That is damning even today on International Women’s Day. Admittedly however, it does have a huge core of truth in it and I am sure every woman will nod either strong or genteel; none will totally disagree. Mice remain mice but men are such changing creatures. Ask any married woman and she’d scream in agreement that the young man she was in love with metamorphosed completely when he turned husband, and in most cases, not for the better, but for the worse, for sure.

I did not agree with much Germaine Greer said at the Galle Literary Festival 2009; neither with Betty Friedan and other women’s libbers and their gimmicky gestures. We laughed at their bra burning in the ‘60s claiming equal rights with men. What a gesture to convey the upheaval-causing message that women would no longer do all to please their men. Perhaps it was a sure way to grab attention, and it did - symbolism of not getting trussed up merely to please the male eye.

We in Sri Lanka had none of this, but in our own modest way, have had women emerging to claim their rights, doing even better in academia and some breaking the glass ceiling - in the public sector mostly.

Women’s suffrage in Ceylon

It was the right to vote that gathered women together in this country. I believe most were OK with the status quo of the man being the policy maker and decision taker, in the home, in the public sphere. But winds of change in England blew across to this colony and so the women’s franchise demand with such as Lady Daisy Dias Bandaranaike, Hilda Kularatne, Agnes de Silva, Florinda Wijeyekoon, Dr Mary Rutnam, Leelavati Aserappa and many others joining. The campaigning paid off. We were the first Asian country to gain universal suffrage in 1931, just a year behind Britain.

Hilda Westbrook Kularatne wrote thus in 1922: "‘Women’s place is in the home.’ If that did not settle the argument, they would go on to say: ‘Oh well, my dear, why do you want to vote or play anything but a domestic role? You know quite well that the hand that rocks the cradle rules the world, so what more can you want?’ And here they think the matter ends… What such men don’t realize of course is that if the house is woman’s place, so also is it man’s place. For is not the state composed of individual homes? And are not matters which concern the state of vital importance to all those – both men and women – who have homes?"2[2]

This may have been to counter statements like P. Ramanatthan’s orthodox views. He said: "We must leave our women alone since all their life must be devoted to the home… the design of God must not be spoilt in any way and must be correctly observed. The question was put to me ‘Have you any objection to women’s suffrage?’ I said I have, because we are concerned about the purity of the home." (Hansard 1928) (even 91 years later the blood boils!!)

Lady Adeleine Molamure, the first woman in the legislature said the following as reported in Hansard, February 14, 1934. "Women have shown that they can be treated on an equal footing with men. Women do not ask for favours … all we want is justice and equal rights with men."

So there were these demands for women’s rights in this country way back almost a century ago.

Traditional homes, tradition bound women

Thinking back on what my mother used to tell me and judging by what my sisters (both elder to me) went through, we in Kandy even as late as the 1950s were quite satisfied moving from father to husband to son. My mother and her generation had no grouse, neither my two sisters in their arranged marriages and full time role as wife, mother and housekeeper. My mother was given a sighting of her future husband and the matter was settled by my grandfather, patriarchal, albeit in a benign way. He was boss and though my grandmother was a kochchi karala as we used to say, she was completely subordinate to her husband’s decisions. There was never any cross talk, never any squabble over their domains of jurisdiction. He oversaw the Korale, the mahagedera and the extended family of grown sons and daughters and their families, and she ruled over the kitchen and dining area and the servants, both living in and dropping by.

There was no equality between them. One example: he dined in spendour in the large dining room with elegant cutlery and crockery while she ate in the cosy kitchen seated on a three legged stool with the kettle strung over the brick and daub hearth, eternally hissing. Now this was entirely due to her wish. But she did have her say in certain matters. "No cooking of meat in my kitchen," was one rule of hers The medical advice then was that an illness demanded beef soup and steak. Hence whenever grandfather felt less well, a male cook was hired and a special kitchen far removed from the house was allocated him. Grandmother personally dished out all meals for my grandfather but completely ignored the meats served him.

My mother and sisters would hardly ever have a meal before their husbands did. These were not signs of patriarchy or stifling conservatism or demeaning signs of male supremacy. Rather were they cultural traits, acts not of servility but of willingly given respectful devotion. And mother, though strong in personality, very willingly moved from her father to the care of my father and then to her elder son when she was widowed in her thirties.

Education

Education it was that promoted women’s emergence and progress to be equal with men. For this the missionaries have to be thanked. Speaking of Kandy, we had missionaries of both the Methodist Church and the Anglican Church of Britain starting schools –Girls’ High School and Kingswood; Trinity and Hillwood. Catholic missionaries, a mite later, started the Good Shepherd Convent, Scholasticas, St Sylvester’s and St Anthony’s College in Katugastota. Dharmarajah College was started soon enough and to impart education in English in a Buddhist milieu, Mahamaya College for girls was built by a Kulangana Samithiya.

English education naturally broadened views of both parents and children.

Three women who made their mark

We applaud Adeleine Molamure as the first woman nominated to the State Council in 1931. She contested and won the Ruwanwella seat left vacant by the death of her father, J. H. Meedeniya Adigar, who represented Ruwanwella. She was sworn in by her husband, Sir Francis Molamure, who was Speaker of the State Council and earlier opposed to women in politics.

But mark this please. A woman from Kandy, Ampitiya, which seems to have been a hamlet that was far more advanced than villages in Peradeniya and Gampola, achieved real fame, though hardly remembered now. She was the first Kandyan woman to go overseas for her higher education (1918) and the first Ceylonese graduate from Women’s Christian College (WCC), Madras. She made history again by being admitted to Girton College, Cambridge University (1924) and won her Tripos in English and another in Sanskrit. She is Soma Seneviratne who had a father with a wonderful guiding hand, not restrictively patriarchal and not at all conservative. He being a scholar himself, arranged for her to go to the newly instituted WCC on the advice of the Dean of the Men’s Christian College in Madras. She had her primary and secondary education in Girls’ High School, Kandy. Two students sat the Senior Cambridge Exam in 1917. Soon thereafter she proceeded to Madras.

She had her rights respected when she married J. W. Samarasinha- her own choice of husband from an entirely different background, he being from the deep South.

Another woman to be respected as emerging from conservatism was Leela Petiyagoda. In 1930 she entered Teacher Training College in Colombo, married the man of her choice – E. A. P. Wijeyeratne, again from another clan - and was an equal partner to him, specially in his diplomatic career as High Commissioner to the Court of St James, Britain, (1951-54) and the Republic of India (1954- 60). She would have projected the image of a dignified, refined woman of Ceylon whether she dined with Queen Elizabeth II at Buckingham Palace or invited the royal couple to the Sri Lankan ambassador’s residence, or sat on the floor listening to bana in the Buddhist temple she helped rebuild in Knightsbridge, with the help of others. This temple moved to Chiswick later.

The wonderful thing is that, all in all, the Sri Lankan woman did not have to fight for her rights; not have to grapple and grasp her place in employment and society. She earned it through education and preserved her high standing by her manner of a fine mix of efficiency and commitment with a huge dollop of sweet femininity and a sprinkling of modesty.