Meet India's wonder women

Mai Bhago, Guru Gobind Singh's bodyguard; (right) Rani Velu Nachiyar, a queen of Sivaganga estate

Flip through an elementary history school textbook and it won't take much time to find a mention of Joan of Arc, Queen Cordelia, Rani Lakshmibai or Rani Padmini. But even after graduating high school, the sex ratio of warriors you encounter is skewed in favour of the male hero. That's why Tara Anand's Warrior Women (Tulika Books), which features a set of 12 illustrated stories of Indian bravehearts, serves as an excellent starter pack for kids. With names including Begum Samru, Rani Chennama, and Joya Thaosen, it reflects diversity across centuries conveying the gist of their lives in a couple of pages. Anand has illustrated colourful snapshots for each story that effectively conveys expression, setting, and time. Edited excerpts from an interview.

You first put together this series on social media in 2016. Was it a challenge to collate it all into a book?
It was a different process; we had to take into account things like structure, chronology and diversity. The list has changed quite a bit from the original bunch of women I put together in 2016: it is now a more well-rounded and inclusive list and has stories that draw from different sections
of society.

History and literature in school textbooks is largely restricted to the West or are typecast. Your work presents a set of intersectional narratives. What according to you is the starting point to move towards intersectionality?
Diversity of voices! We can only truly understand other people if we listen to them. I think the biggest move towards intersectionality in literature and education is to include more variety in the kind of perspectives we include.

The story of each woman could span volumes. Tell us about your process of piecing together the profiles.
Much of the writing was done by writers at Tulika Publishers. Since the book is for a younger audience, we wanted to keep the text simple and informative but still have it convey how vibrant the stories were. We started with paragraphs of basic information and then looked for smaller pieces of information that would lend themselves to visuals.

How has your definition of feminism evolved over the years?
My understanding of feminism is constantly growing! When I was younger, I had a simplistic idea of gender and gender roles but I think I'm working on expanding my definition of feminism to focus less on tropes and rules and more on choice, diversity and perspectives.

Who serves as an inspiration to you in the art world?
I try not to be influenced too much by artists (especially contemporary ones), but I'm a big fan of classical European art, comic books and animated movies.

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