakka's focus

Thimmakka exemplifies the impact of sincere effort without thinking of short cuts or rewards. The fame she had garnered, the awards she had won are not her focus even now. Her only thought is for her trees, always her trees. As she says, she loves to plant and look after trees until they are old.

KB Sundarambal - When life gave her lemons, she made lemonade.

This is the story of a woman, a singer, who is a living memory for many of the older generations in South India. Sundarambal’s life and career coincided with several crosscurrents in twentieth century India - the arrival of an increased number of gramophone companies from Europe into the country in search of new voices, the introduction of cinema and its slowly increasing popularity and the escalation in political activity in India because of the freedom struggle. It was also the time when, increasingly, young women joined the nascent theatre and film industry which stigmatized them rather unfairly. Many traditional patrons of artistes, basically royalty and landed gentry, had lost the resources to continue to extend their age-old support to musicians, actors and dancers. In the changed scenario drama troupes and film studios became the new venues for artistes to showcase their talent, and earn a living.

Photograph taken October, 1932

(https://commons.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:K.B.Sundarambal.jpeg)

The Early Years

Kodumudi Balambal Sundarambal was from Erode, Tamil Nadu, born in October 1908. Her early life was one of extreme privation. At one point, unable to cope with dire poverty, Sundarambal’s mother was about to jump into the Kaveri with her three children, when the little girl convinced her to give life another chance. Sundarambal, even at that young age, promised her mother to earn for the family by her talent for singing. And she kept her word.

Sundarambal began to sing on trains to entertain passengers, and earned money. This was all the musical training Sundarambal had, but one apparently so complete that it stood her in good stead all her life. Her strong and resonant voice, her dignified demeanour and her confidence on stage became her hallmarks. Soon she came to the attention of people connected with Tamil theatre who were on the constant look-out for fresh talent.