A woman known to a very less of our generation is Maharani Gayatri Devi Ji. She was born in Cooch Bihar on 23rd of may who later got married to Maharaja of Jaipur Maharaja Sawai Mann Singh II. She was not only a normal Maharani of Jaipur but one who has dedicated to doing something for the society rather than just being a wife to the maharaja of Jaipur.
Later when India got its independence and princely states were abolished Maharani Gayatri Devi successfully joined the Swatantra Party and served as a politician for 12 years. She was not only actively participated in politics but was also known for her beauty she was a beautiful woman who also was smart and intelligent. She used to really enjoy playing polo she was associated with it since her childhood.
She was such a woman who was not stopped by traditional norms, she won the constituency in the Lok Sabha with the largest number of seats. She also enjoyed hunting and used to sometimes company her husband Maharaja Sawai Mann Singh on his hunting sprees.
There was also a memoir “A princess remembers” which talks a lot about maharani from her childhood to her later life, it talked about her love for her husband and how she shot her first panther at the age of 12. She was more like a tomboy and later after getting married to the Maharaja of Jaipur and entering under the Rajput culture and the different ways of living standards she didn’t change herself but she did try changing the cultures to something more genuine and free for the society.
She was under the list of most fascinating women of that time. She had a modern and free approach to the culture and way of living of the Rajput culture. She was a brave woman whose most important work which still exists in the heart of Jaipur is the school for girls known as Maharani Gayatri Devi Girls School which was founded in 1943. It was the first public school in India for girls though purdah system was still intact maharani Gayatri Devi with the help of her husband maharaja who was also a person of modern thinker and the first founder principle miss L G Lutter’s established the school and slowly she overcame the purdah system in 1950.
She is a woman who was liberal e and was not only a woman with beauty but was wonderful with her thoughts for the society. She died on 29 July 2009 at the age of 90 but her contributions to women’s education and living are still alive in the school she created. As I was a student of her school myself I today feel proud and happy to be a part of the school she made for girls at a time when women education was not even a thought about.
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