Noted author Namita Gokhale was conferred with the seventh Yamin Hazarika Woman of Substance Award in a virtual ceremony held on Sunday.
The award is instituted in memory of Yamin Hazarika, the first woman from the Northeast to join the central police service, and is given annually by a collective of women professionals since 2015. Hazarika succumbed to cancer in the year 1999, but her great trail of legacy lives even today inspiring millions, especially women in the law enforcement sector.
An award-winning writer, Gokhale has authored twenty books including eleven works of fiction. Her recent novel, Jaipur Journals, was released in 2020. Betrayed By Hope, a play on the tragic life of the poet Michael Madhusudan Dutt, was also published last year, while, a new novel, The Blind Matriarch, will be out in late September 2021.
Gokhale is also the co-founder and co-director of the Jaipur Literature Festival, founder- directors of the Mountain Echoes, The Bhutan Literature Festival from 2009 to 2019, and mentors Himalayan Echoes, the Kumaon Festival of Literature and the Arts.
"Yamin Hazarika and I were born in the same year. Our lives ran parallel in so many ways. She would have been my age and had her share of further experiences and joy. I too had cancer but I was just fortunate enough to survive it. She was posted in the Hauz Khaus police station for some years, and I live in Hauz Khaus and that is our local police station. Our lives could have easily intersected. We could have met then and become friends but instead, it was fated that I was to encounter this inspirational figure more than two decades after she passed on through this award," Gokhale said.
"The courage and dignity with which she conducted her life is visible in all that I discovered about her," she added.
Robin Hibu, IPS, Special Commissioner, Delhi Police was the Chief Guest on the occasion, while h historian Professor Yasmin Saikia of the Arizona State University, USA was the Guest of Honour.
During the ceremony, the Indian historian from Assam, Yasmin Saikia stated how Yamin Hazarika broke the glass ceiling for Assamese women to join the Central Police Services. Saikia noted that Hazarika had many "achievements to her credit" but what really stood out is the work she started on "crimes against women within the Delhi Police Force". Notably, Hazarika played a pivotal role as the DCP in charge of the country's first crimes against women cell set up in 1983.
"I am thinking of women like Yamin Hazarika and Namita Gokhale who are somewhat like us, we can access them as friends, colleagues, family members, and so on, and yet they are the ones who create their reputations made in a spirit of tireless work and quiet fortitude transcending the social forces and society in general that come in their way, and keep moving forward with determination and raise themselves so outstandingly above the rest of us," Saikia said.
Speaking on the genesis of the prestigious award, journalist and author, Teresa Rehman, who is associated with the collective said, "It all started in a social media group chat of a collective of professional women in the year 2015. Little did we realise when we had decided to celebrate the life of Yamin Hazarika, that 25 years after her death there was so little information about her. She had literally sunk into oblivion".
Yamin Hazarika was a top-ranking officer in the national capital and a trailblazer in so many ways, but everyone who knew her had a vague hazy memory about her. The journey of this award is like a miracle. It is almost like a silent revolution where a collective of women from different walks of life come together annually to remember her, Rehman added.
Previous winners of the prestigious award were author Indrani Raimedhi, athlete Tayabun Nisha, actor Moloya Goswami, environmental activist Purnima Devi Barman, social activist Hasina Kharbhih, and historian Rana Safvi.
