Annie Besant

Annie Besant was born Annie Wood on October 1, 1847, to William Burton Persse Wood and Emily Roche Morris.

Annie married clergyman Frank Besant at the age of 20 after finishing her studies, but their marriage ended in 1873 due to Annie's increasingly unorthodox religious beliefs. She went on to become a well-known speaker for the National Secular Society. 

 

Annie Besant joined the Theosophical Society and became a well-known lecturer on the subject. She travelled to India as part of her theosophical work. In 1898, she assisted in the founding of the Central Hindu School, which was later renamed the Banaras Hindu University.

 

•    Besant was a staunch supporter of Irish independence.

•    She began to doubt her religious views as well. She went so far as to criticise the Church of England. She was a feminist political and religious activist, which caused her difficulties in society as well.

•    She advocated for intellectual equality, secularism, women's rights, contraception, workers' rights, and Fabian socialism. She was particularly opposed to the church interfering in people's lives.

•    She was a fantastic public speaker who often travelled extensively.

•    After meeting Helena Blavatsky in 1889, Besant converted to Theosophy.

•    From 1907 to 1933, Annie Besant served as the society's president.

•    At Benares, Besant founded the Central Hindu College (CHC). Madan Mohan Malaviya and she collaborated to create the Banaras Hindu University in 1916. The CHC was the first constituent college of the university.

•    She became a member of the Indian National Congress (INC) and requested that the government take measures toward self-government.

•    “England's need is India's opportunity,” she said when the First World War broke out.

•    In 1916, Besant and Bal Gangadhar Tilak formed the All India Home Rule League. The League was the first Indian political party to call for self-rule. And, unlike the INC, which only met once a year, the League operated all year.

•    Local branches of the league organised public speeches, gatherings, and demonstrations. In June 1917, the government detained Besant. This caused quite a stir in political circles, with both the INC and the Muslim League calling for her release. Even Mahatma Gandhi pleaded with the government to free her.

•    In September 1917, Besant was finally released, and she was greeted warmly by citizens across the world. She was elected President of Congress in December of that year.

•    Annie Besant died in Adyar in 1933 at the age of 85.

 

After Col. H. S. Olcott died in 1907, Annie Besant became the Theosophical Society's second International President, a position she held until her death in 1933. Mrs Besant had always been an enthusiastic traveller, having visited nearly every country in Europe many times as part of her Theosophical work, as well as the United States, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. Her organisational skills were put to good use in order to ‘make theosophy realistic,' and action became her ‘slogan.' During her presidency, the Society expanded significantly, with more than thirty-six Sections or National Societies joining the original eleven.

 

Dr. Besant continued to lecture and tour across India, focusing on education. The Theosophical Society lodges took it upon themselves to establish schools wherever they could. She also attempted to include women in the campaign wherever possible, as women were not allowed to participate in public life at the time.

 

Her excellent books, such as ‘A Study in Consciousness’, which is used as a textbook in several universities, provided clear descriptions of the many enigmas of existence and the universe. ‘Esoteric Christianity’, another of her main works, has been regarded as a historical text and has aided in the revival of true Christian knowledge. Her lectures on the world's great religions, which she gave at Theosophical conferences, were compiled into a valuable book called ‘Seven Great Religions’, which presented the central teachings of each of them. In 1905, she published the first edition of her English translation of the ‘Bhagavadgita’.

 

Dr. Besant was a realistic mystic, demonstrating lofty idealism and true religious awareness in her life and behaviour, a mixture found in quite a few individuals. She declared the establishment of a Theosophical Order of Service in 1908, with the motto "Union of all who Love in the Service of all who Suffer."

 

From 1908 onwards, Dr. Besant worked to extend the Adyar Headquarters estate. She began ‘The Adyar Bulletin’ in order to get Adyar closer to the rest of the Theosophical world, and it ran until 1929. Currently, the Adyar Newsletter serves a similar purpose.

 

In 1913, Annie Besant entered a new phase of her life when she became involved in Indian politics and took the lead in demanding Home Rule for India. She entered politics because she recognised that India's independence was needed for her age-old wisdom to become a global beacon. She orchestrated a Home Rule movement that spread throughout India. She used all of her energy to put the two divisions of the Indian National Congress, which had been split since 1907, together on the shared platform of the ‘All India Home Rule League.'

She went on to become the President of the Indian National Congress, empowering Indians with a vibrant view of the country's future. She established the ‘Young Men's Indian Association’ in 1914 to prepare them for public service and donated Gokhale Hall in Madras as a centre for national awakening and free speech. She also founded two journals: The ‘Commonweal’, a weekly dealing with national reform problems, and ‘New India’, a daily newspaper that was a powerful tool for fostering Home Rule and revolutionising Indian journalism for fifteen years.

 

The Great War broke out ten months after she started her political work. India was asked to make significant sacrifices, which she gladly accepted, but no British statesman mentioned India's contribution. Dr. Besant was persuaded by this blunder by British statesmen that the political work in India had to proceed and could not be changed or slowed because the Empire was at war. Because of her performance in inspiring the Indian people to love independence, she was imprisoned for three months in 1917. She adopted the slogan "strike while the iron is hot" as well as "making it hot by hitting." She taught Indian journalists how to write good lead articles criticising government actions while staying within the spirit of the law. She made the position of President of the Indian National Congress one of active work throughout the year, rather than only presiding over it during the four-day annual meetings, as was the case previously.

 

Annie Besant's life was a whirlwind of operation. By 1918, she had established the Madras Parliament, Madanapalle College (now in Andhra Pradesh), the Adyar Arts League, the Home Rule League in Bombay, the Girls' College in Benares, the Order of the Brothers of Service, and the Women's Indian Association at Adyar — from which grew the All-India Women's Conference in Poona (now Pune) in 1927 and the Women's Indian Association at Adyar (SPNE). Unfortunately, she fell out of favour with the Indian National Congress as a result of her opposition to Mr Gandhi's agenda of non-cooperation and civil disobedience, which she saw as a threat to the rule of law. Despite her admiration for Gandhi as a man who lived a life led by honesty and compassion, she supported constitutional methods for democratic change. Mr Gandhi's policies were enforced, and the disasters that she had expected occurred throughout India. Despite the fact that she became unpopular and lost her political status, she continued to work for India.