| During the period of the 1920s and 1930s impressive numbers of women in Bengal actively took part in the revolutionary movement against the British, both from behind and in the front ranks. These women passed on secret messages, concealed ammunition, provided monetary support, offered shelter to the escaping revolutionaries (sometimes even posing as the wives of male revolutionaries and living with them for the sake of organizing the plan), prepared explosives, and attempted to assassinate or assassinated representatives of the colonial British government. Needless to say, considering the social mores of the period, these women chose a very non-traditional trajectory for themselves. By devoting to the ideal of "blood sacrifice," they clearly threatened the existing notion of indigenous womanhood and had to fight to establish a new image of Bengali woman initiated by them. Placing these women at its center, my thesis analyzes the consequences of their endeavor tracing the history of the changing parameters of the notion of Bengali womanhood. |
