Hansa Jivraj Mehta (3 July 1897 – 4 April 1995)[1] was a reformist, social activist, educator, independence activist, feminist and writer from India.[2][3] She was one of only two women delegates working alongside Eleanor Roosevelt in the UN Human Rights Commission 1946-48 ensuring the wording "all human beings" instead of "all men" in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.[4]
Mehta studied at an all-girls high school at a time when, she estimated, only 2 percent of Indian women were literate.[5] She graduated with Philosophy in 1918. She studied journalism and sociology in England. In 1918, she met Sarojini Naidu during her education in England. Naidu would act as a mentor and brought her to the 1920 International Woman Suffrage Alliance conference in Geneva.[5] She met Mahatma Gandhi in 1922 while he was in jail in India.[6][7][5] In 1923, Mehta came to the United States to visit institutions for higher education where she learned about women's education in America.[5] In 1930, she encountered Gandhi again when he called for women to join the freedom movement.[5]
Hansa Mehta organized the picketing of shops selling foreign clothes and liquor, and participated in other freedom movement activities in line with the advice of Gandhi. For this she was jailed three times.[5] Later She established Desh Sevika Dal in 1930. She was even arrested and sent to jail by the British along with her husband in 1932. she was elected to Bombay Legislative Council.[2]
After independence, she was among the 15 women who were part of the constituent assembly that drafted the Indian Constitution.[9] She lobbied for civil code that would lead to gender equality, meant to eventually supercede religious laws.[5] She was a member of the Advisory Committee and Sub Committee on Fundamental Rights.[10] She advocated for equality and justice for women in India.[11][6][12]
Mehta was elected to Bombay Schools Committee in 1926 and founded[5], and later became president of All India Women's Conference in 1945–46. In her presidential address at the All India Women's Conference convention held in Hyderabad, she proposed a Charter of Women's Rights, where she linked the struggle for Indian independence with the one for women's rights.[5] As one of three women who drafted the charter, she included the affirmation that women have equal rights in areas such as access to education, suffrage, pay, and property. She also rejected special quotas, instead advocating for an even playing field betwen women and men.[5] In 1946, the panel eventually became the U.N Commission on the Status of Women.[5] She held different posts in India from 1945 to 1960 - the vice-chancellor of SNDT Women's University, member of All India Secondary Board of Education, president of Inter University Board of India and vice-chancellor of Maharaja Sayajirao University of Baroda,[7] among others.
Mehta represented India on the Nuclear Sub-Committee on the status of women in 1946. As the Indian delegate on the UN Human Rights Commission in 1947–48, she was responsible for changing the language of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights from "all men are born free and equal" to "all human beings are born free and equal",[13] highlighting the need for gender equality.[14] While Roosevelt asserted that the use of the word "men" was “generally accepted to include all human beings,” Mehta insisted that the lanugage should be changed.[15] Mehta later went on to become the vice chairman of the Human Rights Commission of the United Nations in 1950. She was also a member of the executive board of UNESCO.[3][16]
From 1946 to 1948, Mehta served as the vice chancellor of the Shreemati Nathibai Damodar Thackersey Women’s University, and from 1949 to 1958 as the vice chancellor of the University of Baroda, making her the first woman to act in that role at an Indian co-educational university.[5] The U.N. holds a discussion series in her name, the Dr. Hansa Mehta Dialogue. The first installement took place in 2021 and centered on women's economic empowerment following the COVID-19 pandemic. The series aims to raise global awareness and conversation about gender equality, women's, and human rights.[5]
Mehta wrote several children's books in Gujarati including Arunnu Adbhut Swapna (1934), Bablana Parakramo (1929), Balvartavali Part 1-2 (1926, 1929). She translated some books of ValmikiRamayana: Aranyakanda, Balakanda and Sundarakanda. She translated many English stories, including Gulliver's Travels. She had also adapted some plays of Shakespeare. Her essays were collected and published as Ketlak Lekho (1978).[2][7]
King of Ujjainī; VIKRAMĀDITYA Haṃsā; Mehta, Hansa. The Adventures of King Vikrama. (Selections from Ṣāmala Bhaṭa's Gujarati version of Siṃhāsana-batrīsī. With plates.) (1948). Bombay : Oxford University Press, pp.vii, 150. OCLC503783112
Mehta, Hansa; Shukla, V. K. Adventures of King Vikrama. (1954) London : Oxford Univ. Press, OCLC551829319
Sarma, D.S.; Mehta, Hansa. The prince of Ayodhya. New Delhi : National Book Trust, India : Chief stockists in India, Thomson Press (India) (1974). OCLC7609419(in English)
Une femme d'aujourd'hui: roman. (1966). Paris : Albin Michel. OCLC58992586(in French)
