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Ahmedabad who also played an important role in India's freedom struggle. He had five daughters and three sons.
He was the president of the Ahmedabad Mill Owner's Association in the year 1918-1919 and also a member of the Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation when Gandhi organized a strike against mill-owners. He had been an ardent supporter of Indian independence movement since 1916, when even Gandhi had not yet launched any big movement in India. Gandhi's ashram at Sabarmati in his starting years ran from funds donated by Sarabhai. He supported Gandhi financially and otherwise at several occasions when needed most. The family was involved in the independence movement for India and later with the developmental tasks undertaken by the government of India by setting up a number of foundations to support development of underprivileged. His wife Sarladevi got inspired by the Maria Montessori philosophy and in the year 1922, Montessori sent E. M. Standing to India for the homeschooling of Sarabhai children.
Anusuya Sarabhai was born in 1885 into the Sarabhai family. She is the sister of Ambalal. She underwent an unsuccessful child marriage at the age of 13. With the help of her brother, she went to England in 1912 to take a medical degree, but switched to the London School of Economics when she realised the animal dissection involved in obtaining a medical degree was in violation of her Jain beliefs. Once back in India, she worked for betterment of women and the poor; she opened a school for striking women and their children. She decided to get involved in the labour movement after witnessing exhausted female mill workers returning home after a 36-hour shift. She helped organise textile workers in 1914 strike in Ahmedabad. Gandhi, a friend of the family, was by then acting as a mentor to Sarabhai. Anusuyabehn served Gandhi severally thereafter.
Pg.96 Gandhi & Jainism
