VIJAYAWADA, November 17, 2013
Hemalatha Lavanam
Gurram Joshua’s daughter Hemalatha Lavanam, who fought against Jogini system, will be featured in National Biography Series of NBT
Memoirs of noted social reformer Hemalatha Lavanam will
soon find place in the National Biography Series of the National Book
Trust of India.
The objective of the National
Biography series is to throw light on the lives of Indian women and men
who have made outstanding contribution towards the development of Indian
society, culture, science, economy, polity as also of modern Indian
sensibility. After Durgabai Deshmukh, Ms. Lavanam is the second woman
selected for the honour from Andhra Pradesh.
“The
news came as a pleasant surprise. I feel very happy because Hemalatha’s
life story gives a sense of self-respect to all women. This kind of
recognition was long overdue,” said atheist leader and Hemalatha’s
husband Lavanam.
Born in 1937 at Vinukonda in Guntur
district, Ms. Lavanam was the last child of Padmabhushan, Kalaprapurna
Gurram Joshua and Mariyamba. Post her travel in Chambal valley in Vinoba
Bhave’s padayatra for Bhudan yagna, her perspective on life changed and
she returned home to take up extensive work in the field of criminal
reform, abolition of Jogini system, social equality and dispelling
superstition.
The two authors selected for writing
the biography –Lalita Vakulabharanam and Sundar Kompalli—are editing
their work to meet the December 13 deadline for submission of the
biography. “We are mainly focussing on her all-encompassing personality,
her unique approach to problems in society, exclusive strategies she
embraced to bring about a reform and most importantly the methods she
adopted to sustain the reforms in such difficult times. As a Dalit
woman, she faced stiff resistance but ironically, almost 65 % of her
work force comprised those belonging to upper castes. She managed to
gain acceptance in a vitiated society,” says one of the two authors Mr.
Kompalli.
Even while waging pitched battle against
social evils like Jogini system in backward remote villages of Nizamabad
district relying heavily on the enormous experience she had gained in
the criminal reforms she undertook in the coastal Andhra region with her
spouse Lavanam, she never allowed the mainstream Dalit politics to
influence her.
It also talks about her early life
and people like her father Gurram Joshua, social reformer and her
father-in-law Gora, Vinoba Bhave and her husband Lavanam, who influenced
it.
“It feels good to know that Hemalatha will go pan-India once the biography is published,” says an elated Lavanam.
Source: The Hindu
