Tirupati: A tale of a homemaker who turned trailblazer

Tirupati: Almost all temple managements in Andhra Pradesh introduced female barbers for tonsuring, one of the age-old customs still followed by Hindu devotees while visiting shrines, more so the 2,000-year-old Tirumala temple, making a small but significant step towards gender equality.

TTD was the first to appoint female barbers to work in its Kalyana Katta, tonsure centre in Tirumala opening a new dawn for OBC women belonging to Nai-Brahmin caste, in 2006.

Following the footsteps of TTD, the temple management administering Sri Venkateswara temple at Tirumala, started recruiting women barbers while the pro-woman approach spurred temples in other states like Tamil Nadu, Telangana and Karnataka follow suit.

But it was intriguing to know that it was an ordinary woman who saw that TTD, the behemoth of Hindu religious institutions, agree to recruit women in its Kalyana Katta, of course after a bitter fight.

K Radha Devi has no political background, a god father or rich or educational degrees but boldly fought the TTD and also the powerful religious heads, who stood behind TTD opposing engaging women as barbers in Kalyana Katta.

Daughter of an ex-serviceman Varadarajulu who took part in 1971 Indo-Pak war, native of Palamaner, a sleepy border town in Chittoor district, she shifted to Punganur after her marriage when she was just 14. After some time, she ran a beauty shop to support her husband Venkataramana (no more) running a saloon in the small town before the family shifted to Tirupati for better opportunities, which proved a turning point in her life.

Radha Devi, harking back into her heroic fight with TTD, said it all began in February 2004 with the petitioning to the then chief minister YS Rajasekhara Reddy and endowments minister M Satyanarayana Rao for employing women in TTD Kalyana Katta.

Talking to The Hans India over phone, recalling her struggle for employing women as barbers in TTD, she said trust board following the direction of Rajasekhar Reddy resolved in March 2005 to recruit female but the same board rejected its own resolution, two months later in May on the ground that some religious heads objecting to it.

In the meantime, she said a group of people approached the court against engaging women barbers, arguing that it is against our tradition and informed that she got impleaded in the case which went in favour of women.

"I took up indefinite fast when TTD delayed taking women barbers as per court order which ultimately forced TTD to recruit 30 female barbers in September 2006 which is an important milestone in gender justice and a memorable day in my life," she recalled.

She further said her fierce battle with TTD lasted for less than two year, it exposed many sections like religious heads and also male members of Nai-brahmins (barber community) were averse to employing women as barbers to work along with men rendering tonsure service to devotees.

Radha Devi, now leading a quiet life, confined mostly to her family, said she was tired but not retired. "Struggle is only a journey for me not destination," she said affirming that she continues the fight for women empowerment and gender equality but silently.

Radha Devi won many awards, including Nari Shakti Puraskar 2019 and won laurels from national and international organisations in recognition of her fight ushering in a new era for women with the recruitment of them as barbers by temples.