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over privilege systems of domination as a basis of interaction between individuals and groups. A feminist critique and development of any peace politics, therefore, ultimately is a critique of systems of unjustified domination".
organisations like Women's Indian Association, All India Women's Conference and National Council of Women in India. There may have been conflict with the nationalists over priorities and tactics but not over ultimate goals. Feminism and nationalism were closely interlinked. As the national movement gained momentum, the goal of independence became the only concern for both men and women. The women's movement in India had none of the man-woman antagonism characteristic of women's movement in the West.
Women's participation in the non-violent struggle also brings out the interplay between nationalism and feminism. Under Gandhi's leadership the Indian women started discovering their identities, they started becoming aware of the fact that they were not objects of men's lust but selfreliant individuals. They learnt to respect themselves and to value their contribution to social and political cause as women. The non-violent struggle legitimised women's role in the movement as women. To be a woman was no longer considered to be inferior to a man. Gandhi maintained, "To call woman the weaker sex is a libel; it is man's injustice to women. If by strength is meant brute strength, then indeed is woman less brute than man. If by strength is meant moral power, then woman is immeasurably man's superior." Gandhi saw that the low status of women was the result of prejudices and adverse traditions, which were centuries old. Woman was reduced to the position of the slave "who did not know that he could or ever had to be free". It is difficult to get women interested in the larger problems of life and because they knew nothing of them, having never been allowed to breathe the fresh air of freedom.
Women realised that the only factor that would enable them to come out of such situation was the determination and strength of women themselves. Though men should help in the cause of women, Gandhi maintained, "ultimately woman will have to determine with authority what she needs". The Satyagraha movements gave women opportunities While the nationalist struggle provided women to take decisions, and to strengthen the bonds of with an opportunity to enter the public sphere and sisterhood. Feminism and nationalism were never bring changes in their lives and around, it has to be mutually exclusive for women in women's noted that it could not totally transform the reality. ૧૦૬ સત્ય-અહિંસા-અપરિગ્રહ પણ જીવનઃ ગાંઘી સાર્ધશતાબ્દી વિશેષાંક ઑક્ટોબર- ૨૦૧૮
Women followed Gandhi, because they found something in him which had direct links with their lives. They discovered their own potential and strength as they got involved in the freedom struggle. As pointed out by Laxmi Menon, women joined the movement because his message. "Offered the women of India an opportunity to break from the past with all its frustrations." According to Aloo Dastur and Usha Mehta, one of the enduring results of Gandhi's great life work has been the awakening of women which made them shed their deep-rooted inferiority complex and rise to great heights of valour and dignity, of self-reliance and achievement.
Vina Mazumdar also stresses that Gandhi's greatest contribution to the movement for raising women's status lay in his revolutionary approach to women's roles in society, and their personal dignity as individuals. As Devaki Jain argues, though many of Gandhi's statements on women may seem jarring when read today, Gandhi seems to have been intuitively attuned to women, and to have seen women's potential more clearly than any other political or religious leader in any part of the world. He perceived women equal, but different. In their difference, Gandhi himself identified with woman.
