My Tryst with Women’s Studies

I was born in a village of the present state of Uttrakhand in the Himalayan valleys, but I did not spend much time there. With my father in the army, as a child I moved around the country quite a bit, and I made friends and met many new people in the different postings that he had. I was the eldest of four children: three sisters and a brother. My father had a very difficult childhood. He lost his father as a child and had to support his family. He could not study much so he was very keen that his children would study well. It was amazing that he joined the British Army as a young boy of 18 and after Independence rose to be an engineer in the army, undertaking studies later on. My mother had also lost her mother when she was two and had an education until high school. Hence both my mother and father spared no efforts in giving us all a good education. I studied at Holy Family High School, which was a girls’ school and a convent taught by the nuns who instilled a lot of moral values in us. When I was in Class 9, there was Telengana agitation in the state of Andhra Pradesh and all schools were closed for quite some time. My father then decided to move me to a central school which was not disturbed by the agitation. I was admitted in September. I was a good student and dreamed of a future in science, but due to late admission I could not get into the science stream and had to take arts subjects instead of science.