Sarojini Naidu (1912); Source: Public Domain

thumbnail_170px-Sarojini_Naidu.jpg

170px-Sarojini_Naidu.jpg

> What do you weave, O ye flower-girls?
With tassels of azure and red?
Crowns for the brow of a bridegroom,
Chaplets to garland his bed,
Sheets of white blossoms new-garnered
To perfume the sleep of the dead.
-Sarojini Naidu, *"In the Bazaars of Hyderabad"*, 1912

Ask any fourth-grade child; Who was the Nightingale of India? The answer is always spontaneous, Sarojini Naidu. This woman created such waves in Indian history that she’s very firmly embedded in it and will always be remembered for generations to come.

The first woman to be anointed as the Indian National Congress’s president in 1925, Sarojini Chattopadhyay was born on February 13th, 1879. Born into a progressive Bengali family, living in Hyderabad. Naidu had a life of privilege as compared to her female counterparts. However, she still had to break through the many barriers that come along with the fact of being a woman in India. She had to demand her right to protest in the freedom movement and she didn’t just protest, she recruited women to fight the oppressors, wrote several highly acclaimed plays and poems which crowned her the ‘Nightingale of India’.

Becoming a student of the University of Madras at the age of 12, Sarojini Naidu was arrested on numerous occasions for her anti-British opinions leading her to spend over 21months in prison. A feat she was extremely proud of, to be arrested in defiance for her country.

> In her remembrance, Sarojini Naidu has an asteroid named after herself; Asteroid 5647 Sarojini Naidu, discovered by Eleanor Helin at Palomar Observatory in 1990.

She joined the Indian freedom development in the wake of the Partition of Bengal in 1905. Before long, she met other such pioneers as Gopal Krishna Gokhale, Rabindranath Tagore, Mahatma Gandhi and roused to pursue accomplishing independence from the frontier system and social reform. After her term as president of the Indian National Congress, Sarojini Naidu went on to become the Governor of the United Provinces in 1947, a historic milestone in history as she became the first Indian woman to hold the workplace of Governor in the Dominion of India.

Aside from her resolute political vocation, Sarojini Naidu is generally known for her verse which included both; children's sonnets and others composed on more genuine subjects including patriotism, sentiment, and misfortune. She started composing at the young age of 12. Her play, Maher Muneer, written in Persian intrigued the then Nawab of Hyderabad. In 1905, her first assortment of sonnets, named The Golden Threshold was distributed.

Imagine being a role model for multiple generations of women, having women’s day celebrated on your birthday due to your courage, conviction and assertiveness. This is what Sarojini Naidu was like