One of the pioneers in India’s freedom movement, Madam Bhikaji Cama

By Vijai Singhal

Madam Bhikaji Cama was one of the pioneers in India’s freedom movement. She was born in 1861 in a wealthy Gujarati Parsi business family of Sorabji Framji Patel and Jaijibai Sorabji Patel. She received her early education in Bombay (now Mumbai). She was a very disciplined and assiduous student. She was influenced by the Indian Nationalist movement taking root at the time under Bal Gangadhar Tilak and Gopal Krishna Gokhale. She got married to a well-known lawyer Rustomji Cama in 1885.

A famine stuck in Bombay in October 1896, followed by bubonic plague. Bhikaji played an active role in providing care for the afflicted and helped in inoculation of the people. Unfortunately, she herself contacted plague. She was sent to London for medical care.

Her sociopolitical views led to differences between the couple. She was also having some health problems which required medical attention. She left India for London. It was in London Bhikaji met with Dadabhai Naoroji and was inspired by his ideals and plunged into the freedom movement.

India House was established as a student-hostel in 1905 in North London. The Indian Home Rule Society (IHRS) was an Indian organisation founded in 1905 that sought to promote the cause of self-rule in India. It was supported by a number of prominent Indian nationalists in Britain at the time, including Dadabhai Naoroji, S.R. Rana, and Bhikaji Cama.

Veer (Vinayak Damodar) Savarkar, a revolutionary, came to London in 1906 on a scholarship to study law. He met with the other active members of IHRS and started taking active part and devoted his efforts to writing nationalist material, organising public meetings and demonstrations, and establishing branches of Abhinav Bharat in the country.

Bhikaji began to publish booklets for the Indian community in England, propagating the cause of Swaraj. “March forward! We are for India. India is for Indians!” she defiantly declared. She also toured US, where she gave speeches on the ill effects of British rule and urged Americans to support the cause of India’s freedom. Sometime later in 1905, she shifted to Paris, where she co-founded the ‘Paris Indian Society’, as a branch of IHRS. She gave shelter to many world revolutionaries in her Paris home, which was also visited by Lenin. She started writing literary works for national movement and published them in Switzerland and the Netherlands. One such publication was Bande Mataram, set up in response to the British ban on famous poem ‘Bande Mataram’ by Bankim Chandra Chatterjee.

Madam Bhikaiji Cama became the first person to hoist the Indian flag in foreign land on 22 August 1907. While unfurling the flag at the International Socialist Conference in Stuttgart, Germany, she appealed for equality and autonomy from the British which had taken over the Indian sub-continent. She was kept under house arrest by the French government in 1914. She returned to her Paris home after the war ended.

In 1935 she suffered a stroke. She made a petition to return to her motherland. She returned to India in 1935 and breathed her last on 13^th August 1935 at the Parsi General Hospital in Bombay. She donated major share of her personal assets for the Bai Avabai Framji Petit Parsi Girls Orphanage and for her family fire temple located at Mazgoan, in South Bombay. In her honour many streets and places have been named after her in India. A commemorative stamp was also issued by Government of Inda on 1962 Republic Day.