Under the Golden Jubilee programmes of Pt Ravishankar Shukla University Raipur, the History Department held a three-day symposium titled “Women in Indian history” from Friday.
State’s First lady Ms Sushmita Dutt, wife of Governor Shekhar Dutt, inaugurated the symposium. Vice-Chancellor of the University Prof SK Pandey, Senior Historian Prof Ravindra Kumar and Dr Ramendranath Mishra, many subject specialists, and prominent citizens in a large number were present at the symposium. Ms Susmita Dutt also released a souvenir of the research symposium.
Addressing the inaugural function, Ms Dutt said that the contribution of a common women needs to be recorded in the history of India. In the Indian society, from past to present, women had performed significant role in the development of the society. In the ancient times, the role of Indian women had been important, but we have information about a few of them.
She said that before 19th century, high social reformation had taken place in India, which resulted into social changes. Great social reformers like Ishwar Chandra Vidya Sagar had taken up the cudgel to change the perspective in the society on woman and to give a new direction to society. During the period, women, not only got freedom from the dreaded ‘Sati’ system, but also gave them the opportunity for re-marriage.
This time, special efforts are being taken to promote education in various parts of the country. This change would give wonderful opportunity for women. Women’s participation in different activities has been increased. “We need to analyse such directions and situations what women had done during that period,” she added.
Vice Chancellor of Pt Ravishankar Shukla University Prof SK Pandey said that women power has an important place in Indian history. “Interesting subjects like history has link with our culture. Adopting a disciplinary perspective, we need to have an all-round study of history,” he added.