She was India's first Muslim female teacher, who gladly welcomed Jyotiba Phule and Savitribai Phule to her home when Jyotiba Phule's father had thrown her out of the house.
A story which society is slowly forgetting. Many social reformers in our country have tried hard to give the right direction to the currents of social evils and stereotypes.
Many social reformers of the country have been encouraging the work of education and upliftment of lives of women and Dalits for centuries. However, the level of education and knowledge is rarely seen.
Fatima Sheikh was an Indian teacher and social activist, who was an associate of Jyotiba Phule and Savitribai Phule who understood the importance of education and worked to enlighten the society.
Jyotiba Phule and Savitribai Phule, along with Fatima Sheikh, worked to spread education among women and the Dalit community.
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Biography
Fatima Shaikh was born on 9 January 1831 in Pune, Maharashtra. She was very fond of reading and writing and keeping learning better. She believed in improving the lives of people around her.
She was the first Muslim teacher in modern India. Amidst the rigid caste system and feudal ideas, she took up the responsibility of providing education to Dalit children and women.
Fatima Shaikh was introduced to Savitribai Phule at the teacher training institute run by American missionary Cynthia Farrar. Both of them had taken teaching training from this institute.
She was the sister of Mian Usman Shaikh. When her father threw her out of the house along with her family, rejecting Jyotiba Phule, who encouraged the work of upliftment of Dalits and women, it was Mian Usman Shaikh and Fatima Shaikh who gave her a place to live in their house.
Usman Sheikh not only accommodated the Phule couple in his house but also agreed to run a school in the premises of the house.
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At that time, only upper caste men got education, women and Dalits were rejected by the society as if they did not belong to the human race, due to which there was no education system for women and Dalits.
In 1848, the first school for girls was opened in the house of Osman Shaikh and his sister Fatima Shaikh.
Fatima Shaikh and Savitribai Phule started giving education to women and people from oppressed castes.
It was Fatima Sheikh who fully supported Savitribai Phule with determination.
Fatima Shaikh actively participated in the establishment of two schools established by Jyotiba Phule in Mumbai (then Bombay) in 1851.
She taught in all five schools that were founded by the Phule couple.
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Fatima Shaikh's contribution has been largely ignored by the Dalit Bahujan movement. However, scholars such as Gail Omvedt and Rosalind O'Hanlon have highlighted his work in society.
On 9 October 1900, Fatima Shaikh said goodbye to this human world forever.
On January 9, 2022, Google honored Fatima Shaikh by making a doodle on her 191st birth anniversary.
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The Andhra Pradesh government has included a chapter about her in the 8th class syllabus.
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