Phoolan Devi, India's Bandit Queen

Phoolan was born in Gorha Ka Purwa, Uttar Pradesh, India into the family of a humble fisherman and sharecropper as a daughter of India's lowest caste, the Harijans or, as they prefer to call themselves,  Dalits.   Her very birth into caste was an indignity but it was not that indignity which she revenged.   A daughter of her caste is not much valued in India and at only 11 years of age, she was married off to a middle-aged widower in exhange for a cow.  He treated her horribly and at only 12 years old, she found the strength to begin her life's journey as an outcast by leaving him.   Her family felt disgraced by Phoolan's rejection of her assigned husband; her father invited her to commit suicide by jumping into the village well.  She struggled on alone until she married one of her cousins who already had one wife.  Her marriage didn't last long.  Alone again, a young teenage woman, unsupported by her family, she was scorned as a harlot.   Still, uneducated as she was, she stood up to authorities in her own defence and even in support of her father.  At only 20 she took her father's land rights battle to the courts.   An uppity woman like Phoolan pays a price for such impudence.  A year later, punishment was meted against her.  She was arrested on a fraudulent charge of robbery and was held in custody without legal recourse for over a month during which she was often raped and beaten.  She had offended the Thakur caste.

In the summer of 1979, Phoolan took her escape or according to some accounts was taken by a dacoit or bandit band.  It is said that the dacoit leader abused and brutalized her but soon an admirer among the band, a member of her own caste, Vikram Mallah, came to her defense and killed the abusive dacoit leader,  Babu Gujar.  This handsome bandit taught Phoolan what he knew.  She learned well for she was now committed to avenge her life-long abuse.   She found resolve and support from Vikram: "Kill twenty, not just one.  If you kill twenty your fame will spread; if you kill just one, you will be hanged as a murderess."  With Vikram, she led her dacoit band.  A year later, her beloved Vikram slumped into her lap dying of a gunshot wound to his head.  He had been killed in revenge for the murder of Babu Gujar.  Phoolan was captured,  bound and gagged and thrown into a boat which carried her to Behmai.  There, she was imprisoned by a group of Thakurs who, each night, while she was blindfolded, gang-raped her into unconsciousness.  After three weeks of such torture, they released her into the village as their humiliated slave.  She was ripped naked and forced to draw their water.  Eventually, a friend, Santosh Pandit, rescued her from her humiliation.  She found her way back to the safe ravines of her bandit days.  She formed her own dacoit band.

In the winter of 1982, she revenged her mistreatment at the hands of the Thakurs, returning to Behmai to kill every single man of them who had abused and humiliated her.   She is said to have personally shot 22 men with her .315 Mauser.  Her fame blossomed.  Her very defiance of her assigned humiliation won the respect of the Mallah caste and the downtrodden throughout India.  Her exploits even won her the admiration of the ruling class and upper castes.  Authorities, however, were not so respectful.  The Indian police sought her relentlessly and just a year after her Valentine's day massacre, she negotiated surrender to 600 Indian police.  Perhaps the most famous picture of this wonderful woman is that taken at the time of her surrender before a throng of 8000 roaring admirers.  She had found dignity.
 

Phoolan's story continues to this day.  Since 1982, she has spent years in prison, uncharged for any crime, has been released and has served as member of the Indian Parliament.  She has married.  She has learned to read and write.  But, in 1997, the Indian government chose to threaten her again with the humiliation of prison and indignity.  Wonderful Phoolan has fled again into her safe ravines.  There is,  now perhaps, little prospect of her living a long dignified life.  Still, as she lives, she lives a life which dignifies all women of the world.  Thank you, Phoolan!

© Olivia Jensen
1998-05-05

Mary Anne Weaver's article in the  November 1966 Atlantic Monthly,  India's Bandit Queen: A saga of revenge  and the making of a legend of "the real India"  beautifully recounts more  of this noble woman's wonderful story.

See,  also,  Anuja Pande's article Phoolan Power  in SUNDAY, 14-20 July 1996, p. 38-40.

Caste as woman: izzat and larai* in Northern India A feminist's interpretation of Phoolan's story...angela aujla

And for more, check out Philip Fredric McEldowney's tribute:  The Phoolan Devi Home Page.