Dispersed Radiance: Women Scientists in C.V.

Raman's Laboratory
Abha Sur

Meridians: feminism, race, transnationalism, Volume 1, Number 2,

Spring 2001, pp. 95-127 (Article)
Published by Indiana University Press
DOI: 10.1353/mer.2001.0010

For additional information about this article

http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/mer/summary/v001/1.2.sur.html

Accessed 30 Oct 2014 14:05 GMT GMT

Dispersed Radiance
Women Scientists in CV. Raman's Laboratory
ABHA SUR

I can neverforget the ivay he treated mejust because I was a woman.

Kamala Sohonie, Biochemist

But you make too much o/my "equanimity," Sonya.

It is simply my u>ay
When I suffer not to utter a word
Jane Cooper, 'Threads: Rosa Luxumbergjrom Prison"
I had barely introduced my project on writing a history ofwomen scientists in India to Professor Anna Mani, when one of her colleagues at the
Raman Research Institute came over to us. Mani, with a quizzical smile
turned to her colleague and introduced me: "Meet Dr. Sur. She is from
America and thinks I am history." I mumbled incoherent protests but to
no avail. She continued questioning my gendered motivations and their
American origins, thoroughly amused by my obvious discomfiture. "Why
do you want to interview me? My being a woman had absolutely no bearing on what I chose to do with my life. What is this hoopla about women
and science? They wanted me to participate in one such session in Trieste
as well. It must be getting difficult for women to do science these days.
We had no such problems in our time" (Mani 1993).
The disjunction between Anna Mani's perceptions ofwomen in science
in India and the lived reality of the majority of Indian women could
not have been more acute. In 1913, the year ofMani's birth, the literacy
rate for women in India stood at less than 1 percent. The total number of
women enrolled in colleges (that is, above grade ten) was less than one
thousand (Louis 1986). By the time Mani went to college in the 1930s,
things had improved only marginally and opportunities for women

[Meridians: feminism, race, transnationalism 2001, vol. 1, no. 2, pp. 95-127]

2001 by Wesleyan University Press. All rights reserved.
95

to pursue science were few and far between. There was a consensus
at that time that education for women should be tailored to their particular roles as mothers and homemakers.1 However, failures at the level of

whole systems often have little or no bearing on selective successes.

Statistical reality gives no indication ofthe experience ofthose who belie
the probabilities.
Mani, who had risen to the post of the assistant director general of
India's meteorological society and, at the time I spoke with her, was running her own environmental enterprise after retirement, was being neither facetious nor ironic when she claimed that women did not encounter

many difficulties in pursuing science in her time. To be sure, Mani was

not referring to ordinarywomen, rather, her "we" happened to be a highly
selective and privileged group ofwomen whose urban, upper-caste, and
Western-educated families ensured their individual access to higher education.2 Even so, Mani's summary dismissal ofthe influence ofgender in
science warrants greater scrutiny. It is, on the one hand, typical of the
response of successful women scientists all over the world and, on the
other, reflective of her particular circumstances in the context of Indian
society. Following the lead offeminist critics ofscience in the West, one
could attribute Mani's denial ofthe significance ofgender to an internalized acquiescence to dominant ideologies which emphasize the objectivity and neutrality ofscientific knowledge.3
However, through many extended conversations with Anna Mani, I
came to realize that while she accepted implicitly the standard criterion
for success in science and guarded zealously her hard-earned recognition, she was deeply aware ofand willing to discuss the pervasive but very
personalized gender discrimination women endured as scientists. She
seemed implicitly to differentiate between social relations in laboratories,
which mimicked gender relations ofthe society at large, and the bureaucratic structures of scientific and technical institutions, which touted

their "gender-blind" rules and regulations. Her "disavowal ofdifference"

then could be read as simultaneously an assertion of equity with men
insofar as evaluative structures in science were concerned and an expression of identification with Indian women in general who faced gender
discrimination in many, ifnot all, aspects oftheir lives. In this respect, for
women, doing science was not any more difficult than or qualitatively
different from pursuing a career in literature or history.
In this essay, through a collective history of Anna Mani and her two
women colleagues Lalitha Chandrasekhar and Sunanda Baiall ofthem
96

ABHA SUR

graduate students in CV. Raman's laboratory at the Indian Institute of

Science, Bangalore in the 1940s, I explore the enabling (and disabling)
aspects of culture in the making ofwomen scientists in India. I want to
understand how nationalism and its incumbent cultural norms enabled

women's entry into and survival in science and how family structures and
class position mediated their careers. I will differentiate between the
dominant nationalist ideology and its selective appropriation and modification by womenwhat one might call received nationalism. Women,
especially through their participation in all forms ofnationalist struggles,
from political opposition and mass nonviolent resistance to revolutionary armed struggle, developed their own understanding of nationalism
which guided their participation in all aspects ofIndian polity. I also want
to revisit the question ofgender identities in science. I have already indicated that Mani's disavowal of gender significance is qualified, and
yet this reading itself needs further elaboration, tied as it is to the myth
of gender-neutral institutions, to coerced womanhood, and to types of
affirmative gender identities.
Unlike standard biographies, which inevitably focus on individual
struggles and triumphs, a collective biography ofsimilarly situated individuals can highlight interactions of groups of people with society and
can thus be more effective in unraveling salient processes of cultural
transformations.4 However, the paucity of both primary and secondary
sources and the lack ofarchives make the task ofwriting the history of
women scientists, let alone a collective history, especially arduous. This
essay is based on extensive conversations with Professor Anna Mani, who
provided biographical information not only about herselfbut also about
two of her female colleagues in Raman's laboratory. I also interviewed
several contemporaries ofMani who provided insights and background
material for understanding the social and cultural milieu ofthe period.5
My own experience in the practice ofscience helped in large measure in
eliciting from Mani a retrospective at times at odds with interviews that
she had given earlier. Nonetheless, the scope of this essay is circumscribed by Anna Mani's perceptions and recollections, refracted and
sifted through my own understanding ofscience and society in India.
I have embedded the biographies of Lalitha Chandrasekhar, Sunanda
Bai, and Anna Mani within the general social history ofwomen's education in India. This format allows for a fluidity ofmovement between individuals and society at large, where issues of nationalism, cultural practices, and the imperatives ofclass privileges and family come to the fore.
DISPERSED RADIANCE

97

Visible Careers, Invisible Lives

It is estimated that there are more than a million women scientists in

India today.6 The figure is impressive whichever way one might look at it.
The fact that one out of every four scientists in India today is a woman
seems implausible given that just three generations ago, in the 1900s,
there were only a handful ofwomen enrolled at the collegiate level and
these included women in all disciplines (See Krishnaraj 1991 and Jayawardena 1986). And yet, women scientists appear neither in scholarship
on women nor in scholarship on science.7 Different not only from their
male colleagues, but also, and perhaps more important, from their nonscientist sisters, the women scientists implicitly challenge the accepted
frameworks for historical analysis. Thus, the historians of science in
India remain oblivious of, or indifferent to, women's presence in the field
and their contributions to it.

The history and philosophy ofscience in India, until recently, have been
conceptualized within two broad frameworks. One exalts tradition and
sees the enterprise ofscience as a continuation ofthe colonial onslaught
in India, violating indigenous scientific traditions and practices (see, e.g.,
Sheshadri 1994, Nandi 1990, and Shiva 1989). The other rejects tradition
as moribund and superstitious and embraces modern science as a means
of salvation out of the morass of economic and social stagnation
(Sheshadri 1994). In both these accounts, modern science becomes a borrowed activity forced upon a culture alien to its methods and modes. One
laments the impact ofcolonial science on traditional Indian society, while
the other decries the persistence ofarchaic cultural practices. Both frameworks implicitly ascribe a strict rigidity and ahistoricity to "tradition,"
while the "modern" is seen as all encompassing, open, and accommodating. Both in their own way deny the capacity of human agency to
absorb, contemplate, and modify received bodies ofknowledge in order
to transform their own societies.8 Not surprisingly, the women scientists
of India, repositories of the tradition, spirituality, and inner essence of
India as women, and simultaneously the embodiment of the modern,
material and Western as scientists, find no place in these accounts.9
More recent critiques, which promote a more nuanced view of postcolonial science, suggest that science was simultaneously alienating
and counter-hegemonic for its practitioners in India. The estrangement
derived from the discourse of science was imbued with the dogma of
domination, while its execution in the cultural idioms of India
98

ABHASUR

destabilized its meaning and dispersed its authority and hence made it
counter-hegemonic (see, e.g., Prakash 1999). The overarching centrality
ofcolonial domination in these critiques subsumes the more local imperatives of class, caste, and gender except in a very superficial way. Thus,
these discussions, too, remain steadfastly silent on the question of
women scientists in India. Yet women scientists are crucial to under-

standing the social process ofscience in India as they interface between

the competing forces ofmodernity and tradition, a struggle in which the
impetus to transform material reality by advanced science and technology
invariably is punctuated by the desire to keep intact India's spiritual and
cultural sanctity.
The entry ofwomen into advanced science was unobtrusive, though
not uncontested. Kamala Sohonie, e top student at her undergraduate
university in 1933, recounts that CV. Raman, 1930 Nobel laureate in
physics and unarguably India's preeminent physicist in the twentieth
century, was less than welcoming to women students. She had applied for
admission to the graduate studies program at the Indian Institute of
Science only to be dismissed by Raman, who reportedly retorted, "I am
not going to take any girls in my institute." When Sohonie confronted
him, he relented and admitted her, although not as a regular student.
Sohonie completed her course ofstudy with distinction in 1936 and went
on to earn a doctoral degree from Cambridge University.10 Although
heroic stories ofvalor and courage where defiant women triumph against
all odds to gain acceptance in the male-dominated realm of science are
few, the accounts by women scientists underscore their ingenuity in making the best ofa less than perfect situation.11

CV. Raman: A BriefBiography

The Indian Institute ofScience was the brainchild oflamsetji Tata, India's
leading industrialist. Founded in 1909 by his benefaction, the institute's
mission was to promote original investigations in all branches ofknowledge and to foster the close association ofscientific research with industry (Subbarayappa 1992). CV. Raman was appointed the director of the
institute and the professor and head ofthe physics department in 1933.
Raman was the most distinguished scientist in India. He was born in
November 1888 into an upper caste Brahmin family in the southern state
of Tamilnadu, and by the age of nineteen he had obtained a master's
DISPERSED RADIANCE

99

degree in physics and had published his first independent paper in the
Philosophical Magazine. Opportunities for research careers for Indians
were nonexistent, unless one had been trained in Britain. Consequently,
Raman joined the Financial Civil Service as assistant accountant general
and was posted in Calcutta, where he came into contact with the Indian
Association for the Cultivation of Science (iacs). lacs was "entirely
under native management and control" and was a forum for discussing
new ideas in scientific developments (A Century ofIndian Association for
the Cultivation of Science, 5). The laboratories of the association provided a remarkable opportunity for Raman to pursue experimental
research in physics. In the ten years he spent in Calcutta, working days as
an accountant and early mornings and nights doing science, he published twenty-seven scientific papers, including many in the prestigious
British journal Nature (Venkataraman 1988).
In 1917, despite an almost 50 percent cut in his salary, Raman accepted
the Palit chair in physics at Calcutta University, where he devoted all his
time to research and teaching. Raman's particular strength lay in the
study ofwaves. His work on optics, vibrations, and musical instruments
shows a profound understanding ofthe nature ofwaves. His many contributions include studies on the blue color ofthe sea, on whispering galleries, on the acoustics ofthe violin, veena (an Indian string instrument),
and various percussion instruments, on colors in nature, on crystal
dynamics, and on lattice dynamics. Raman is best known for his discovery of the effect named after him, for which he was awarded the Nobel
Prize in physics.12
In 1933 Raman moved from Calcutta to Bangalore to assume the directorship ofthe Indian Institute ofScience. His directorship was, however,
short-lived. Raman soon was embroiled in major conflicts at the institute.
He was seen as an autocrat determined to build his own department of
physics at the cost of seriously undermining other programs. Students
outside the physics department and other faculty members mounted
strong opposition, and a committee was appointed to look into Raman's
leadership. The Irvine Committee, as it came to be known, recommended
that Raman step down from the director's position and stay on at the
institute as a professor ofphysics.13 Raman complied with these recommendations; he gave up the directorship in 1937 but continued as a professor ofphysics at the Institute.
Lalitha Chandrasekhar joined Raman's research laboratory in 1936, in
IOO

ABHA SUR

the midst of his most turbulent year at the institute, while Sunanda Bai

and Anna Mani followed a few years later, in 1939 and 1940, respectively.
Colonialism, Social Reform, and Women's Education
The entry ofwomen into higher education depended crucially upon the
social reform movement and the educational programs of missionaries
in nineteenth century India. Indian reformers saw women's education
as essential for the elimination of such social evils as child marriage,
sati, polygamy, and the denial ofproperty rights to widowed women.14
They further saw education as a means to "improve women's efficiency
as wives and mothers and strengthen the hold of traditional values on
society, since women are better carriers of these values" (Jayawardena
1986, 88).
The social reform movement and the efforts ofChristian missionaries

found ready acceptance amongst the emerging professional class of

Indians. "For many men ofthe times, the aspirations to educate a wife or
a daughter became a driving passionpushing them to disregard the
sentiments or even the protests both ofthe women they were educating
and other members ofthe family" (Chitnis 1992). Anandi Gopal Joshi, the
first Hindu woman to study medicine in America (she received her degree
in medicine in 1886) was coerced into "schooling" by her authoritarian
husband, who later denounced university education for women
(Chakravarty 1998, 211-15).
The introduction of English education in India gradually gave rise to
new social structures and ideologies that made possible women's entry
into higher education. By the 1880s women had started graduating from
universities, although the number ofwomen in colleges and universities
was very low. Calcutta University accepted women students on its rolls
before the University of London (Borthwick 198). Chandramukhi Bose

and Kadambini Ganguli graduated from Calcutta University in 1883.

Kadambini Ganguli and Ananda Gopal Joshi were among the earliest
women physicians in India. The newness ofscientific institutions in India
protected the women somewhat from the historically entrenched gender
bias of the old universities and scientific societies in the West.15 The

officials ofCalcutta University agreed quite readily to admitting women

to degree programs upon a request from Chandramukhi Bose to sit for
DISPERSED RADIANCE

???

the entrance examination in 1876, and by 1878 the Calcutta University

syndicate had formulated and approved policies for women candidates
(A Hundred Years ofCalcutta University 1957, 121-22; Murshid 1983, 48-50).
More important, as women began to get educated, some became more
aware oftheir subjugation by men and began to write with greater assurance about the reasons for their low status in society. "God certainly does
not wish that only men would enjoy the pleasure oflearning and women
the agony ofignorance. On the contrary, He has given men and women
the same physical and mental abilities so that both can enjoy endless hap-

piness by acquiring the wealth oflearning" wrote Madhumati Ganguli in

Bamabodhini Patrika, a monthly magazine for women started in 1863
(Ganguli 1864, cited in Murshid 1983, 53). Saudamini Debi wrote a year
later, "Why should men keep us in such deplorable condition? Aren't we
the daughters of God? Isn't it unjust to deprive women of education,
which alone could give them the "heavenly" pleasure now being enjoyed
by men alone?" (Debi 1865, cited in Murshid 1983, 55). The social reform
movement, howsoever selective and circumscribed it may have been in its
adaptation or adoption of Western liberalism, nonetheless expanded
significantly the educational opportunities available to women in India
(see Sarkar 1985).

Nationalism, Science, and Women Scientists

The importance of science and technology in generating the material
wealth ofa nation had been firmly established by the late nineteenth century. Modern science had made its impact on India through the various
scientific institutionssuch as the Geological, Meteorological, Zoological, Botanical, Archeological and Trigonometric Surveysestablished
by the British. Indian nationalism was not oblivious to the obvious superiority ofthe West in this domain. Partha Chatterji has argued that nationalism in India, in its quest for reconciling opposition to colonialism with
fascination for science, implicitly divided the cultural sphere into material and spiritual domains. In the material domain, science and technology took center stage as the Indian intelligentsia demanded and established technical and research institutions oftheir own. At the same time,

the spiritual domain became the venue for the expression of national
culture and self-identity. This not only allowed the nationalists to retain
a sense of their own spiritual superiority as they strove to adopt the
102

ABHA SUR

material ways of the colonialists, but created gendered dichotomies

as well. The material domain was public and masculine, while the spiritual became private and feminine (see Chatterji 1989).
While Chatterji's analysis perhaps is useful in explaining the persistence of certain patriarchal structures, the stark absence ofthe voices of
women themselves from his study precludes a more nuanced understanding of gender relations. The nationalism of individuals and of
marginal groups, often significantly different from the ideologies and
intentions of dominant leaders, played a disproportionate role in social
and cultural transformation. Women were prominent and visible in the
nationalist struggle. They were in the forefront ofthe nonviolent resistance, they participated in the growing movement ofpolitical opposition,
and they were actively involved even in the so-called terrorist organizations. Their experience necessarily engendered a very different notion of
nationalism, in which the line between the public and private domains
became increasingly blurred. Indeed, after independence women did not
just recede into their private oblivion but continued to play an active role
in public life. Thus, in order to understand the nexus of gender and
nationalism, it is imperative that we heed not only the organized and
articulate agenda of the male leaders but also the oppositional and at
times contradictory voices on the periphery.
There is little doubt that women's education was further consolidated

in the nationalist phase. The question now was not whether women
should be educated but rather what kind of education was suitable for

them. By far the general consensus was that their education must be cognizant ofwomen's distinct role in society. Mahatma Gandhi reflected the
dominant view of educated Indians: "As Nature has made men and

women different, it is necessary to maintain a difference between the education ofthe two. True, they are equals in life, but their functions differ.
It is woman's right to rule the home. Man is master outside it. Man is the
earner. Woman spends and saves.... In this scheme of Nature, and it is
just as it should be, woman should not have to earn her living."16
The assertion of biological difference, and consequently the legitimization of sexual division of labor, in the writing of Gandhi is hardly
surprising. The material /spiritual, outer/inner, public /private, and
masculine /feminine dichotomies have been the mainstay of Western
liberalism as well.17 However, the particular ways in which sexual
dichotomies operated in the nationalist discourse and in the cultural
substrate of Indian society were markedly different. The pursuit of
DISPERSED RADIANCE

IO3

science as a higher calling, a quest for knowledge of the natural world

made it more ofa spiritual than material endeavor. Reflecting upon "the
age of intellect," of science, Rabindranath Tagore wrote: "We all know
that intellect is impersonal. Our life, and our heart, are one with us, but
our mind can be detached from the personal man and then only can it
freely move in its world ofthoughts. Our intellect is an ascetic who wears
no clothes, takes no food, knows no sleep, has no wishes, feels no love or
hatred or pity for human limitations, who only reasons, unmoved
through the vicissitudes oflife. It burrows to the roots ofthings, because
it has no concern with the thing itself" (Tagore [1950] 1985, 20).
The element ofsacrifice evinced in the unceasing quest for knowledge,
coupled with the relative insignificance ofthe rational/emotional and the
objective/subjective dichotomies in Eastern philosophies, perhaps made
it more agreeable for Indian women to pursue science.18 The Indian
polity contained radically different strains of thought on this question.
Addressing the audience at the foundation-laying ceremony ofa college
for women in Allahabad in 1928, Nehru was openly critical of the college's prospectus, which claimed that "woman's place was in the home,
and that her duty was to be a devoted wife, bringing up her children skillfully" (Jayawardena 1986, 98).
The demand for equality in education, although voiced by a minority,
was nonetheless persistent. In 1916 the Indian Government had recommended a thorough and exhaustive review of the University ofCalcutta.
The Calcutta University Commission was formed and solicited the opinions of leading academicians, community leaders, and government
officials on all aspects of Calcutta University. The twelve-volume report
generated by the commission runs into several thousand pages. The
voices ofwomen are entirely absent in this report, except on the question
ofwomen. Here too, however, women are in the minorityofmore than
one hundred responses, women contributed fewer than twenty. Most
respondents decry "purdah" (veil), show concern about the delicate
health ofwomen and the strain examinations put on them, and suggest a
softer curriculum, which will allow students to hone the skills of moth-

erhood and homemaking. Others, albeit in a tiny minority campaigned

for gender equality (Calcutta University Commission Report [hereafter
Report] 1919, chap. 14, vol. 12).
More often than not it was the younger women who took up the cause
ofgender equality in education. The response from the students ofthe allwomen Bethune College was striking both in its diametric opposition to
104

ABHA SUR

the conventional wisdom and in the emphasis it placed on science education for women. The Bethune students argued categorically against a
separate university for women, claiming that gender segregation necessarily would limit competition. Their primary concern was that standards
might be lowered for an exclusively women's university, and they did not
want women to lag behind men. The students lamented that "if the
standards were lower than that among men, we women could not stand
properly by the side ofour brothers." They further recommended that "in
the mufassal where colleges for men exist women students should be
admitted. This would give many girls the opportunity ofhaving a college
education who at present cannot find a seat in the Calcutta colleges or
whose parents, for a variety of reasons, do not see their way to sending
them to colleges in Calcutta" (Report: 409, 410). They demanded that
Bethune College, without delay, begin to offer courses leading to the honors degree standard in "philosophy, economics, history, mathematics,
geography, botany, and in the other science subjects, such as physics,
chemistry, physiology, zoology, as soon as the latter can be introduced"
(Report, 409).

The Association of University Women in India, although not quite as

progressive as the students of Bethune College, nonetheless recommended "better science teaching" in women's colleges (Report, 459).
Support for science in women's education stemmed from multiple
considerations. The Association ofUniversity Women no doubt was reiterating the need felt by the colonial state for trained professional women
in medicine and teaching (Pearson 1982, 139-40). The Bethune College
students, however, seemed equally concerned with equality of the sexes
as with the occupational needs ofsociety.
The assertion of equality of sexes in the demands ofthe women students emphasizes that women were not simply passive recipients ofthe
dominant nationalist ideologies. Rather they developed and asserted
their own understanding ofthe role women would play in modern India.
Lalitha Chandrasekhar, Sunanda Bai, and Anna Mani had entered universities in the late 1920s and mid 1930s. The social and political milieu in
this post world-war era was decidedly anti-imperialist. The fervor ofthe
independence movement, the mobilization oflarge numbers ofwomen
in grassroots political opposition, and the rhetoric ofwomen's emancipation in left-wing politics permeated the consciousness of women
students of Anna Mani's generation. Socialist politics had entered a
variety of student, youth, and peasant organizations which became
DISPERSED RADIANCE

105

increasingly aware of the need to integrate nationalism with social justice. Reminiscing about her university days Mani recalled, "In those days,
we had respect only for the leftists." Both Sunanda Bai and Anna Mani
gravitated toward socialist politics during their years in graduate school.
According to Mani, they associated with left-leaning people, read socialist literature, and considered themselves quite "enlightened." Egalitarian
politics thus became an integral part oftheir ideological makeup.
Mani remembered how impressed both she and Bai had been with
Sarojini Naidu's presidency of the Indian National Congress. Naidu, an
eminent poet and a respected nationalist leader, symbolized the new
Indian woman for heran independent and self-assured woman who
could scale new heights. As a child, Mani had been drawn to Gandhian
politics, particularly to Gandhi's vision ofsuraraj (self-rule). Gandhi had
visited Mani's hometown when she was a little girl. He spoke there ofselfreliance and self-help and promoted a large-scale boycott of foreign
goods, especially ofcloth from British mills. Mani recalled, with a touch
ofpride, how she took to wearing only khadi, the homespun Indian cloth,
after hearing his talk. In spite of this influence, Mani, did not share
Gandhi's views on women's education, nor did she imitate his renunciation of modern industrial civilization. Similarly, Asima Chatterjee, the
eminent natural-products chemist at Calcutta University who grew up in
a devout Brahmo household, is an ardent follower ofthe social reformer

Vivekananda, who, among other proposals, prescribed that women

should not be educated in modern sciences but should be trained to

achieve fulfillment within the family. Heedless ofVivekananda's views in

this area, Chatterjee has devoted herselfentirely to the cause ofscience.
Long retired from Calcutta University, she continues to put in a ten-hour
day at her laboratory overseeing the work of her research assistants
(Chatterjee 1977, Chatterjee 1995).
The claims ofsome critics that pursuing Western science would necessarily be alienating for Indians notwithstanding, neither Anna Mani nor
Asima Chatterjee expressed any qualms about doing science. On the contrary, at least during Mani's and Chatterjee's careers, most scientists in
India felt that creating a strong base for science and technology was a productive and nationalist endeavor. Anna Mani's admiration for Gandhi

and Asima Chatterjee's devotion to Vivekananda is also not incongruous

with their careers. While both the women implicitly rejected certain
aspects of these reformers' philosophies, both voluntarily took up a
Gandhian way of life and Chatterjee assumed a devoutly religious
106

ABHA SUR

perspective as well. Indeed, this selective adoption of certain cultural

norms ofnationalism helped, rather than hindered, their career choices.
The strict adherence to a simple and virtuous life made doing science a
higher calling, a kind ofasceticism. It helped dissolve the public/private
dichotomy, as the integrity ofthe private feminine domain with its incumbent social norms easily could be transported to the public sphere.

The Role ofFamily

Within the constraints ofcolonial education and nationalist ideology, the
background of her family, more than any other social institution, determined whether a woman would pursue higher studies or not. Active support for the pursuit ofscience was not necessary, benign indifference was
enough. The middle and upper classes, to which almost all ofthe scientific personnel in India belong, felt little need to link women's education
to employment opportunities. Education forwomen was seen by the family as a means to become better and more informed wives and mothers. It
mattered little, therefore, whether a woman studied literature or history
or chemistry or physics, as long as college education did not destabilize
the hierarchical family structure. However circumscribed, women's
admission to higher education ensured that a few women would end up
studying even the most unlikely ofdisciplines.
However, detached from employment opportunities and active participation in society at large, women's education acquired an ornamental
status, at least in the eyes ofthe family. Anna Mani, who is averse to wearing any form ofjewelry, told me that on her eighth birthday when she was
offered diamond earrings, as had become a custom in her family, she
opted instead for a set ofthe Encyclopedia Britannica. Anna Mani continued,
"In the olden days they would compile all the family assets on papyrus. If
a woman's worth had to be measured by herjewelry and assets, wouldn't
it be easier for the woman to wear a list ofthese assets around her neck?"

Aware of the growing schism between her perspective and her family's,
Anna Mani "got on pretty much on her own" especially after she left her
home to pursue a bachelor's degree in physics honors at Presidency
College, Madras.
Anna Mani came from a large family (she is the seventh of eight children, three girls and five boys) in the state ofTravancore in the southern
part of India. Her father was a prosperous civil engineer who owned
DISPERSED RADIANCE

I07

cardamom estates. Although Mani's family belonged to an ancient Syrian

Christian church, her father was an agnostic. The state ofTravancore was
one of the few states in India where matrilineal traditions prevailed.
"Education ofboth girls and boys was free and was almost compulsory up
to high school, thanks to the maharani ofthe state," Mani informed me.
By the time she was eight, Mani had read almost all the books in Malyalam
at her public library.
One ofthe youngest children in the family, Mani followed her brothers,
who were groomed for high-level careers in government service, rather
than her sisters. While there was no persistent opposition to her desire
for higher education in physics from her family, there was little encouragement. Her brothers, on the other hand, had been supported in pursuing their careers. Retrospectively, Anna Mani was not in the least bit troubled by the differential treatment meted out to her. She seemed fiercely
independent as she told me that her parents had had little impact on her
decision to pursue a career in physics and to go abroad for meteorological training. While she was critical ofher brothers' decision to work for
the British in India, she justified her own acceptance ofa British scholarship on the grounds that "they thought it was their money but I knew it
was ours." Here Mani was repeating what was in her young adulthood a
standard complaint of the Indians with respect to budget allocation. In
1920-21, for instance, while the net imperial revenue was more than Rs
14 trillion, the total annual expenditure on education per head remained
abysmally low, a mere Rs. 0.74 (Basu 1974, 96).
Sunanda Bai, the second woman student in Raman's laboratory, came
from a Brahmin family from the province of Maharashtra. She is no
longer living, and in conversations with several ofher peers at Raman's
laboratory, I was able to piece together only a few basic facts about her.
She was married off at an early age but lived an independent life. Mani
thought that Sunada Bai's husband was a liberal man who may have
encouraged Bai to pursue higher education. At Benares Hindu University,
from which Bai obtained her Master's degree in physics, she had lived in
a women's dormitory. She joined Raman's laboratory in 1939 as a graduate student in physics at the Indian Institute ofScience. In Bangalore, too,
she lived alone; her husband, who resided some two hundred kilometers

away, visited her occasionally. Most of her colleagues and friends, however, did not know her marital status, and there were frequent aspersions
in Raman's laboratory about how only women who are unable to get married take up the study ofphysics (Mani 1993).
108

ABHA SUR

Lalitha Chandrasekhar, Raman's first woman student, came from a

family which had been especially influenced by social reforms.19 Lalitha's

maternal aunt Subalakshmi had become, by the age of eleven, a child
widow. The lot ofwidows in India used to be, and, to a large extent, continues to be particularly harsh. Tradition demanded that when a child
widow reached puberty, her hair was to be shaved off, she was not to wear
any ornaments, and she was only permitted to wear a coarse cotton sari.
The child widow was doomed to live as a maid in a relative's house for the

rest ofher life. Not only that, she had to keep away from all religious functions, for she was considered a bad omen. Subalakshmi's father, whose
own sister had gone through this devastating life, could not bear to see
his daughter forced into a similar situation. He resolved to educate not
only his widowed daughter but all of his five daughters. Subalakshmi
received a B.A. degree in 1911 with honorsshe had outperformed all the
men in her year.
Subalakshmi was educated in a missionary school. Christian missionaries who took up the task ofeducating women and girls "were keen to
use education for proselytizing and for ensuring that, if the women
became Christians, there would be no lapses back to the old beliefs
by male converts" (Jayawardena 1986, 81). Despite fear of conversion
attempts and of association with lower caste women, which kept most
upper-caste Hindus from participating in the missionary efforts,
Subalakshmi's father opted for missionary education for his daughters
because the alternative was much too dreadful. Subalakshmi eventually
converted to Christianity and ran a teacher's training school for widows
from her home. She dedicated her life to women's education and the
rehabilitation ofwidows.

Subalakshmi had a deep influence on young Lalitha. Lalitha's father

was a physician who died when Lalitha was barely ten years old.
Consequently Lalitha, with her mother and her two elder sisters, moved
in with her grandparents. In their household, women's education was by
then taken for granted. Lalitha's sisters went on to become physicians.
Lalitha herself opted for a master's degree in physics at Presidency
College in Madras, from which she graduated in 1931.
Lalitha Chandrasekhar wanted to pursue graduate research in physics
but her family would not consider sending an unmarried girl to England
for further studies (see WaIi 1991). She taught physics and science at
a high school in Madras for a year and then went to Delhi to teach
at a women's medical school, Lady Harding Medical College. She
DISPERSED RADIANCE

IO9

subsequently returned to South India and joined Raman's laboratory

in 1935.
In August 1936, Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar, her classmate in
physics at Presidency College, returned from Cambridge for a brief
visit. Lalitha and Chandrasekhar had kept up their college friendship
through frequent correspondence, and it was no surprise to anyone when
within two months of his arrival, the two had married. Chandrasekhar

and Lalitha left India soon and subsequently settled in America. Lalitha
took courses in astrophysics and astronomy at the observatory at
Williams Bay, Illinois, where Chandrasekhar taught, but she decided not
to pursue research. It is clear from accounts ofChandrasekhar's life that
Lalitha gave up her aspirations ofa career in science to provide support
for her husband. Chandra, as he was known, went on to become a

renowned astrophysicist at the University ofChicago, and won the Nobel

Prize in 1983.
Unlike Anna Mani, who was the only one ofthree sisters to have pursued higher education, Lalitha Chandrasekhar came from a family of
highly educated women. Three ofher aunts were teachers and both ofher
sisters were physicians. Yet, Lalitha gave up her own aspirations for a
research career to devote herself to her husband. "I had to give up the
idea offurther studies," Lalitha tells Kameshwar WaIi, Chandra's biographer. "Chandra was not too happy about it: he felt that I was ready to
undertake a research problem, but I made the decision not to continue
since I felt that I would not be able to devote my full time. I understood
that Chandra had to give most ofhis time to his science. That is the way a
scientist is made."

The incompatibility ofmarriage and a career in science seems to be a

recurrent theme in the lives ofwomen scientists in colonial India. Anna

Mani is most candid about it. She has never regretted her decision to
remain single. Her elder sister was married at the age ofseventeen, and
according to Mani "could have used her brain more usefully had she not
married." Mani could "handle only one Syrian Christian at a time" as, in
her own words, they were always "hatching, matching, and dispatching."
Alamelu Venkataraman, a contemporary ofMani with a Ph.D. in organic
chemistry from Madras University, voices a similar sentiment: "Once you
get into science, marriage becomes troublesome. You can neither do one
nor the other" (Venkataraman, 1993). Alamelu Venkataraman did marry
a fellow biochemist but chose to remain in India to pursue her career
when he moved to New Jersey.
ABHASUR

The lives ofthese women scientists reveal the cracks that had begun to
appear in the largely traditional even if "embattled" family structures of
the nineteenth century (see Chakravarty 1998 and Sangari 1991). The new
generation ofwomen, who had access to higher institutes of learning,
began slowly to erode the worldview of the older generation ofwomen
who had been schooled to please their men. They began to confront the
contradictions between marriage and doing science by charting out their
own trajectories, and marriage was often subordinated to work.
Gender Blind Science?

The reasons behind women's entry into scientific disciplines remain

something ofan enigma. What motivated the women to study physics in
the first place, when there was neither precedent nor encouragement to
do so? I sensed in Anna Mani a very matter of fact view of her life and
achievements. She saw nothing unusual in her pursuing physics in an era
where it was possible to count all the women physicists in India on one's
fingertips. There were no stories ofan intrinsic love for physics, nor ofan
insatiable thirst to understand the natural world. Of the many options
available for graduate studies, she chose physics because she happened
to be good in the subject.
Familial pressures and cultural taboos that prevented most women
from pursuing any higher education, let alone science, became mere
abstractions for the women who were allowed to enroll in the universities. It was the outsiders and the women who did not make it into the

world of science who saw and felt intimidated by social forces. Women
scientists, imbued with the promise ofa new era and confidence in their
own ability, ignored, for the most part, the hostility they encountered
from some of their male colleagues. For the successful, achievements
overshadowed personal struggle, and the deep capacity for endurance
into which women are often socialized made their particular difficulties
seem trivial.

In an interview granted to the Bulletin of the Wotld Meteorological

Organization (hereafter Bulletin ofwmo 1992, 287-97), Anna Mani states,
"For myself, I must say that at no time did I experience professional discrimination as a woman in what was considered largely a man's world. I
did not feel I was either penalized or privileged because ofbeing female."
Having been schooled in feminist and cultural critiques ofscience, I had
DISPERSED RADIANCE

III

been inclined to read Mani's response as typical of established women

scientists, who have been perceived, by and large, as being inattentive to
gender.20 However, Mani's assertions that the institutions ofscience were
gender neutral reflected neither insensitivity to women's condition nor a
strategic ploy to ensure a place in science by decrying attention to
difference. Rather, Mani probably saw herselfas a beneficiary ofthe institutional and social privileges that accrued to her class, in comparison
with which the individualized gender discrimination encountered in
doing science, painful as it might have been, would fade into insignificance. Indeed Anna Mani seemed acutely aware of the subtle and overt
differences between the men and the women ofher generation ofscholars. The twenty women who sailed with her to Britain were "remarkably
broadminded" and "socially conscious," she recalled, while some ofthe
men, especially her juniors at the Meteorological Department were quite
"resentful" ofher success.

Another likely explanation ofMani's attitude is nationalism. Nationalist ideology, which had a profound influence on women scientists ofthat
era, tended to mask class, caste, and gender differences as it asserted
a self-conscious and self-confident Indian identity. Her insistence on
downplaying gender in science can also be seen as a form ofresistance to
coercive identities imposed in the society at large, which limited women's
potential. It did not entail a blanket denial ofall difference but rather the
denial of those formulations that posited different intellectual capabilities in men and women. Anna Mani displayed a healthy disdain for victim
politics as well. To the extent that the discourse ofdiscrimination carries
with it aspersions ofinequality, so that personal achievement and success
become contaminated with "special consideration" and patronage, the
stoic and proud Anna Mani would have no part ofit. "I had worked hard
to gain my academic qualifications and was judged fit to carry out the
work that was needed, " she would insist when asked whether her being a
woman had any impact on her work. "Selection for the scholarships at
Bangalore and in the United Kingdom had nothing to do with one's sex"
(Bulletin ofwmo 1992).
Yet, as I asked Anna Mani about the social environment and the support
ofher peers, a deep-seated hurt and anger surfaced anew. "He was an odious man," she said, referring to a colleague who had done his best to
make the women feel inept both as scientists and as women. Any slight
error the women made in handling instrumentation or in setting up an
experiment was immediately broadcast by some men as a sign offemale
ABHASUR

incompetence.21 When Mani and Bai audited a course on theoretical

physics, itwas generally assumed thatthe material would be beyond their
ken (which Mani, with her characteristic humor, admits itwas).

Educational and research institutions are seen primarily as genderblind admission granting bodies concerned only with merit and excellence in their pursuit of knowledge, and not as cultural and social sites.
This helps perpetuate the myth ofgender neutrality in science. The gender and caste prejudices embedded in the interactions ofthe laboratory
are not seen as reproductions ofthe social relations ofthe society at large,
but as individual actions. The merit-based admission process helped to
establish the gender-neutral credentials ofthe institutions. However, the
academic credentials ofthe women students were brought into question
again and again by some oftheir male colleagues as every action oftheirs
was minutely scrutinized with suspicion and doubt, undermining their
position and slowly eroding their sense ofbelonging to the laboratory.
Women students received more than their share of the ridicule and

banter so pervasive in the life of a university. Every woman student was

given a derisive "nickname." The women seemed to have taken the banter in stride, seeing it as a part of university rituals. But whereas Anna
Mani related to me the names given to some of her colleagues in the
chemistry department, she steadfastly refused to reveal the name given to
her or to Sunanda Bai. The nicknames were well thought out. They struck
at the core of the woman's personality, setting her apart from the other
women students. The cultural images embodied in this process de-center the focus from the collective treatment ofa social group to an individual peculiarity. The women, even as they were targets of this insidious
practice, participated in the game, masking their individual embarrassment in the jovial mockery oftheir friends.

The Laboratory as a Differential Space

Women scientists were not immune to social and cultural taboos, despite
the demands oftheir newvocations. The segregation by sex insisted upon
by Indian society found its way into the research laboratories, severely
limiting the intellectual contact so essential for full participation in scientific life. Raman maintained a strict separation ofsexes in his laboratory. Mani and Bai for the most part worked alone, isolated from their
peers. The crucial practice ofdiscussion and debate about scientific ideas
DISPERSED RADIANCE

II3

among peers was denied to them, rendering the women peripheral to the
scientific enterprise. Casual, informal association with male colleagues
was strictly out ofbounds. Raman frowned upon any interaction between
men and women. Mani recalled how he would mutter "Scandalous!"

every time a male and a female student walked together by his window.
With a touch ofamusement, Mani noted that Raman must have had an
uncanny sense, for even while bending over a microscope, he would be
able to catch a glimpse ofan "offending" couple. She remembered one
incident vividly. She was talking to Nagamani, one ofher male colleagues
in the laboratory. In the middle ofa sentence, Nagamani looked up to find
Raman at a distance, cycling slowly ("like a big bear") toward them.
Nagamani turned pale and fled the scene as fast as he could,she remembered, "leaving me to face the music alone." Mani laughed at the recollection but communicated nevertheless the loneliness and professional
seclusion forced upon the women.
Mani and Bai spent long hours in the laboratory. To record weak spectra plates had to be exposed for twelve to fifteen hours, which meant that
the women often spent nights in the laboratory. They would snatch a few
hours ofsleep curled under the table on which they had set up their experiments. The introverted interior cultural spaces that women symbolized
made the physical spaces available to them constricted as well. While
men students under similar experimental constraints could have rested in
the corridors or on the patches of green outside the laboratory, the
women felt confined to the limited privacy afforded by the tabletop.
The austere conditions under which Mani and Bai worked and the iso-

lation they suffered were perhaps the reasons they were accepted at all in
the scientific community, as well as in the society at large. Anna Mani
recounts that on a visit to a famous Hindu temple near Madras, Mrs.
Raman smuggled her into the inner sanctum, which was forbidden to
non-Brahmins and widows. The priest, horrified to see Anna Mani without red kumkum on her forehead, which signifies a Hindu woman who is
not a widow, was about to throw her out ofthe sanctum when Mrs. Raman
intervened. She deftly put kumkum on Mani's forehead and chided her in
front ofthe priest. "Saraswati," she said, "why are you so careless about
your appearance?" Anna Mani told me that she was pleased Mrs. Raman
had referred to her as Saraswati, the goddess oflearning and wisdom, and
not as Lakshmi, the goddess ofwealth.
The figure ofan ascetic, oblivious ofpersonal needs and desires in the
single-minded quest for knowledge, is deeply respected in Indian culture.
114

ABHA SUR

Women scientists, with their devotion to science and their spartan nonfamilial lives, are ascribed a status similar to that ofan ascetic, if not by
their fellow male scientists, then certainly by those scientists' wives and
mothers. Mani felt grateful to these women for welcoming her into their
homes and for being her surrogate mothers and sisters.
These cultural contingencies notwithstanding, the scientific institutions perpetuated their own gender biases. Neither Anna Mani nor
Sunanda Bai was ever granted a doctoral degree. Their completed Ph.D.
dissertations remain in the library ofRaman Research Institute, indistinguishable from other bound dissertations with not a trace to suggest that
these were eventually denied degrees. Madras University, which at that
time formally granted degrees for work done at the Indian Institute of
Science, claimed that Mani did not have an M.Sc. degree, and therefore
they could not possibly grant her a Ph.D. They chose to overlook the facts
that Mani had graduated with honors in physics and chemistry, had won
a scholarship for graduate studies at the Indian Institute ofScience, and
had published five single-authored papers on the luminescence of diamond for her thesis work. However, Mani insisted that the lack ofa Ph.D.
degree made little difference in her life, as she left for England on a government scholarship to train as a meteorological instrumentation specialist soon after finishing her research work in Raman's laboratory.
Although her preference had been to pursue research in physics, the only
scholarships available at that time were in meteorology, and Mani was
"grateful that things turned out as they did." In England she was "treated
like a princess" because Indians were "so rare" in Britain at that time.
Regardless of her scientific achievements, something troubled
Sunanda Bai deeply. Just before her intended departure to Sweden for
postdoctoral work in experimental physics, Bai and her friend Sharda
together attempted suicide. Sharda's brother was able to save his
sister but evidently could do nothing to save Bai. Sunanda Bai's death is
shrouded in mystery even today. Former colleagues and friends remain
disquietingly silent; all that is ever said is that her suicide had nothing to
do with her work or with the Indian Institute ofScience.

According to Anna Mani, Bai's last wish had been to be granted the
Ph.D. degree that she so rightfully deserved, posthumously. Officials at
Madras did not fulfill her wish, ostensibly for bureaucratic reasons. Mani
who had accepted graciously the reasons Madras University had given for
denying her a Ph.D. degree, nonetheless felt tormented by the injustice of
their decision vis--vis Sunanda Bai.
DISPERSED RADIANCE

II5

The Women and Their Science

Sunanda Bai was one of six students whose work Raman personally
supervised. The other students worked under various senior scientists
and postdoctoral fellows in Raman's laboratory (Ramaseshan 1993).
From all accounts, Bai was an excellent researcher. She did pioneering
work in recording and analyzing the composite nature of the scattered
spectrum of liquids.22 During the five years that Bai spent in Raman's
laboratory, she published ten single-authored papers, which in itselfis a
remarkable achievement, considering the complexities of the problems
she was working on as well as the experimental difficulties in working
with low-intensity scattered radiation (Bai 1942).
In 1940, a year after finishing college, Anna Mani obtained a scholarship to do research in physics at the Indian Institute ofScience. She was
accepted in Raman's laboratory as a graduate student. There Mani
worked on the spectroscopy ofdiamonds and rubies. Raman had become
increasingly obsessed with the study ofdiamonds because ofhis ongoing
controversies with Max Born about crystal dynamics (Sur 1999) and with
Kathleen Lonsdale about the structure ofdiamond. He had a collection of

three hundred diamonds from India and Africa; practically all ofhis students worked on some aspect or another ofdiamonds. Mani recorded and
analyzed fluorescence, absorption, and Raman spectra ofthirty-two diamonds. She studied temperature dependence and polarization effects in
these spectra. The experiments were long and painstaking: the crystals
were held at liquid air temperatures, and the weak luminescence ofsome
of the diamonds required fifteen to twenty hours of exposure time to
record the spectrum on photographic plates (Mani 1944). Mani spent
long hours in the laboratory. Between 1942 and 1945, she published five
single-authored papers on the luminescence ofdiamonds and rubies. In
August 1945 she submitted her Ph.D. dissertation to Madras University
and was awarded a government scholarship for an internship in England,
where she specialized in meteorological instrumentation.
Mani returned to Independent India in 1948. She joined the Indian
Meteorological Department at Pune, where she was in charge of construction of radiation instrumentation. She published a number of
papers on subjects ranging from atmospheric ozone to the need for international instrument comparisons and national standardization ofmeteorological instrumentation. She retired as the deputy director general of
the Indian Meteorological Department in 1976 and subsequently
HO

ABHASUR

returned to the Raman Research Institute as a visiting professor for three

years. She published two books, The Handbook/or Solar Radiation Data for
India (1980) and Solar Radiation over India (1981), and was working on a
project for harnessing wind energy in India in 1993.
Despite her interest in and involvement with issues of environment,
Anna Mani "got out ofthe business," as environmentalists ("carpetbaggers" as she called them) seemed to be "always in orbit." She preferred to
stay in one place.

Moral Regulation and Painful Transitions

The early woman scientists lurked hesitatingly at the margins ofIndian
society. In their demeanor and way oflife, they abided very much within
the bounds of tradition, yet their scientific vocations made them
different. However, unlike their male colleagues, who inspired admiration, women scientists for the most part invoked curiosity, as they
appeared remarkably traditional in their bearing yet quite modern in their
career pursuits.
Despite having chosen modern, nontraditional, and until then entirely
male dominated fields ofstudy, Indian women scientists were accepted,
by and large, within the folds oftraditional society precisely because they
did not challenge social and cultural norms. Anna Mani recalled with
gratitude the warmth with which the wives of her male colleagues welcomed her into their homes: "Mrs. Venketeswaran, [the wife of her

immediate supervisor at the Meteorological Department] was like a goddess. She had not had much education but was more broadminded than

so called educated people." As a graduate student, Mani became close to

Mrs. Raman, who treated her "as ifI was her own daughter." As long as
these women did not undermine cultural norms or the social fabric of

family life, their nontraditional professions were not only tolerated but
perhaps even encouraged.
The lives of these women illustrate the process by which change is
slowly incorporated within the continuity of tradition. The hegemonic
sense of tradition as "a deliberately selective and connective process,
which offers a historical and cultural ratification of a contemporary
order," is invariably rooted in morality and religion (Williams 1977, 116).
And, given ancient India's plethora ofgoddesses ofwisdom and wealth,
it becomes relatively easy to legitimize women's ventures into new fields
DISPERSED RADIANCE

II7

by invoking selective traditions, provided that the women maintain a certain social decorum. Thus, the women scientists could be identified with

the heritage ofLilavati, the author ofa ninth century treatise on mathematics, ofAvyar, a scholar ofastronomy, medicine and geography, and of
Gargi and Maitreyi, learned women of ancient India. However, the
acceptance rests on implicitly differentiating between culture as "the
general process ofintellectual, spiritual and aesthetic development," and
culture as a way oflife, comprising social relations, norms, and etiquette
(Williams 1983, 90). Dramatic changes in the intellectual and aesthetic
development ofwomen in India, as indicated by the numbers ofwomen
with tertiary education, invariably have been accompanied by the fear that
educated women will undermine male dominance and control, the way of
life as it were. This fear has had to be assuaged time and again by educators and public leaders. On the graduation of the first women students
from Calcutta University in 1883, the vice-chancellor, Mr. H. J. Reynolds,
assured the audience:

No one wishes, no one expects, that the extension of education to

Indian Women will lead them at once to throw aside the restraints

ofcaste, the habits ofseclusion which the practice ofthe country justifies, or even the timidity of the temperament which characterizes
them today. Those who apprehend anything like a disorganization of
the present social system ofIndia may lay aside their fears. The customs of the nation are not so easily changed. (Quoted in Borthwick
1984, 96 n. 129)
But the "customs ofnation" do change albeit though slowly, unevenly,
and erratically. The accommodation of change within the continuity of
tradition implies a certain fluidity or plasticity oftraditions. However, the
differential evolution of "way of life" and "aesthetic and intellectual
development" ensure that the plasticity oftraditions at any given time in
history is finite. The containment ofthe "modern" within the more slowly
evolving social norms is often unstable. At critical junctures in women's
personal histories, social constraints become overwhelming, often with
painful or dire consequences for the women involved. As noted above,
Sunanda Bai, the most accomplished female student of Raman's, took
her own life on the eve ofher departure to Sweden for postdoctoral studies. The reasons for her suicide are shrouded in silence even to this day,
and the secrecy serves to heighten the sense ofa scandal surrounding a
social transgression. Anna Mani's lasting recollection ofthis tragic event
118

ABHA SUR

was the visit of Sunanda Bai's physics professor from Benaras Hindu
University a few weeks after her death. The frail old man had been visibly
shaken by Sunanda Bai's death and had wept bitterly at the loss of his
favorite pupil.
Conclusion

The lives ofthe women scientists in Raman's laboratory evince an ongoing tussle between individual agency and societal discrimination. If
Kamala Sohonie's perseverance and academic success opened doors for
Lalitha Chandrasekhar, Anna Mani, and Sunanda Bai, perhaps a perceived social transgression by Sunanda Bai may have closed them, at least
in Raman's eyes, for subsequently there were no women students in his
laboratory. In an era preceding the articulation ofa feminist consciousness and collective agency, these women scientists struggled alone. And
yet their individual actions, their personal achievement, and their failures
assumed larger-than-life proportions in the eyes of the society which
posited in them the womanhood of sciencethe acid test of whether
women should be doing science. The absence ofwomen in the postSunanda Bai phase ofRaman's laboratory perhaps indicates the price of
doing science for Indian women. Survival in science demanded from the
women social conformity and conservatism.
Nonetheless, in the microcosm of Raman's laboratory, the three
women embody clearly different modes ofintersection ofgender, culture,
and science. All ofthem were from the middle or upper class, all had families that valued women's education, and all studied physics under similar circumstances. Their lives illustrate how different cultural influences

within India adapted to modernizing forces. Lalitha Chandrasekhar epitomizes the educated woman visualized by the Indian religious reformers;
her education made her the ideal wife, willing to forego her career to be a
supportive companion. About Sunanda Bai, one can only surmise. The
glimpses ofher life and her lively intellect that seep through the guarded
quiet of her peers suggest an insistent dissidence. The tension exuding
from the stony silences of her peers is as palpable today as it must have
been fifty years ago.
Anna Mani, on the other hand, represents the confluence of the
modernizing aspects ofscience, nationalist, and gender ideologies. She
is a success story to which few women (or men) could aspire. She
DISPERSED RADIANCE

Hg

transcended the delimited cultural and physical spaces available to her

and created not only a room ofher own, or a laboratory ofher own, but a
whole workshop, a mini-factory ofher own. In the industrial suburbs of
Bangalore, Mani heads a small company that manufactures instruments
for measuring wind speed and solar energy. Here one witnesses an almost
complete reversal of gender roles. Some thirty workers, largely men,
stood up with alacrity and deference as Anna Mani walked in the door,
much as schoolchildren rise from their seats to greet their teachers. The
gesture was both amusing and perplexing. The unhesitant respect Mani
commanded seemed refreshing. However, even as the gender roles were
being redefined, class relations remained intact and unfaltering in Anna
Mani's workshop.
The role of upper class women in the history of their education was
at once complicit with and antagonistic to patriarchal authority as they
were simultaneously beneficiaries of their social location and subordinated to its gendered organization (see Bannerji 1992). Similarly, the history ofwomen scientists in India is inherently a history ofincongruities
and diametric oppositions. These histories embody a quagmire of contradictionsof privilege and penalty, of exaltation and damnation, and
of power and subservience. The success ofwomen scientists, it seems
to me, sits rather uncomfortably within the larger context of science
and society.
The survival of women in the hallowed halls of science has been

poignantly difficult, and yet their presence in these halls does not dissuade or dissolve the gender and class inequities embedded in the larger
system. There has been a lingering hope among feminists that the participation of large numbers ofwomen in traditionally male-dominated
fields of inquiry would change not only the institutional biases but also
more importantly the very nature of these fields. The slow trickle of
women into the higher echelons ofeducation in the late nineteenth century did over time change the institutional response to women. However,
altering the very nature of science would have required a self-conscious
affirmation ofgender identities by the women scientists in opposition to
the coercive womanhood forced upon them by their male colleagues and
the society at large.
Anna Mani's resistance to coercive gendered identities and to the
imposition of "difference from above" cannot, however, be interpreted
solely as a negation or repudiation ofgender in order for her to be fully
included in the enterprise of science. Rather, her assertion of gender
ABHA SUR

neutrality can perhaps be seen as an expression ofher spirit ofegalitarianism.23 The received enlightenment ofMani's generation was washed
clean ofits tainted historythe history ofexclusion ofwomen and people ofcolor from political participation in the West. The constitution of
Independent India granted equal rights to all citizens, eliminating the
need for Indian women to organize as women. The demand for gender
equality in education, although constrained by dominant nationalist ideology, was not directed against the state or the public institutions but
against familial taboos and that, too, in an individual capacity. The battles for access to higher education were, for the most part, fought in the
privacy ofhomes. The women ofIndian enlightenment were not genderblind but perhaps mistakenly took gender equality for granted. Indeed,
toward the end of our many conversations, Anna Mani, who until then
had steadfastly resisted the notion ofgendered science, became wistful as
she began to realize that during the years when she had worn the mantle
ofscience, had had the authority to hire women as scientists, and could
have been a conscious role model for younger women, she had been
unaware ofthe need to do so.

Perhaps the contention between egalitarian feminism and feminism of

difference lies not in their visions ofa gender-just world but rather in their
perceptions of how best to achieve it in particular historical and social
contexts.
NOTES

I would like to thank Mario Biagiolli, Deborah Fitzgerald, Sumi Krishna,

laved Malick, Katy Park, Modhurnita Roy, and Amy Slaton for their useful
comments and criticisms. I also owe special thanks to Susan Van Dyne of
Meridians and to the two referees, Ravi Rajan and Banu Subramaniam for their
invaluable insights and suggestions. Any errors or omissions that remain are
entirely my own responsibility.

i. The Calcutta University Commission Report (1919) published the response ofintellectuals, administrators, university and college faculty, and students in India
on the question ofwomen's education. By far the majority ofthe respondents
argue for a separate curriculum for women to reflect their needs as homemakers and mothers (see vol. 12: 401-61).
2. Although the women scientists came largely from upper-caste and upper-class
families, Sumit Sarkar has argued that their families cannot be considered elite
in that they did not self-consciously promote their own caste and class interests. More often than not the English-educated Indians supported measures
that direcdy or indirectly undermined upper-caste privileges. They agitated for
compulsory primary education and started many private colleges at the time
when government aid to higher education was being cut severely due to the
DISPERSED RADIANCE

121

recommendations ofthe Hunter Commission (1882). (See Sarkar 1983: 72-73).

3.Keller (1989), in particular, has argued persuasively that "for women scientists
as scientists, the principal point is that measures ofscientific performance
admitted ofonly a single scale, according to which, to be different was to be
lesser. Under such circumstances, the hope ofequity, indeed the very concepr
ofequity, appearedas it still appears to depend on the disavowal of
difference." She also notes that "any acknowledgment ofgender based
difference was almost invariably employed as a justification for exclusion.
Either it was used to exclude them from science, or to brand them as 'not

women'in practice, usually both at the same time."

4.Gary Werskey (1978) has developed the concept ofcollective history and the
interaction ofgroups ofindividuals with society at large.
5. 1 conducted interviews with Professor Emeritus Asima Chatterjee, natural
products chemist, University ofCalcutta; Professor Rajeshwari Chakravarty,
retired professor ofelectrical engineering, Indian Institute ofScience,
Bangalore; Dr. Alamelu Venkataraman, organic chemist, and former director
ofthe Botanical Instirute in Lucknow; and Dr. Bhavani Bedawadi, retired

deputy director ofthe National Institute ofNutrition in Hyderabad.

6.The figure ofone million refers to the number ofwomen trained as scientists. Only a small fraction ofthese (about 5000 women) are engaged in
research and development (Chakravarty et al. 1984).
7.Apart from a number ofreports commissioned by the Department ofScience
and Technology (DST) on the status ofwomen scientists in India, very few
scholars have examined critically the sociology/anthropology ofwomen in
science. Exceptions are Subrahmanyan (1998), Mukhopadhyay and Seymour
(1994), and Krishnaraj (1991).
8.Recent work by Irian Habib and Dhruv Raina emphasizes a new approach
toward the history ofscience by focusing on the idea of"science in struggle."
See, for instance, Habib and Raina (198g: 51-66).
9.In an essay Madhu Kishwar divides the students at Miranda House, a
women's college affiliated with Delhi University, into three categories: "the
westernized Mirandians who come from elite schools, the science types, and
the Hindi-speaking bhenjis" (Kishwar 1995: 10) Apart from this characterization, as the "science types," science students get no mention at all in the rest of
the article, relegated once again to obscurity, this time in the pages ofthe leading women's journal in India. Similarly, Vandana Shiva in her critique of
"western science" posits an insuperable dichotomy between white men and
rural Indian women, and in the process chooses to overlook the inconvenient
category ofwomen scientists (Shiva 1989).
10.Tethinraj (1997). The story ofKamala Sohonie has only recendy come to
light. Apparendy, Anna Mani and her coworkers were unaware ofthe difficulties faced by Dr. Sohonie.
11.According to the Indraprastha College Alumni Association newsletter,
Professor Radha Pant ofAllahabad University, for instance, forged a scientific
career in biochemistry through the circuitous route ofa home science degree
ABHA SUR

with specialization in nutrition. Also, many women who had aspired to be

physicians, including Anna Mani, instead took up opportunities in science
because ofthe paucity ofmedical schools for women.
12.The Raman effect, or Raman scattering, is observed when a monochromatic
incident beam oflight is irradiated on a sample where it collides with the molecules and in the process either gives up some ofits energy to the molecules or
collects energy from the molecules. The exiting beam thus emerges with a
modified frequency, either a lower (Stokes radiation) or a higher (anti-Stokes
radiation). Since the energy transfer depends upon the energy levels ofthe molecules, the modified scattered radiation contains the imprint ofthe molecular
energy levels ofthe irradiated sample. The discovery ofthe Raman effect
opened up new fields ofexperimental research, as the internal energy structure
ofmolecules could be explored and the chemical composition ofmolecules
studied by Raman spectroscopy.
13.Report ofthe Quinquennial Reviewing Committee ofthe Indian Institute of
Science 1936, India Office Library, London (v/26/865/4). See also "The Saha
Raman Controversy." For a briefhistory ofRaman's tenure at the Indian
Institute ofScience, see Subbarayappa (1992: 112-51).
14.One ofthe earliest reformers, Raja Ram Mohan Roy, for instance, campaigned
for both women's education and scientific and technical education. Ghulam

Murshid suggests that Roy might have been influenced by Mary

Wollstonecraft's Vindication ofthe Rights ofWoman. See Murshid (1983).
15.For a discussion ofgender discrimination in scientific institutions in the West,
see for instance, R. Strachy, The Cause (New York: Kennikat Press, 1969 and
1928). See also, Londa Schiebinger, "The History and Philosophy ofWomen in
Science: A Review Essay" in Sandra Harding and lean F. O'Barr (eds.), Sex and
Scientific Inquiry, (Chicago: The University ofChicago Press, 1987). See also
Londa Schiebinger, The Mind Has No Sex (Cambridge, Harvard University Press,
1989, 1996).
16.Gandhi gave this speech at the Second Gujrat Educational Conference, 20
October 1917. Quoted in Gandhi on Women, P. Ioshi, ed. (New Delhi: Centre for
Women's Development Studies, 1988) p. 14
17.Elizabeth Fee has argued that "the liberal ideology ofrational man is actually
dependent on an unstated clause: that the characteristics of"man" are actually
the characteristics ofmales, and the rational man is inextricably bound to his
less visible partner, emotional woman. In fact, the construction ofour political
philosophy and views ofhuman nature seem to depend on a series ofsexual
dichotomies, involved in the construction ofgender differences." See Elizabeth
Fee, Lowe, and Hubbard (1986).
18.Brajendranath Seal, writing on the scientific method ofthe Hindus expounded
this criterion oftruth: "Truth is found not in mere cognitive presentation, but
in the correspondence between the cognitive and the practical activity ofthe
self, which together are supposed to form the circuit ofconsciousness" (see
Appendix: "On the Scientific Method ofthe Hindus," in P. C. Ray, History of
Hindu Chemistry, vol. 2 [London: Williams and Norgate, 1904, 1990]). The
DISPERSED RADIANCE

123

dissolution ofobjective/subjective in the scientific method ofthe Hindus might

partially explain recent statistics on the proportion ofwomen studying mathematical sciences. It appears that a significandy larger percentage ofAsian
women scientists (16%) are physicists and mathematicians as compared to
American women scientists (6%).

19.This section is based on conversations with Anna Mani in July 1993 as well as
on information obtained from Wall's biography ofLalitha Chandrasekhar's
husband, the astrophysicist Chandrasekhar (see WaIi, 1991).
20.Feminist scientists began to study the question ofwomen in science in the
1970s. For a useful bibliography on gender and science, see Nancy Tuana (ed.),
Feminism and Science (BIoomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press,
1989). In the chapter "Seventies Questions for Thirties Women: Gender and
Generation in a Study ofEarly Women Psychoanalysts," Nancy Chodorow
notes that the early women psychoanalysts "were relatively gender-blind, or
unattuned to gender, regarding both their role in the profession and rheir profession's theory." See Nancy Chodorow, Feminism and Psychoanalytic Theory
(New Haven: Yale University Press, 1989).
21. 1 formed this impression from conversations with one ofAnna Mani's male
contemporaries who, even after fifty years, recalled with hostility incidents
where certain scientific instruments were perhaps mishandled by die women
students.

22.A simple experimental innovation that allowed her to separate the rotational
contribution to the scattered spectrum led Sunanda Bai to assert that the
Placzek-Teller formulation ofthe ratio ofthe Q branch intensity to the total
intensity ofthe rotational wing was inadequate and that molecules were not
completely free to rotate in a liquid. Her carefully and painstakingly designed
experiments and theoretical models also confirmed that the bulk ofdensity
fluctuations giving rise to Raman scattering in a liquid are adiabatic rather
than isothermal processes. (See Bai 1941 and 1942). See also Venkataraman,
1988: 318-19.
23.It is important to note that the women who affirmed a distinct feminine identity in that era also campaigned for a separate educational curriculum for
female students which would have foreclosed the options ofstudying science.
WORKS CITED

A Century ofIndian Association/or the Cultivation ofScience. 1976. Calcutta.

Asima Chatterjee's Sixtieth Birthday Celebration Souvenir. 1977. Calcutta.
Bai, Sunanda. 1941 and 1942. "Depolarization oflight scattered by liquids,"
Proceedings ofthe Indian Academy ofScience, A13: 43g and "The scattering oflight
in liquids," ibid. A15.
-------. 1944. "Investigations on Optics and Light Scattering." Ph.D. diss.,
Institute ofScience. Currently deposited at the library ofRaman Research
Institute, Bangalore.
Bannerji, Himani. 1992. "Mothers and Teachers: Gender and Class in
Educational Proposals for and by Women in Colonial Bengal." Journal of
124

ABHA SUR

Historical Sociology 5 (March: 1-30).

Basu, Aparna. 1974. The Grourth ofEducation and Political Development in India,
1898-1920. Delhi: Oxford University Press.
-------. 1989. Indian Higher Education: Colonialism and Beyond. In From
Dependence to Autonomy, edited by P. G. Altbach and V. Selvaratnam. Dordrecht:
Kluwer Academic Publishers.

Borthwick, Meredith. 1984. The Changing Role ofWomen in Bengal 1894-1905.

Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Calcutta University Commission Report. 1919. Vol. xn, Chapter xiv. Calcutta:
University ofCalcutta Press.
Chakravarty, Radha, Anju Chawla, and Geeta Mehta. 1984. The Status 0/Women
Scientists in India. New Delhi: National Institute ofScience Technology and
Development Studies.
Chakravarty, Uma. 1998. Reuniting History, The Life and Times ofPandita Ramabai.
New Delhi: Kali for Women.

Chatterjee, Asima. 1995. Conversation with the aurhor. Calcutta. Ianuary.

Chatterji, Partha. 1989. The Nationalist Resolution ofthe Women's Question. In
Recasting Women: Essays in Colonial History, edited by Kumkum Sangari and
Sudesh Vaid. New Delhi: Kali for Women.

Chitnis, Suma. 1993. Foreward. In S. J. Joshi Anandi Gopal. (English Translation by

Asha Damle). Calcutta: Street.

Cooper, lane. 1984. "Threads: Rosa Luxembourg from Prison." In Scqjjolding.

London: Anvil Press Poetry.
Debi, Saudamini. 1865. Bamabodhini Patrilca. (May-Iune: 40).
Fee, Elizabeth. 1986. Women's Nature and Scientific Objectivity. In Woman's
Nature: Rationalizations 0/Inequality, edited by Marian Lowe and Ruth Hubbard.
New York: Pergamon Press.
Ganguli, Madhumati. 1864. "Bamaganer Rachana." In Bamabodhini Patrilca.
Calcutta (Oct.-Nov): 229.
Habib, Irtan and Dhruv Raina. 1989. "Copernicus, Columbus, Colonialism and
the Role ofScience in Nineteenth Cenrury India." Social Scientist, 190-191:
51-66.
layawardena, Kumari. 1986. Feminism and Nationalism in the Third World. London:
Zed Books.

Ioshi, P. ed. 1988. Gandhi on Women. New Delhi: Centre for Women's Development
Studies.

Keller, Evelyn Fox. 1989. The Gender/Science System or, Is Sex to Gender as
Nature is to Science. In Feminism and Science, edited by Nancy Tuana.
Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press.
Kishwar, Madhu. 1995. Manushi 88 (May-June).
Krishnaraj, Maithreyi. 1991. Women and Science. Bombay: Himalaya Publishing
House.

Louis, Mary Iosephine. 1986. "Educational Aspects." In Uplifhnent ofWomen in

South India in 20th Century and Suggestions/or 2000 a.D. Kodaikanal: Seminar
Series, Mother Teresa Women's University.
DISPERSED RADIANCE

I25

Mani, Anna. 1993. Conversations with the author. Bangalore, India. July.
-------. 1945. Studies on the Luminescence ofDiamond. Ph.D. diss., Indian
Institute ofScience. Currenty deposited with the library ofRaman Research
Institute, Bangalore.

Mukhopadhyay, Carol C. and Susan Seymour, eds. 1994. Women, Education and
Family Structure in India. San Francisco: Westview Press.
Murshid, Ghulam. 1983. Reluctant Debutante: Response ofBengali Women to
Modernization, 1849-1905. Dhaka: Sahitya Samsad, Rajshahi University.
Nandi, Asish, ed. iggo. Science, Hegemony and Violence: A Requiemfor Modernity.
Delhi: Oxford University Press.
Pearson, Gail. ig82. The Female Intelligentsia in a Segregated SocietyBombay,
a Case Study. In Women in India and Nepal, edited by M. Allen and S. N.
Mukherjee. Canberra: Australian National University Press.
Prakash, Gyan. iggg. Another Reason: Science and the Imagination ofModem India.
Princeton: Princeton University Press.

Ramaseshan, S. igg3- Conversations with the author. Bangelore: Raman

Research Institute. June.

Report of the Quinquennial Reviewing Committee ofthe Indian Institute of

Science. ig36. India Office Library, London (v/26/865/4).
Sangari, Kumkum. iggi. "Relating Histories: Definitions ofLiteracy, Literature,
Gender in Nineteenth Century Calcutta and England." In Rethinking English:
Essays in Literature, Language History, ed. Svati Ioshi. New Delhi: Trianka.
Sarkar, Sumit. 1983. Modern India. New Delhi: Macmillan India Ltd.
-------. 1985. The Women's Question in Nineteenth Century Bengal. In Women and
Culture, edited by Kumkum Sangari and Sudesh Vaid. Bombay: sndt Women's
University Press.

Schiebinger, Londa. ig87 The History and Philosophy ofWomen in Science:

A Review Essay. In Sex and Scientific Inquiry, edited by Sandra Harding and lean
F. O'Barr. Chicago: The University ofChicago Press.
-------. igg6. The Mind Has No Sex. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Sheshadri, Ram. igg4- "Traditional Science Congress." Economic and Political
Weekly, vol. XXIX (December).
Shiva, Vandana. ig8g. Staying Alive: Women Ecology and Development. London: Zed
Press.

Strachy, R. [ig28] ig6g. The Cause. New York: Kennikat Press.

Subbarayappa, H. V. igg2. In Pursuit ofExcellence: A History ofthe Indian Institute of
Science. New Delhi: Tata McGraw-Hill Publishing Company.
Subrahmanyan, Lalita. 1998. Women Scientists in the Third World: The Indian
Experience. New Delhi: Sage Publications.
Sur, Abha. I9gg. "Aesthetics, Authority and Control in an Indian Laboratory: The
Raman-Born Controversy on Lattice Dynamics." Isis go: 25-49.
Tagore, Rabindranath, 1985. Nationalism. Madras: Macmillan India Ltd.
Tethinraj, T. S. Gopi. 1997. "Raman had a Gender Bias." Indian Express, July 8.
The Indraprastha College Alumni Association Newsletter. igg8. Vol. 1 (July).

126

ABHA sur

The Saha Raman Controversy. 1934. Saha's Papers. New Delhi: Nehru Memorial
Library.
Venkataraman, Alamelu. 1993. Conversations with the author. Bangalore: India.
July.
Venkataraman, G. 1988. Journey into Light: Life and Science ofC. V. Raman. Bangalore:
The Indian Academy ofSciences.
WaIi, Kameshwar C. 1991. Chandra: A Biography ofS. Chandrasekhar. Chicago:
University ofChicago Press.
Werskey, Gary. 1978. The Visible College. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston.
Williams, Raymond. 1977. Marxism and Literature. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
-------. 1983. Keywords. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
World Meteorological Organization Bulletin. 1992. Interview with Anna Mani.

dispersed radiance

127