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Anand T Hingorani, To the Women, Ahmedabad: Navajivan Publishing House, 1941. Volume II. First Edition.

247 pages, including an index; accompanied by an important group of contemporary typed editorial notes, marked thematic extracts, and review drafts relating to the publication, interpretation, and dissemination of Gandhi’s writings on women, education, marriage, equality, widowhood, and social reform; several passages underlined and marked in red pencil; including contemporary Hindustan Times review material discussing the Gandhi Series edited by Anand T. Hingorani; original publisher’s binding.
8.8 x 5.8 in (22.35 x 14.73 cm)

Signed and dated by Mahatma Gandhi in Hindi in black ink, “Bapu 2/10/41"

"WOMAN IS THE COMPANION OF MAN": Gandhi's Vision of Equality

A rare autographed first edition of To the Women, one of the most important thematic compilations of Mahatma Gandhi’s writings on women, social reform, equality, education, marriage, and moral responsibility, edited and published by his close associate Anand T Hingorani during the final decade of British rule in India. The work forms part of the larger Gandhian publishing programme through which Gandhi’s speeches, articles, letters, and reflections were systematically organised for different sections of Indian society during the freedom movement.

The present archive is of exceptional importance not merely as a signed Gandhian publication but as a surviving documentary record of the editorial and intellectual processes through which Gandhian social thought was disseminated to modern India. Accompanying the signed volume is an important group of contemporary editorial notes, marked thematic extracts, and review drafts prepared in connection with the publication and reception of To the Women and the associated Gandhi Series edited by Anand T Hingorani.

These papers reveal Hingorani’s active role not simply as publisher but as interpreter, selector, organiser, and propagator of Gandhian thought. The archive preserves working selections and highlighted passages relating to women’s education, widowhood, marriage, equality, domestic ethics, social responsibility, and female participation within public life and the nationalist movement. Particularly striking are Gandhi’s statements asserting that “Woman is the companion of man, gifted with equal mental capacities" and that daughters and sons should be treated “on a footing of perfect equality"—remarks that carried considerable social and political significance in India during the early 1940s.

The accompanying review material further demonstrates how Gandhi was being positioned publicly as a moral reformer and advocate of women’s dignity and participation in national regeneration. A contemporary Hindustan Times review preserved within the archive praises Hingorani’s editorial efforts in selecting “important and thought-provoking articles of permanent value", while simultaneously framing Gandhi as one of the foremost ethical voices on women’s rights, marriage reform, education, and social responsibility in modern India. The papers therefore preserve not only Gandhi’s words themselves but also the editorial and critical reception that shaped their circulation during the final years of the independence movement.

Signed and dated by Gandhi in Hindi in black ink, “Bapu 2/10/41", the present copy was inscribed during a politically charged period immediately preceding the Quit India Movement, when Gandhi’s social and moral writings were becoming increasingly intertwined with broader questions of national reconstruction and civil resistance. Its direct association with Anand T Hingorani—Gandhian activist, participant in the Dandi March, editor, and member of Gandhi’s close intellectual circle—gives the archive particular historical and personal significance.

Taken together, the signed volume and its accompanying papers provide a rare documentary record of the publication, reception, and circulation of one of Gandhi’s most influential statements on the role of women in Indian society. They illuminate how his ideas on equality, education, and social reform reached contemporary readers, offering valuable insight into the intellectual life of the freedom movement beyond the political arena.

This lot will be shipped in "as is" condition. For further details, please refer to the images of individual lots as a reference for the condition of each lot.