Valliamma - Role Model: yadyadAcharati shreShThaH - यद्यदाचरति श्रेष्ठः

February 24, 2013

I just got forwarded an email about an extraordinary woman named Valliamma, reference in an article "Women Extraordinaire" by Gopalkrishna Gandhi in the Hindustan Times. The author quotes Gandhi on Valliamma (the more faded of the two pictures shown above):

“Valliamma R Munuswami Mudaliar was a young girl of Johannesburg only 16 years of age. She was confined to bed when I saw her. As she was a tall girl, her emaciated body was a terrible thing to behold. ‘Valliamma, you do not repent of your having gone to jail?’ I asked. ‘Repent? I am even now ready to go to jail again, if I am arrested’, said Valliamma. ‘But what if it results in your death?’, I pursued. ‘I do not mind it. Who would not love to die for one’s motherland?’ was the reply.”

The article is a must read, although I think it is shameful that Hindustan Times did not bother to publish the pictures of these remarkable women, especially since the Gandhi archives in New Delhi or Mumbai would have freely shared these pictures shown above. Kudos to mkgandhi.org for providing wider publicity to this article through their own link. I source the pictures above through the link at mkgandhi.org. I know I have not focused on Kasturba Gandhi, who is also a subject of the article. Hopefully in a future post...

Pujya Gurudev used to love verse 3-21 in which Śrī Kṛṣṇa says that we all eagerly follow what the great do. Hence the need for a role model. For other posts on role models, click here. We just need to look around to find an appropriate role model for ourselves. We live in an era where Google makes these fascinating people only a few clicks away.

Hari Om and Namaskaar until the next post

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