BY DARSHANA JAMINDAR
AHMEDABAD: Renowned activist Ela Bhatt who was the founder of SEWA Self-Employed Women’s Association at Ahmedabad passed away on Wednesday. She was 89.
She was the recipient of the Ramon Magsaysay Award in 1977, the Right Livelihood Award in 1984, and the Padma Bhushan in 1986 for her work in empowering impoverished women in Gujarat. She was also selected for the Niwano Peace Prize in 2010.
Ela Bhatt was also serving as the chairperson of the Sabarmati Ashram since 2016.
Until recently, for seven years, she had served as the chancellor of Gujarat Vidyapith. She stepped down from the post on 19 October due to failing health.
Elaben Bhatt was born on 7 September 1933. Her father Sumantrai Bhatt was a successful lawyer while her mother Vanalila Vyas was active in the women’s movement and was the secretary of the All India Women’s Conference founded by Kamladevi Chattopadhyay,
Ela Bhatt, who studied law in college, joined the legal department of the Textile Labour Association (TLA) in Ahmedabad in 1955.
Ela Bhatt founded SEWA, an organisation of poor, self-employed women workers, in 1972 and served as its general secretary from 1972 to 1996.
She was involved in many movements related to international labour, and women’s issues.
Ela Bhatt was deeply influenced by Gandhian philosophy and thinking. Her grandfather had joined Mahatma Gandhi on the Salt Satyagraha in 1930 to protest the British ban on Indians making salt.
In an interview with the Berkley Center, Ela Bhatt described what led her to start SEWA. “I became more and more aware, as I worked with the unionized (textile) labour, of the much larger labour force that was outside the purview of the protective labour laws, of any form of social security, access to justice, access to financial services, anything. That tugged at my heart. And those people were unorganized and had no strength to act to seek remedies.”
She also served as a Rajya Sabha MP and an adviser to the World Bank. In 2007, she had joined the Elders, a group of world leaders founded by Nelson Mandela to promote human rights and peace.
Ela Bhatt had married Ramesh Bhatt in 1956. Their two children Amimayi (1958) and Mihir (1959) live in Ahmedabad.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi paid tribute to Ilaben through his post in tweeter.
Gujarat CM Bhupendra Patel also send condolence message to Ilaben through tweeter post.
Many other leaders and politicians, VIPs have paid tribute to Ilaben in their own ways.
