Mahadevi Varma: Political Essays on Women, Culture, and Nation By Anita Anantharam

Mahadevi Varma: Political Essays on Women, Culture, and Nation B ...

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If our body moves independently of the mind, then we will be called crazy, and if our mind is active but the body fails it, then we will be like someone who has suffered a stroke. The nation’s mental and material progress only happens in harmony, like that of a healthy mind and body.³²

It is clear that Mahadevi sees the role of the writer (sahityakar) in moulding culture as central. She suggests that in the contemporary political climate of her time, politicians are ready to commemorate the valour of those who fought in the freedom struggle, but at the same time forget the writers and artists who have with equal passion and courage “protected” (raksha karna) India’s cultures and traditions:

Those who have borne the weight of protecting our cultural treasury are no less important than those devotees of the nation who, in our struggle for independence, fought in the political trenches. One cannot assess today what they managed to save in that terrible battle, but there is no doubt that with respect to our literature and culture, it is because of them that we can raise our heads high today and face even the most prosperous of nations (literally: enriched by literature).³³

Mahadevi, in fact, is suggesting in this speech that writers and artists (kalakar) be understood as guardians of national culture and literature. Kalidas and Tulsidas, she argues towards the end of her speech, ought to be held in the same esteem as writers like Shakespeare and Tolstoy, adding that there are countless more writers of such calibre in Indian literary history.³⁴She concludes with a plea for the Uttar Pradesh government to take the question of education seriously when charting their plans for an independent India:

If in our present imbalanced life we seek to establish harmony for the new generation, then we will have to give education such a high place in our society from which the students will be able to acquire the message of unity of mankind and universal friendship, and they will be able to become even more complete human beings. Simultaneously, we will also have to emancipate those