Chapter-IV
Writing Differences: J. B. Kripalani
and Sucheta Kripalani
Jiwantram Bhagwandas Kripalani (1888-1982), popularly called Acharya
Kripa1ani, was a professor at Banaras Hindu University. However he left the
university in 1920 to join the Non-cooperation Movement. He served as Principal of
Gujarat Vidyapeeth until 1927 and was thus called Acharya Kripalani. He was the
General Secretary of Congress from 1934 to 1945. Kripalani was arrested in 1942 for
his part in Quit India Movement and released in 1945. The following year he was
elected President of the Indian National Congress. He finished his autobiography My
Times: An Autobiography (1982) two months before his death. He began writi.ng it
when he was past eighty-four and worked on it off and on for nearly ten years. The
autobiography runs into 946 pages excluding the two Appendices, the Afterword and
the Index. Sucheta, his wife, was among the people who helped Kripalani in the
preparation of the book. She died before it was published. Kripalani devotes the dozen
pages of the Appendix- II exclusively to her.
Sucheta Kripalani was an Indian freedom fighter and the first woman to be
elected Chief Minister of a state in India. She was one of the few women who were
elected to the Constituent Assembly and authored the Indian Constitution. She
married Acharya Kripalani in 1936. Khushwant Singh persuaded Sucheta to write her
memoirs for the Illustrated Weekly of India. This is how she began to work on her
autobiography. Sucheta: An Unfinished Autobiography ( 1978), published by the
Navjivan Publishing House in 1978, is a volume of 250 pages without the index.
However, the first sixty pages comprise the actual text of Sucheta's "unfinished
autobiography." The rest of the text is a collection of her speeches, talks, articles, and
letters along with a record of her political activities and obituary messages on her
death by different contributors.
The pattern of this chapter is the same as the earlier chapter. The writing
differences in male/female autobiography are highlighted through the eight subtitles:
association, dissociation; personal, public; self-conscious, self-confident and
fragmented, structured. The first of the pairs again stand for male traits while the latter
for the female.
Association
Unlike her husband, Sucheta seeks individuation in association with others in
An Unfinished Autobiography. Like Vijayalakshmi Pandit, Sucheta associates with
parents, friends, fellow workers, Acharya Kripalani and even with the refugees who
came from Pakistan to India after the partition of the country. For Sucheta
individuation lies in association while for Acharya Kripalani it lies in dissociation.
As a child, Sucheta associates with her mother, father and sister. She
elaborately discusses her childhood. Her childhood days were happy and carefree. Her
father, Surendra Nath Mazumdar, came from an old Brahmo family. They were a
large family of nine brothers and sisters. Sucheta admits that while her father was
indulgent to his children, her mother was strict. The mother was herself very hard
94
working and she made the children also work. This description of her childhood gives
us an impression of a very strong emotional bonding among the family and of how
Sucheta seeks individuation through association with her family:
In the evenings, mother gathered her children round her for a hymn
and a short prayer, suited for the children. In this we followed the true
Brahmo tradition. I am sorry that by the time we reached college,
somehow or the other, the evening prayer had been discontinued.
Mother was a good singer with a rich, melodious voice. In the
evenings, when my parents had no outside engagements, we would all
sing together, mother playing the organ. Even when still in my teens, I
would take mother's place when she was not there. I was fond of music
and singing. My youngest sister had the sweetest voice in the family.
She went to Santiniketan to get trained in music. (Kripalani, Sucheta:
5)
Sucheta also associates with her elder sister Sulekha. Sulekha was only a year
and a half older to her and was a bright student in her class. Sucheta acknowledges
that her sister tried to give her whatever protection she could. She further states that
they were close friends, however, that did not stop them from having occasional bouts
of fight. Both the sisters appeared for their matriculation examination in the same
year. They were both very fond of books. Sucheta relates an embarrassing incident
regarding the visit of the Prince of Wales to Delhi after the Jallianwalabag massacre.
The girls from their school were taken to stand near the Kudsia Garden to honour the
Prince of Wales. She and her sister were outraged at the idea of going out to honour
him but could not pick up sufficient courage to refuse to do so:
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In our three years' stay in Queen Mary's, an incident occurred of
which I was ashamed for a long time. Towards the end of 1920, the
Prince of Wales was visiting Delhi. The girls from our school were
taken to stand near the Kudsia Garden on the Alipur Road in his
honour. Since the Jallianwalabagh massacre, my family had become
extra-patriotic, though father did not give up his service. We took a
good deal of interest in the political movement. Sulekha and myself
were, therefore, outraged at the idea of going out to honour the Prince
of Wales but we did'not pick up sufficient courage to refuse to do so.
After reaching the garden, in the confusion we two made ourselves
scarce and sat behind a bush till the whole thing was over and then
joined the girls to walk back to the school. But this did not absolve our
conscience of a feeling of shame. We both felt very small because of
our own cowardice. (Kripalani, Sucheta: 7)
Sulekha, however, died of rheumatic fever and heart trouble at a very young
age. This was the first death in the family and they all deeply grieved her death.
Sucheta associates herself also with her teachers like Ms. Jarwood, Ms. Fenn,
and Mrs. Roy. Ms. Jarwood gave her a sound education, an awareness of the society
and the country, and her duties towards them. These teachers inculcated in her a
strong sense of social responsibility. Sucheta acknowledges her sense of gratitude
towards Mrs. Roy:
Mrs. Roy was a friend of the family and she offered to teach me. Till
then I had been considered as dull and slow-witted. But this lady seems
to have found in me an intelligent but a shy and timid child. She
praised and encouraged me. I soon came to like my studies and worked
hard at them. Then onwards, I steadily improved. After a few months,
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when I was sent to a boarding school in Allahabad, I was counted
among the top students of the class. (Kripalani, Sucheta: 6)
In a sharp contrast to Acharya Kripalani who constantly dissociates himself
from the others, including his spouse, Sucheta acknowledges the development of self
through 3;n intense association with others. She associates with Kripalani. She
appreciates the sharp intellect and rich scholarship of her husband. Kripalani advised
Sucheta not to degrade herself in whatever work she undertook, including politics.
She humbly admits that Kripalani had an indelible influence upon her:
1 was keen to start political work. I used to feel small before the
veteran jail-goers, as I had not graduated through jail life. Kripalani
was not too keen for me to enter politics. He wanted me to do any
work of my choice, not necessarily politics. Early in our life his advice
to me was that in whatever I did I should not degrade myself. In Hindi,
he said, "Apna daman saf Rakhna." I have remembered it over all these
years. He was not only my husband but also my political guide. Living
close to him, I imbibed, often unconsciously, his way of thinking, of
assessing situations, and even of public speaking. In the course of
years, I have developed my own style of speaking, writing, and
functioning, but his early influence has left an indelible impression on
me. (Kripalani, Sucheta: 24)
Among early women autobiographers looking upon the father/ husband as on
almighty God, Guru or mentor is very common. Maharani Sunity Devi of Cooch
Behar, Maharani Gayatri Devi of Jaipur, Maharani Vijayaraje Scindia ofGwalior- all
these royal women share this trait. So do other autobiographers like Lak.shmibai Tilak
who ca11s her autobiography I Follow After and thus gives out the relationship right in
the title; or Ramabai Ranade whose autobiography turns into an excellent document
97
on man's contribution of empowennent of Indian woman through education. The
book gives a vivid description of Justice Ranade's highly focused attempt to empower
his young, illiterate bride Ramabai through literacy. The girl-bride's education begins
on the first night of their wedding while this unusual happening is being spied over by
eleven old widows of the family. A white teacher is employed to teach Ramabai
English. The classes are conducted outside the house and the bride is compelled to
take cold water bath fetching water from the well in the compound in Justice
Ranade's absence. The young bride suffers all this as she is scared of her husband and
looks upon him as a mentor; finally, attaining excellent command over English and
public speaking. She joins public activities, meets Ramabai Saraswati despite severe
opposition from the old women of the family- all this because her idealist, Gandhian
husband wants her to do this. Ramabai's success story closes with husband's death!
The same with Vijayaraje Scindia and Gayatri Devi who look upon their husbands as
their lords with whose deaths their lives lose meaning! While the fact is that all these
women achieve greater success after their husbands' passing away. The most
memorable and amusing example of this generation woman's reverence and
dedication to Pati/ Pita can be traced in Shudha Mazumdar's autobiography A Pattern
of Life ( 1977) wherein she is taught a mantra by her traditional mother to appease
Gods before doing anything that was not pennitted for girls in Hinduism at the
father's insistence. If the father wanted his girl to eat meat, which according to the
traditional Hindu belief was not to be done by a girl, the mother advised the child
Shudha not to displease the father by refusing the meat she could just recite a 'mantra'
in Sanskrit which meant "father is God, father is heaven, he is the almighty/ by
pleasing father one pleases gods and heaven." The girl Shudha learnt her mother's
traditional wisdom well and used the 'mantra' all her life to venture every single
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adventure not pennitted to woman by the patriarchy by replacing 'pita' by 'pati' after
her marriage.
Such instances of male supremacy as discussed in above paragraphs can be
interpreted as the by-products of the 'feminine' culture of these women in
Showalterian tenns. Showalter, the known gynocentric critic of the contemporary
academia defines three distinct phases ofwomen's development, namely 'feminine',
'feminist', and 'female' (1981 ). The feminine phase in her tenninology is a phase in
which woman accepts all the patriarchal values and imitates them in order to be
accepted. This is imitative, muted phase of the marginals' growth in the post-colonial
theory.
Sucheta further associates herself with Mahatma Gandhi and with women's
organizations in India and abroad. She points out that Indian women were more
fortunate than their counterparts in the West as they did not have to go through a bitter
struggle to secure their political rights. The Brahmo Samaj (in Bengal) and the Arya
Samaj (in Punjab) contributed greatly to the emancipation of women in India. Sunity
Devi who was the daughter of the Brahmo leader Keshab Chandra Sen, and Kamla
Devi Chattopadyay also discuss in their autobiographies at length how the Brahmo
Samaj and the Arya Samaj empowered Indian women. Mahatma Gandhi was a
staunch supporter of women's rights. In 1917 a deputation of women met Mr. Edwin
Montagu, the then Secretary of State for India, with a demand that women should be
allowed the same opportunities for representation in public life as men. By 1929,
women in India secured the right to vote in the pre-partition India. Sucheta also
explains that women in India demanded equality with men but not favour:
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Thus, a little thirty years after the first agitation for suffrage, women in
India secured equality of rights, an equality which women in the West
took a much longer time to secure. Throughout this movement for
emancipation, responsible women's organisations and women leaders
never tried to secure for themselves any special rights as distinguished
from, or opposed to, those of men. A distinctive feature of their
movement was emphasis on equality. They wanted freedom of
opportunity to work and asked for fair field and no favour. (Kripalani,
Sucheta: 183)
In An Unfinished Autobiography, Sucheta thus, seeks individuation through an
intense association with others. She associates with parents, friends, fellow workers,
and even with the refugees who came from Pakistan to India after the partition of the
subcontinent.
Dissociation
Kripalani's My Times: An Autobiography reiterates the male tradition of
autobiographical writing in the author's constant dissociation of himself from the
others. He considers himself a self-sustained entity and at the centre of the living
space. This dissociation is evident from his school days and college years. J. B.
Kripalani dissociates from his family and community:
After passing my M.A. examination, there was the question of my
future. I could not possibly remain in Sind. Given my radical political
views, I found it difficult to adapt myself to my community and family.
The difficulty was soon resolved. H. L. Chablani had applied for a
professor's post in the Greer Bhumihar Brahman College at
Muzatfarpur. Given his qualifications he was immediately appointed
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professor of economics. Soon after taking it up, he wrote to me that
there was a vacancy in his college in the history department, and that if
I applied for it, I might get it. (Kripalani, J. B: 35)
Kripalani was the first political worker to come in contact with the Mahatma
after the latter's return from South Africa (Introduction). Gandhi exercised a great
influence on the masses as well as the stalwarts of the Congress organization. In
political and personal matters, people sought his guidance. Kripalani, however,
dissociates himself from the Mahatma and states clearly that he never consulted
Gandhi on personal matters. In the years, preceding the independence of India from
the British rule, Gandhi was like an uncrowned king. His ideas and wishes were
respected almost unquestionably. People, great or small, emulated his behaviour in
public and private life - from the wearing of 'khaddar' to the observing of
purificatory fasts. Kripalani disassociates himself from the Mahatma as regards to the
observation of fasts in order to reform people or to improve the affairs of the nation.
He decided not to undertake fasts on medical grounds:
Those days I suffered from piles, the fast aggravating the condition.
After that experience, I decided never to undertake a fast for any cause
except between meals or when food was denied to me! I have always
felt that fasting for the sins of others or, to reform them, or to improve
the affairs of the nation should be better left to the Mahatma. Ordinary
mortals discharging the duties of citizens need not indulge in this
virtue! (Kripalani, J. B: 112)
In My Times: An Autobiography, Kripalani gives numerous instances of his
disagreement with Mahatma Gandhi and other eminent political leaders like
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Jawaharlal Nehru, Maulana Abdul Kalam Azad, Sardar Patel, Subhas Chandra Bose,
etc. He candidly notes:
It is true that I had political differences with Subhas, but I also had
such differences with Jawaharlal. None of this, however, interfered
with the functioning of the AICC office. After all, neither the president
nor the general secretary could function independently, in all important
matters having to give effect to the resolutions passed at the annual
session of the Congress and the various meetings of the AICC and the
Working Committee. There was therefore little scope for conflict.
(Kripalani, J. B: 328)
Kripalani was a Congress volunteer and did whatever was required of him in
that capacity. He willingly suffered the hardships that his work entailed upon him.
Gandhi was a mass leader. Huge crowds came pay their respects to him wherever he
went. Shouts and suffocation caused by crowds irritated Kripalani. At one railway
station, when the train stopped, a crowd of young men boarded the small
compartment to greet the Mahatma. Kripalani was a part of the entourage. When he
could tolerate it no more, Kripalani said in disgust "Damn the Mahatama" in a voice
loud enough that Kasturba overheard. The incident runs as under:
At one large railway station, as soon as the train steamed in, a crowd of
young men boarded our small, already crowded compartment, causing
suffocation. As ifthis were not enough, the young men began shouting,
'Mahatma Gandhi ki jai' and 'lnquilab zindabad' at the top of their
voices. This irritated me so much that in disgust I said, 'Damn the
Mahatma', enraging them so much that they began showering abuses
on me. I suffered this with all the patience at my command, but
unfortunately Kasturba had overheard my remark. She protested and
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said, 'Professor, you are damning Bapu.' I said, 'Not Bapu, but the
Mahatma.' Not understanding the distinction, she shook her head in
displeasure and remarked, 'You should not do so, Professor.' I was
'Professor' to Gandhiji and to all the ashramites. (Kripalani, J. B: 184)
We further note that Kripalani's My Times: An Autobiography is dominated by
an egocentric 'I'. He consciously dissociates himself from the others and presents
himself as the centre of happenings. He knows that the significant role played by him
in the Indian Freedom struggle would interest and benefit the readers:
My life story largely consists of the history of the Congress and of the
independence movement. Thus, this is no mere autobiography but a
record of momentous events. In the course of the narrative I shall have
to describe what I observed and not what I did. I shall dwell upon the
events and important personalities of the time and, as I have said, not
particularly on me or the part I played. The presentation is bound to be
coloured by my personality, may be even by my likes and dislikes. No
account of a period of stress and strain can escape this. All that I can
promise is that I shall try to be as objective as it is possible for a person
who was not merely a witness but a participant in the most fascinating
and exciting drama of our times- India's freedom struggle. (Kripalani,
J. B: xviii)
After independence, Kripalani dissociates himself even from Indian National
Congress and resigned from the party in 1951. He wanted the organizational wing and
the legislature wing of the Congress Party to be clearly defined so that the government
did not become autocratic. When he saw this was not happening he resigned from the
presidentship of the party. Kripalani's My Times: An Autobiography, thus attests the
male tradition of autobiography writing that the process of individuation for males is
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to dissociate from others and that his autobiography is dominated by a well defined 'I'
which is always at the centre.
Personal
As a researcher, to attain objectivity one must record facts objectively- this is
the prime requirement of research methodology and hence two exceptional
autobiographies by women must be mentioned here. These are Shoilabala Das' A
Look Before and After ( 1956) and Kamla Devi Chattopadhyay's Inner Recesses Outer
Spaces ( 1986). Both of these women who were politically active and made their mark
in their field of work write in men's fashion. Their autobiographies ignore the
personal in favour of the public and thus tend to belong to the male tradition of
autobiography-writing. On the other hand, in spite of her very successful political
career Sucheta focuses on personal affairs in An Unfinished Autobiography. Like
Vijayalakshmi Pandit, Sucheta frequently refers to her public life but the emphasis is
on the personal aspects of her life. We are provided with details regarding her father's
career, sister's illness and death, family friends, contact with Kripalani, and
experiences in jail, etc. She treats even monumental events like Jalianwallabagh
massacre and partition in personal light. Sucheta recollects:
I must go back a few years to recount how strong nationalistic
sentiments penetrated our home. I have some recollections of the
agitation in the house over the Jallianwalabagh and the subsequent
incidents in the Punjab. A little earlier, father had been posted at
Saharanpur. Many of our friends and relatives, who were in the Punjab
at that time, came away and stayed with us till things quietened down.
A wave of indignation and wrath swept our house, when they
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recounted to us their harrowing experiences. I was about ten years old.
I could understand enough to feel great anger against the British. We
vented our anger on some of the Anglo-Indian children we played
with, calling them all kinds of names. (Kripalani, Sucheta: 7-8)
In the first chapter of her autobiography Such eta provides us with information
about her family background and heritage. Hers was a large family of nine brothers
and sisters. Though· she fully supports the policy of family planning, she admits that a
large family is the best place to bring up a child. This is because in a large family, she
believes, no one is spoilt with excessive attention and one learns to share what he gets
with others. Sucheta describes her parents as under:
Father was indulgent to his children, jolly, witty and ready to share in
our fun, when he was not too busy. Mother was strict; scolding and
occasional slaps came from her. But she ran our home well and
efficiently. Herself hard working, she made us take our share in
household work. Father and mother started their day with prayers in
the small puja room we invariably had in our house. (Kripalani,
Sucheta: 5)
Sucheta then discusses the first death in the family and the sad blow caused to
her parents by it. Sucheta and her elder sister Sulekha studied together at Simla.
Sulekha caught a chill a few months before the exam. She developed a serious illness
and heart trouble and had to hospitalize for months. She died in the midst ofSucheta's
intermediate examination. The death of the first child deeply grieved the parents.
From then on, Sucheta says, her father's health began to break down. He consequently
got very ill. He also passed away after a severe haemorrhage. This was the most
depressing period for the family. They had to change their entire mode of living:
105
We curtailed all possible expenses except on education. Mother
struggled valiantly to see that our health and education did not suffer.
We were greatly helped by three good friends, my cousin Jotin who
lived in New Delhi, Mr. Mukherjee, a businessman and a close friend
of my father, and Dr. Basu, a class friend of my father, who lived
nearby, and who acted more or less as our guardian. Since our
childhood we had called these two gentlemen 'uncle'. They played the
role of unreal uncles to us in our distress. Our relatives were slightly
intimidated by the idea of getting involved with us. They knew we
were a big family and father had not left us too well provided. Mother
in any case was too proud to ask any one fir help, and we, her children,
were also determined to make good on our own. (Kripalani, Sucheta:
13-14)
Besides this, Sucheta also gives us a personal account of her teachers like
Mrs. Roy, Ms. Fenn and Ms. Jarwood and the crucial role they played in her
development. She also gives a brief account of the old cook who was like a member
ofthe family.
The most interesting, however, is the account she gives of her marriage with
Kripalani. It is interesting to note that instead of describing himself Kripalani quotes
lengthily from Sucheta to supplement his brief description of how he came to marry
her in his autobiography. Sucheta, on the other hand gives an intimate description of
their relationship; how she came to like him and how she eventually married him
amidst opposition from both the families. Gandhiji was also opposed to their
marriage. He thought family responsibilities would divert Kripalani's attention from
national work and said, "If you marry him, you will break my right arm". Sucheta's
quick reply to this was that why did he not think that, instead of one national worker,
he would gain two. He was so adamant that at one point she agreed to give up the idea
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of marrying Kripalani. Not content with this, Gandhiji insisted her to marry some one
else. Sucheta, however, rejected this idea and told him that what he was proposing
was wrong, unjust and immoral. She notes:
At this time, I turned on him and told him that what he was proposing
was wrong; it would be unjust and immoral to do so. He had no reply
to that. That ended our discussions. Jamnalalji's sympathy was with us;
he did some canvassing with Gandhiji irYour favour. Sometime in early
1936, Gandhiji sent for me and told me that he had no objection to our
marriage, but he would not be able to give us his blessings. He could
only pray for us. We were satisfied with his prayer. In April 1936, we
got married according to Brahmo rites in Benares. (Kripalani, Sucheta:
22)
A parallel interesting incident from Vijayalakshmi's autobiography may be
cited here. After Vijayalakshmi's marriage to Ranjit Pandit they approached Gandhiji
for blessings. Gandhij i, instead of wishing them a happy conjugal life, discussed with
the newly married couple the principle of celibacy and asked them to take an oath of
celibacy. Ranjit Pandit, the bridegroom, was shy to argue with Bapu but
Vijayalakshmi who was nick-named as "Tempest" by her father at the time of her
birth mustered courage to tell the old man that his proposal was absurd.
Another amusing incident related to Kripalani that is missing in his own
autobiography is as follows. Gandhi sent Kripalani on a fact-finding mission to
Noakhali which had seen some of the worst communal riots in the year before
independence. Sucheta accompanied him there. It was not possible to reach the riot
affected areas without the assistance of the British administration and the provincial
government who tried to prevent them from visiting Noakhal i. After travelling by
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plane, jeep, boat, and on foot they reached a place nearest to the riot-stricken area. It
was then that Kripalani fell into a shallow canal from a bamboo bridge:
Walking there, Kripalani fell off the narrow bamboo bridge called
'Shanko' and got wet in the shallow canal water. His dhoti and kurta
were too wet and heavy for him to walk. So, he completed the journey
wearing his chadar as a lungi and his waist-coat in place of the kurta!
This gave us some chance for hilarity in the midst of this grim
Odyssey. (Kripalani, Sucheta: 45)
Though projecting a 'feminine' 'muted self both Sucheta and Vijayalakshmi
display rare confidence and capacity to articulate exactly what they feel in presence of
a stalwart like Gandhiji. The focus, however, in Sucheta Kripalani's An Unfinished
Autobiography is on the personal rather than the political aspects of life. Like the
other female autobiographers Sucheta defies the established male notion of the
content of autobiography. Sucheta provides us with minute personal details like
Vijayalakshmi's arrangement of small reception for them and Jawaharlal's mother
Swaroop Rani's giving her a beautiful sari as a wedding gift. Such details are
altogether missing in Kripalani's autobiography.
Public
In My Times: An Autobiography, Kripalani focuses more his political career
and the crucial role he played in India's freedom struggle, than on the personal,
domestic affairs. My Times: An Autobiography, Kripalani claims, is not merely an
autobiography but a record of the momentous events leading to India's independence.
He clearly states that in his autobiography he has devoted more space to India's
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struggle for independence than to himself. Due to his political preoccupations,
Kripalani had little time or inclination to focus on personal matters - a fact that
becomes applicable to almost all the male autobiographers. One can find some
interesting exception to this in autobiographies by Nobel laureates like Russell, Wole
Soyinka, and Neruda who create a rare balance between the personal and public in
their life-writing. Kripalani writes:
If my account in any detail varies from that of others, who have written
or may hereafter write about our times, the reader is free to accept
whichever appears to him to be objective. I shall only try to record
what 1 consider to be true as an actor and as a spectator. As I shall
have, during the course of my narrative, to talk of and even criticize
persons in high public esteem, all that I can assure is that I suffer from
no personal prejudice against them. Rather, I consider them all to be
great men and great patriots, men such as Rajendra Babu, Sardar Patel,
Maulana Saheb, and Jawaharlal. (Kripalani, J. B: xviii-xix)
Kripalani was an active participant in the movement for India's independence.
He was associated with the major events and the important personalities of the time.
As he claims, his autobiography devotes more space to the independence struggle
than to himself. He diminishes "I" as much as possible to concentrate more on the
political affairs. Kripalani believes his reminiscences will have a historical value:
My friends feel that my knowledge of important events and
personalities who played the chief role in our national struggle would
be intimate and revealing. My reminiscences will thus have some
historical value. l have, therefore, in what l have written here devoted
more space to our independence struggle than to myself. Hence I have
called this book My Times. There is as little of the "I" in it as it is
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necessary. This, in an egotistic age like ours, should be considered not
as a drawback of the book but as its merit. (Kripalani, J. B: xviii)
In Introduction to My Times: An Autobiography, Kripalani repeatedly
reiterates his active involvement in India's struggle for independence. The line of
demarcation between the personal and the political is blurring. His story is a record of
. the momentous eve_nts in the history of India's independence movement. Kripalani
promises the readers of My Times: An Autobiography objectivity in the narration of
the exciting drama of India's freedom struggle in which he happened to be an active
participant.
Due to his political preoccupations, Kripalani admits that he had no time for
personal affairs. He remained a bachelor for long. He met Sucheta Mazumdar when
she approached him in relation to some relief work in Bihar. They met several times
in the course ofthe relief work and decided to get married. Kripalani was already fifty
at the time. He had no house or income of his own. It is very interesting to note that
Kripalani describes the praiseworthy personal qualities ofSucheta and considers these
qualities important because they would prevent Sucheta from being an unnecessary
burden on him and allows her to work shoulder to shoulder with him in the political
activities:
Sucheta was then a Professor at Banaras Hindu University, and I was
then often invited by the students of the university to lecture there on
various aspects of the national movement. During these visits, Sucheta
and I had many occasions to meet, and our friendship grew. I found
her, apart from her intellectual qualities, intensely patriotic. She would
have resigned her post and joined the national movement if, after the
110
premature death of her father, she was not needed to support her
family. She was competent, hard-working, methodical, and
resourceful, widely read, and had a keen sense of humour. As for
myself, I was at the time a man without a home, without any income of
my own. In Sarojini's words, I was a 'beloved vagabond', and I think it
was the vagabond in me that attracted Sucheta, but I was certain that
she would not be a burden on me and that we could work together for
the national cause. (Kripalani, J. B: 272)
The family members of both Kripalani and Sucheta were opposed to their
marriage. Even Gandhi did not want Kripalani to marry because, he argued, the
family responsibilities might divert their attention from the national movement.
However, it seems that Gandhi's fear was misplaced, at least in Kripalani's case. It is
strange, however, that instead of describing hims~lf Kripalani quotes lengthily from
Sucheta to supplement his brief description of how he came to marry her runs as
under:
Here, I will leave it to her to describe how we ultimately decided to
marry and the impediments in the way, as she recorded the events in a
series of articles she wrote for The Illustrated Weekly of India ...
(Kripalani, J. B: 272)
Writing of the history of India during the struggle for independence is not
possible without reference to Gandhi and the Congress. Kripalani mentions in several
places in My Times: An Autobiography that the story of his life is a record of the
momentous events leading to India's independence. He reproduces long passages
from articles or speeches or letters from various personages or bodies to support his
arguments or to give an idea of the current political atmosphere. He quotes liberally
Ill
from Gandhi's writings to explain the position of the Congress in the freedom
struggle against the imperial government. Kripalani feels that he need not offer
apologies to his readers for doing so:
I need not apologize to the readers for giving long passages from
Gandhiji's writings. They clearly bring into focus the position of the
Congress organization in the freedom struggle and also its position
vis- a-vis the foreign imperial government. By the 1935 refonns, as
they were called, the British government had not given up even an iota
of its absolute power and authority. (Kripalani, J. B: 319)
My Times -An Autobiography, thus, attests the restrictive male view that a
good autobiography not only focuses on its author but also reveals his connectedness
to the rest of society; it is representative of his times and a mirror to his era. It gives
an interesting account of national and international events and the contemporary
personalities like Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru, Sardar Patel, Rajendra Babu
and so on. The volume, like the volumes of other male autobiographers under scrutiny
in this thesis, records almost every important political event during the freedom
struggle of India. They all have ample space and time for public/ political happenings
and how these events contributed to Indian independence. However, they are trying to
dash off half-hearted lives when it comes to their personal life. Many things on the
personal front are left unsaid. Kripalani has written full chapters on the Gandhi
Ashram, Purna Swaraj, Partition, Khadi Board, Tibet-China, the Czech Crisis, etc, but
not a single chapter is devoted to Sucheta or to their marital life!
112
Self-Conscious
The self-image projected by Sucheta in An Unfinished Autobiography is that
of self-consciousness unlike that of confidence by J. B. Kripalani in My Times: An
Autobiography. Like other female autobiographers she is conscious of her limitations
as a woman in the male dominated society. She admits in her autobiography that she
was a very dull student at school. Moreover, her education was hindered because she
had to change schools so often due to her father's frequent transfers. She was
conscious that she lacked in liveliness and felt painfully inferior to her two sisters in
appearance and intelligence. Sucheta avoided meeting her mother's friends on
account of her extreme shyness:
Our education was very chequered. Due to father's frequent transfers, I
must have changed a dozen schools by the time I matriculated. To start
with, I was a very dull student. My elder sister Sulekha, very fair in
complexion, vivacious and restless, was an attractive child. The sister
next to me, Himani, was a very lovely child with a mass of curly hair,
sparkling intelligent eyes, and full of mischief. In between these two
extroverts, I was dark, dull and agonisingly shy. Mother's friends used
to say, ""You talk of three daughters; but where is the second
daughter? We never see her. (Kripalani, Sucheta: 5)
Sucheta is conscious of her role as a woman in the patriarchal society and even
more patriarchal set up of the political structure in India. She narrates how she gave
up her desire to study medicine and said good bye to a medical career in fulfillment of
her father's wishes. A woman doctor in the Lady Hardinge Medical College had an
unpleasant experience. Sucheta 's father himself was a doctor. Like Maggie Tulliver's
113
father in George Eliot's The Mill on the Floss, Sucheta's father too decided that it was
not good for his daughter to pursue a medical career. Thus, Sucheta's gender
prevented her from going into the profession she desired for herself:
I had always planned to study medicine. Unfortunately, some time
earlier, a woman doctor on the staff of the Lady Hardinge Medical
College had an unpleasant experience. Father, therefore, ruled out a
medical career for me. He never interfered with us, but we had such
high regard for him that we did not like to do anything against his
wishes. So I said good bye to my medical career. (Kripalani, Sucheta:
9)
Sheila Rowbotham notes In Women's Consciousness Men's World ( 1978), a
woman cannot experience herself as an entirely unique entity because she is always
aware of how she is defined as a woman. Sucheta and her sister Himani got admitted
in St. Stephen's College, Delhi. There were very few girls in the college. Sucheta was
very conscious of being surrounded by male teachers and boy students and even asked
for exemption on the plea of preoccupation at home due to father's illness:
My first days in St. Stephen's were a little bewildering. I had been
taught earlier by English women and never by men. For three or four
days I could not follow the lectures by my Indian teachers as their
pronunciation and intonation sounded strange to me. But I soon got
over the difficulty. My second worry was how to keep up my end
against the boys. The boys naturally watched the only girl in the class
very critically. There was also a certain amount of sniggering and loud
remarks about me. All this made me very nervous. Before our first
house examinations were to he held, I went to Dr. Spears and asked for
exemption on the plea of preoccupation at home due to father's illness.
He sympathized with me but insisted that I appear in as many papers as
114
I could. In the papers I took, except for one, I stood first. I heaved a
sigh of relief. I had no longer to bother about the sniggerings of the
boys. My reputation in St. Stephen's was established. (Kripalani,
Sucheta: 13)
Sucheta reveals her lack of confidence in the narration of her anxious wait for
the result of M. A. examination. She had an interesting experience on the day my
result was to be announced. She was very disturbed because of her father's death and
could not pay enough attention to her studies when she was appearing for the exam.
She was sure that she would fail and shed tears for hours before she got to know that
she had bagged a gold medal for topping the list:
I had an interesting experience on the day my result was to be
announced. I was waiting for information from Asha Sen, the daughter
of the university registrar. She was my old classmate from Queen
Mary's school and had appeared for M. A. in English that year. She
was expecting her result the same day. I had asked her to find out mine
also and let me know. I waited the whole day, but no message came
from her. By the evening I was quite sure that I had failed. I sat in my
room shedding tears. Himani, my sister, then went to the nearby house
of a Professor in the hope of getting some news. There she learnt that
not only had I passed but topped the list of the candidates in the
History group. I was happy and relieved at not having to do the
examination again. This also brought me a gold medal. (Kripalani,
Sucheta: 14)
Sucheta considered Kripalani not only as her husband but also her political
guide. She imbibed his way of thinking and speaking. She sincerely followed his
advice in taking major decisions in life. Though over the years Sucheta developed her
115
own style of thinking, writing, speaking, and functioning, Kripalani had made a deep
iqiluence on her personality.
Kripalani was not too keen for me to enter politics. He wanted me to
do any work of my choice, not necessarily politics. Early in our life,
his advice to me was that in whatever I did I should not degrade
myself. In Hindi, he said, "Apna Daman saf Rakhna." I have
remembered it over all these years. He was not only my husband but
also my political guide. Living close to him, I imbibed, often
unconsciously, his way of thinking, of assessing situations, and even of
public speaking. In the course of years, I have developed my own style
of speaking, writing and functioning, but his early influence has left an
indelible impression on me. (Kripalani, Sucheta: 24)
Sucheta confides in her readers that she, as a woman, did not have confidence
in her own ability. She acknowledges Gandhi's contribution in the emancipation of
Indian women from her socio-cultural bondage. Gandhi's method was to make
women realize their potential by exposing them to unusual challenges. Women always
found a place of equal responsibility and importance with men in the various
constructive programmes launched by Gandhi. Sucheta confesses:
I, a woman, did not have confidence in our own ability but he knew us
better. Throughout his life he sent women out to face all kinds of
challenges. He sent Khurshed Behn Naoroji, an aristocrat to her
fingertips, highly Westernized sensitive and sophisticated to go and
work amongst the Pathan followers of Abdul Ghaffar Khan. In that
strange atmosphere of hard and harsh life, Khurshed Behn succeeded
superbly and became favourite sister of the Pathans. He was like a
good teacher who knew that the student can only learn when his latent
ability and initiative are drawn out to face to face a challenge.
116
A few days before his death while talking to some of us in Delhi he
said that he would like to see a Harijan woman as the first President of
India. "I shall dance with joy when I see her in this high place." He
wanted to see the lowest of the land occupying the highest position.
That was the dream that he dreamt. That was the trust and confidence
that he placed in women. (Kripalani, Sucheta: 1 05-6)
Thus, we note that in a sharp contrast to Acharya Kripalani, the self-image
projected by Sucheta in An Unfinished Autobiography is of self-consciousness. In
spite of her successful political career, we feel that there is always a consciousness
that she has to perform the role assigned to her as a woman in a male dominated
society. Like other female autobiographers she is conscious of her limitations as a
woman in the patriarchal society.
Self-Confident
In My Times: An Autobiography, Kripalani projects a very confident self-
image. He knows that his reminiscences will have a historical value as he was closely
associated with the freedom movement. Like Jawaharlal Nehru, Kripalani also
provides us very little information about his childhood and deals mainly with adult
crisis. In his voluminous autobiography of946 pages, Kripalani devotes not more than
ten pages to the discussion of his childhood. He gives a very brief account of his
childhood and quickly switches over to adult life during which he played a crucial
role in the Indian freedom movement. This is in accordance with Estelle Jelinek's
observation that men in order to idealize their lives and to make it seem heroic often
desist from revealing their childhood crises and are more likely to relate crises in
117
adulthood, usually turning points in their professional career. Thus, projecting the
image of self-confidence and determination, Kripalani follows the tradition of male
autobiography writing.
Kripalani elaborately discusses the Indian freedom struggle and the important
role that he played in it. He proudly notes that he was the first political worker to ..
come in contact with the Mahatma after his return from South Africa in 1915. He
participated in the first ever Satyagraha against the British in India. Later Kripalani
held important positions in the Congress and steered the organization through difficult
circumstances. Kripalani repeatedly uses the first person singular 'I'. His self-
confidence is reflected in every sentence in the brief passage quoted below from My
Times: An Autobiography:
I was the first political worker who came in contact with Gandhiji as
soon as he returned from South Africa, early in 1915. I was also
associated with him in the first Satyagraha movement launched in
Champaran (Bihar), against the rapacity and tyranny of the white
Indigo planters. I was the General Secretary of the Congress for the
twelve critical and anxious final years of our freedom struggle. I was
the President of the Congress in the year India attained her
independence. (Kripalani, J. B: xvii, xviii)
Men tend to idealize and often depict their lives as heroic. The productivity of
men toward embellishing their autobiography results in the projection of a self-image
of confidence, no matter what difficulties they have encountered. Kripalani claims
very confidently his life story largely consists of the history of the Congress and of
118
the independence movement. Thus, this is no mere autobiography but a record of
momentous events. T. N. Chaturvedi notes:
The life of Jiwantram Bhagwandas Kripalani - Congressman,
Gandhian, socialist, parliamentarian, and writer - spanned almost a
century. As a young man he saw the rise of Mahatma Gandhi to centre
stage in Indian politics; and in old age, the fall of the Janta Party
Government from power. A social and political activist for some
seventy years, at no point did he ever compromise his views or
principles to suit those who were in power, or to curry favour with
them. If ever there was a person for whom the saying "to thine own
self be true" was written, it was Kripalani. (Kripalani, J. B: vii)
Kripalani respected and almost adored Gandhi for his role in the Indian
freedom struggle. Gandhi had become a kind of role model for the freedom ftghters.
In political and personal matters, people sought his guidance. Whether they
understood Gandhi or not, people tried to copy his mode of living. Kripalani,
however, followed Gandhi only so far as it was necessary for him to do so in the
struggle for India's independence. He lived his life his own way and never consulted
Gandhi on personal matters. He did not believe in observing fasts to reform people or
to improve the affairs of the nation. He rarely attended Gandhi's prayer meetings. He
asserts that he has always lived his own life and has never sought to "mechanically
copy Gandhiji's mode of living". He proudly claims that he did not stick to the
Gandhian concept of simplicity in expanding khadi work:
In expanding khadi work I am afraid we did not stick to the Gandhian
concept of simplicity, seeking to produce as fine khadi as we could.
We also sought to make it attractive, and to this end experimented
119
extensively. We learnt that there was block printing industry at
Farrukhabad (U.P.) and placed printing orders there. In course oftime,
the most elaborate and complicated printing was done in the ashram
and some of our saree border designs were copied even by the mills.
Historically, the finest cotton cloth was produced in India. I do not
know whether the story true or not but it is said that one day the
puritanical Mughal emperor Aurangzeb rebuked his daughter for being
indecently dressed, to which she replied that she had draped herself in
seven folds of cloth. It is said that the mummies in ancient Egypt were
wrapped in the finest fabrics imported from India. However, our
experiments to improve khadi were not always appreciated by
orthodox Gandhians. (Kripalani, J. B: I 00)
Another significant instance of Kripalani not adhering to Gandhi's wish is his
marriage with Sucheta Mazumdar. Gandhi was averse to the marriage and even
advised Sucheta that she must marry another person, otherwise Kripalani would
remain unhappy. Gandhi tried to dissuade Sucheta from marrying but did not argue
much with Kripalani on the matter. Gandhi knew that it was difficult to change
Kripalani's mind once he decided on something. Kripalani quotes extensively from
Sucheta's An Unfinished Autobiography:
Gandhiji did not argue with him. He perhaps knew that it was useless
to talk to a hard headed person like Kripalani, once he had made up his
mind. He thought it was best tackle a young woman. Even then there
was delay in our marriage. This was because of Jawaharlal's long
imprisonment. Kripalani and he were close friends then. He could not
think of marriage while his friend was in prison. During this waiting
period oftwo years, Gandhiji called me two or three times to Wardha.
Finally, I bowed to his wishes and agreed to give up the idea.
(Kripalani, 1. B: 273)
120
Kripalani was a vigilant and vocal parliamentarian. As early as 1950s, he was
lamenting the corruption that was beginning to affect the body politic. He had strong
political differences with Nehru. Kripalani and Nehru often crossed swords in
Parliament. On one occasion, during the heated debate on the Chinese invasion on
Ladakh, Nehru stated that not a blade of grass grew in the area. Kripalani's pointed
reply to this is quoted in the Introduction by T. N. Chaturvedi, the Honourable
Governor of Karnataka:
We were told the territory was mountainous, where nothing grew, not
even a blade of grass and no people lived. There are places like that in
Rajasthan. I wonder what our government will do if Pakistan occupied
them. If these places in Ladakh are so uninhabitable, why do the
Chinese want them? People here have an idea that these parts of our
territories were occupied to serve as springboards for future action. A
springboard need not have to be green or populated. (Kripalani, J. B:
xiii-iv)
Thus, we note that Kripalani in My Times: An Autobiography projects the self
image of confidence and determination. He being a male is privileged to pursue the
single goal of a successful career. In line with other male autobiographers he projects
himself at the centre of the living space. This is contrary to the self-image of
consciousness projected by Sucheta in An Unfinished Autobiography.
Fragmented
An Unfinished Autobiography lacks the uniformity and orderliness evident in
My Times: An Autobiography. It is a very simple narrative. The paragraphs are short
121
and each of them is given a heading. It reads almost like a personal conversation with
a friend. The narrative of her life is not chronological and progressive. It is
disconnected and fragmentary; organized into self-sustained units rather than
connecting chapters. She begins her autobiography with a candid speculation:
When I look back over the long years of my life it strikes me as very
full, interesting and on th~ whole very gratifying. I do not seem to have
much to regret about (Kripalani, Sucheta: 3)
Sucheta begins her autobiography with a description of her family background
and heritage. This is followed by her childhood memories and school experiences.
Kripalani gives a very brief account of his childhood and quickly switches over to
adult life during which he played a crucial role in the Indian freedom movement. For
fear of appearing sentimental, men tend to desist from revealing crisis in their
childhood and are more likely to relate adult crises. In a sharp contrast to this, Sucheta
elaborately discusses her childhood memories and crises. She discusses the death of
Sulekha, her sister, and the sad blow caused to her parents by it. Sucheta and her elder
sister Sulekha studied together at Simla. Sulekha caught a chill and had to be
hospitalized for months:
A few months before our examination Sulekha caught a chill, this
developed into her old ailment of rheumatic fever and heart trouble.
For the next four or five months, we were just in and out of the
hospital. Mother, father and myself took turns to nurse her. But all our
care was of no avail. On the 41h of May, while I was in the midst of my
intermediate examination, she passed away. This was the first death in
our family. Our parents grieved deeply the death of their first child.
122
Father's health began to break down from then on. (Kripalani,
Such eta: I 0)
The progression of narrative in male autobiographies is linear with clear
divisions of beginning, middle, and end. In women's autobiography writing, however,
the progression of narrative is spiral in stead of linear. Men are socially conditioned to
pursue the single goal of a successful career. The multidimensionality of women's
socially conditioned roles, however, established a 'pattern of diffusion and diversity
when they write their autobiographies. The narrative is spiral in the sense that in stead
of following chronological order of events of their lives, they tend to narrate the
events in terms of their importance in their lives. This notion is, however, partially
defied in An Unfinished Autobiography. This phenomenon could be accounted for by
the fact that Sucheta was persuaded by Khushwant Singh to write the autobiography
for the Illustrated Weekly of India. The orderliness evident in the autobiography might
be attributed to the fact that it was to be published in instalments.
For Kripalani, his autobiography is a record of historical events in India's
struggle for freedom. Sucheta too participated in the freedom movement and
eventually became the first woman Chief Minister of a state in India. But she does not
think of her autobiography in terms of a historical document. On the contrary, she
interests herself more in creative process of writing than in historical procession of
events. Sucheta discusses the role of the creative writer in society. She distinguishes
between the ideologies and attitudes of the politician and the creative writer. The
politician has social or political commitments which could be selfish or otherwise. On
the other hand, the creative writer should be free from fixed ideologies and
obligations. The creative writers should never be political partisans. Sucheta reiterates
123
that in a perfect State the creative writers should not be troubled with social or
political obligations. She argues that India has not attained that perfect State. In the
given circumstances, the writers must use their creative powers to further the moral,
social, political, and cultural aspirations of their people:
In our present state, I wish most fervently that the creative powers of
our writers and artists may be effectively employed towards the
furthering of the social, moral, political, and cultural objectives that we
have placed before us. I think there is nothing wrong in this wish. At
the same time, I know - and say with all the emphasis at my command
- that this is not a matter of dictation and not even one of planning.
For, what is of the very essence of the matter here, is freedom. What,
therefore, I wish is just a happy and harmonious conjunction between
our hopes and the writer's powers. It is essential that this conjunction
should take in freedom. Freedom cannot be real and durable unless it is
based on mutual respect. I do not know what the writers on their side
would prescribe as the test of freedom. I can suggest one on the side
society. A free society will not demand conformity from creative
writers. In its eyes a creative writer will not cease to be an artist simply
because he has gone wrong in his sociology or economics. It seems to
me tha"t every creative worker should feel that he has a stake in the
building up of such a society. (Sucheta: 142)
Thus, we note that the criterion of orderliness and harmonious shaping with
which critical canons characterize autobiography cannot be applied to Sucheta
Kripalani's Autobiography. It cannot be, however, condemned as formless because it
has a curious form of its own which attests to the female tradition of autobiography
writing. Sucheta, a political leader in her own right and an achiever woman, rose to
become the Chief Minister of an Indian State. However, she writes her autobiography
simply as a woman. The content, form, structure and language of her autobiography
124
remain gender-specific and yet her autobiography is as much an important document
as is her husband's - one recording Indian political life through a personal, a
'feminine' experience while the other a male-authored document which could as well
be looked upon as a documentation ofthe history of India in a particular era.
Structured
J. B. Kripalani worked on My Times: An Autobiography over a period of ten
years. It follows a logical progression - beginning from Kripalani's early life in Sind
(now in Pakistan) in 1880s to post-independence times in India. The autobiography
follows a chronological linear narrative. Order and uniformity underlie it. Like other
male autobiographers, Kripalani focuses on one period of life, one theme, or one
characteristic of personality at a time.
Kripalani begins his autobiography with a description of Sind, the province of
his birth, situated in the North-West corner of India. This is followed by a brief
description of his community and culture. After this, he discusses his family and
childhood. His was a large family of seven brothers and two sisters. He moves on to
discuss his school, college life and then switches over to his adult crisis and political
career. This orderliness and harmony is witnessed in his autobiography because as a
male he is socially conditioned to pursue the single goal of a successful career - as a
political leader. N. Krishnaswamy had been Kripalani's secretary for over three
decades. He notes:
125
If Acharya Kripalani's narration of the significant events in his life
reads more like a history of that era, it is because he was an active
participant in the non-violent struggle for national emancipation
launched under the unique leadership of Mahatma Gandhi.
However, as the reader would no doubt have noticed, Kripalaniji
emerges dry-as-dust historian but as a keen observer of an unfolding
drama, an incisive analyst of the different characters and, as an
intelligent interpreter ofthe momentous scenes. (Kripalani, J. B: 965)
As we have noted earlier, Kripalani had been vigilant and vocal in his role as a
parliamentarian. He had a grasp of the current political developments at home and
abroad. The latter part of My Times: An Autobiography is devoted to a wide range of
topics of national and international importance. In this part of the autobiography, he
discusses the topics ranging from the States reorganization, the Kamraj Plan, the
Bhoodan Movement, Foreign Policy, Tibet-China, the Czech Crisis etc. Kripalani
quotes extensively from various sources to support his arguments or to bring his point
home. He justifies quoting long passages from Gandhi:
I need not apologize to the readers for giving long passages from
· Gandhiji's writings. They clearly bring into focus the position of the
Congress organization in the freedom struggle and also its position
vis- a-vis the foreign imperial government. By the 1935 refonns, as
they were called, the British government had not given up even an iota
of its absolute power and authority. (Kripalani, J. B: 3 I 9)
The present study focuses on the writing differences in autobiographies of four
pairs of male and female personalities in Indian politics. All these autobiographers
were contemporaries. Various aspects of the individual autobiographer's personality
I26
are reflected in his or her autobiography. However, it is interesting to note the
observations one autobiographer makes on the others. In My Times: An
Autobiography, Kripalani comments on the difference in the language used by Nehru
and Gandhi whose autobiographies are included in the present study. Nehru's
language, Kripalani says, was influenced by the communist ideologies of Marx and
Russian revolutionaries. Gandhi's language, on the other hand, revealed his moral and
spiritual orientation to politics and life:
There were not only temperamental differences between the two but
also a difference in the language they used. While Gandhiji used terms
and phrases with greater moral and spiritual connotation than political
and economic, the language used by Jawaharlal was 'modem', made
current by Marx and the communist revolutionaries in Russia. This
was the language of the so-calle~ intellectuals of those days and
unfortunately continues to be so today. (Kripalani, J. B: Page 229)
In his tum, Kripalani lacks the intellectual height of Nehru and the moral
depth of Gandhi. His language is not literary and the style is straightforward and
matter-of-fact. He wrote his autobiography in his mid-eighties. Kripalani suffered
hardships and austerities in the freedom movement but fell out with former colleagues
in the decades following independence. In spite of this, he has tried to be as objective
as possible:
All that I can promise is that I shall try to be as objective as it is
possible for a person who was not merely a witness but a participant in
the most fascinating and exciting drama of our times -India's freedom
struggle. If my account in any detail varies from that of others, who
have written or may hereafter write about our times, the reader is free
to accept whichever appears to him to be objective. I shall only try to
127
record what I consider to be true as an actor and as a spectator. As I
shall have, during the course of my narrative, to talk of and even
criticize persons in high public esteem, all that I can assure is that I
suffer from no personal prejudice against them. Rather, I consider them
all to be great men and great patriots, men such as Rajendra Babu,
Sardar Patel, Maulana Saheb, and Jawaharlal. (Kripalani, J. B: xviii)
Kripalani's My Times: An Autobiography, thus, shares unifonnity in form and
content with Jawaharlal Nehru and other male autobiographers. He has taken
meticulous care to provide accurate facts, dates, places, and names because he wanted
to achieve historical objectivity in the story of his life. The development of the
narrative is in consistence with the growth of Kripalani's personality. In My Times:
An Autobiography, we find harmony and orderliness that is often missing in
autobiographies by women.
The above given analysis of Acharya J. B. Kripalani's My Times: An
Autobiography and Sucheta Kripalani's An Unfinished Autobiography enables the
researcher to conclude that the autobiographies by two Indian politicians, who happen
to be husband and wife, uphold that gender influences autobiography-writing. Both
Acharya Kripalani and Sucheta Kripalani participated in the freedom movement under
the leadership of Mahatma Gandhi. Whereas Kripalani's autobiography focuses on his
crucial role in the independence movement and political developments thereafter,
Sucheta's An Unfinished Autobiography dwells more on personal affairs in the midst
of dramatic historical events leading to India's freedom. This reminds one of Jane
Austen, who in the midst of so many upheavals in the world around, like French
Revolution etc. focused on her domestic narratives like an artist carving a small piece
of ivory with the greatest possible focus and precision. Sucheta's autobiography
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convinces the readers that a female autobiographer's reasons for inscribing her life are
altogether different. She definitely doesn't aim at posterity or public acclaim as does
her husband, perhaps. Both write differently, as their purposes are different.
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