Women in Activism, Assertion and Empowerment: A Study of T. N Sadalakshmi’s Biography Nene Balaani (I am Strength)

Abstract

Assertion leads to activism and activism leads to empowerment. The interrelatedness and reciprocity implies that empowerment cannot be achieved without holding onto either assertion or activism. Therefore, it is the assertion of oneself leads to activism that strengthens the socio-political position of women to combat to accomplish empowerment. The goal of assertion and activism is to accomplish empowerment by questioning and challenging the existing socio-historical, cultural and political oppressive structures of the society. Considering the Dalit assertion and activism which can be defined as socio-political apparatus derived from the self-contained personalities like Mahatma Jyotiba Phule, Periyar and Dr. B. R. Ambedkar who apparently cling on to the assertion and activism which lead them to question the dominant voices. T. N Sadalakshmi, a Telugu Dalit Bahujan leader and activist who hails from Telangana comes with the assertion and activism with the influence of the self-contained Dalit ideologues like Dr. B. R. Ambedkar, Periyar and Phule who took up assertion and activism as a means of bringing empowerment and a constructive change in the society. The present paper seeks to highlight the dialogues of T. N Sadalakshmi with Gogu Shyamala. Further the paper tries to evaluate T. N Sadalakshmi’s biography Nene Balaani (2011) as such an example to study and understand how as a downtrodden woman empowered herself and further lead the Dalit Bahujan community to assertion, activism and empowerment by embracing the words of Dr. B. R. Ambedkar’s ‘educate, agitate and organize’.