Tribute: Recalling Judith - Politico-social activist, blend of courage and compassion
By John B Monteiro
Mangaluru, Jan 9: I had interviewed about a decade ago Judith Mascarenhas, who passed away on January 9, for a now-defunct English daily. Since then I used to run into her, always with a benign smile, at public functions – reflecting her interest and concern in various issues. Here is a fond recall.
"What is in a name? that which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet".
- Shakespeare in Romeo and Juliet
She sported a long name – Judith Mary Rita Mascarenhas – and for good reason. When her mother was expecting her, there was uncertainty about the baby’s safe delivery and doubt about its mother’s survival. Then it was vowed that if things went well, the baby would be named after St. Rita – the saint of the impossible. Then a leading priest of the day, a close friend of the family, came up with the name of Judith that has a biblical history. That Judith was a religious woman of the ancient Jews who saved her town from conquest by entering the camp of the besieging Assyrian army and cutting off the head of its commander, Holofernes, while he slept. That she swept the commander off guard by her beauty and charm, made him drink to the point of sinking into deep sleep and her using his own sword to behead him are associated details. When she came out from his tent in the camp displaying his head, the invading army fled in panic. And her second name, Mary was the favourite of devout Catholic families. She had exhibited the right combination of compassion and courage symbolised in her names, in her decades of public service and activism.
File Photos
Judith had inherited her social service legacy from her parents, Aloysius I Mascarenhas, a noted Konkani poet, journalist and a social activist, and Magdalene M Mascarenhas who combined teaching with social service. Aloysius was the founder of Society of Vincent de Paul, committed to the uplift of the downtrodden, in Mangalore diocese. He set up the Diocesan Arbitration Court to save people from court litigation and launched the first Konkani magazine, Dirvem.
Last of her parents’ eight children, Judith was born on December 22, 1931. She did her education throughout at St. Agnes College, completing BA in 1953 with a high rank in the university and first in the college. She completed BT in 1956, again with a high university rank. She initially taught at Sophia Cambridge School in Bangalore for two and a half years and switched to Capitanio High School in Mangalore for the rest of her teaching career, till she took voluntary retirement in 1983. Even while she was teaching in Capitanio, she would often be distracted by the suffering people on the road and there were instances when she would first attend to such cases even at the risk of being late at the school. This must have annoyed the school authorities and realising this she plunged whole time into social service by taking recourse to a provision that allowed teachers with 20 years of service to take leave on loss of pay up to five years.
During this period, Judith lobbied with the then chief minister, Ramakrishna Hegde, to extend the benefit of pension, available to teachers in government schools conditional on 20 years of service, also to non-aided school teachers. Once she succeeded in this, she resigned her job and got into full time social service – falling back on her pension.
Then, in 1983, there emerged a provision for 25% reservation for women in civic elections. Political parties were searching for winnable candidates. Knowing Judith’s passion for social service, some well-meaning friends persuaded her to enter politics. For practical reasons, she contested on Janata Dal symbol and she turned out to be the only woman to win from her party compared to nine from the Congress. Judith won the election for three consecutive terms – first in the reserved category and the next two in the general category. She became the deputy mayor of the Mangalore City Corporation for 1999-2001. She lost the election in 2002.
Judith admitted that being deputy mayor made it easy to move things in Bengaluru. She said that politics offered a readymade platform to do good. She also conceded that being a party Corporator one had to compromise one’s independence. She pushed through many measures for her constituency and the city at large. One of the things she doggedly pursued and succeeded related to metering water for apartment buildings. Earlier, the total consumption by the building was billed involving higher rates for higher slabs of consumption. Her reform involved dividing the total building water consumption by the number of flats and then applying the lower rate.
Judith networked with a number of NGOs and advocated that her fellow Catholics should go out of the church compound and join the mainstream movements for social action. When she became the Corporator, she launched a bimonthly magazine, Nagaradeepika, to communicate with her constituents. One of her concerns was to save the Kadri Park, part of which had been surrendered for commercial developments, for the citizens of Mangaluru.
Asked why she had remained a Miss, Judith said marriage and social work go ill together. "If you are married, your first duty is to your family. It cannot be 'Urige upakara, manege mari'". (Benefactor to the country, curse at home). For the same reason, she had ruled out adoption. "I do not want to be tied down to one or two children and would rather have more children under my concern". So, Judith struggled on with optimism and on a positive note unto the last.
Watch:
Earlier Report
Daijiworld Media Network - Mangaluru
Mangaluru, Jan 9: Former deputy mayor and well-known social worker Judith Mascarenhas passed away here on Monday January 9. She was 85.
A lady who had an illustrious career as a politician, social worker and teacher, Judith had been bedridden for sometime, suffering from paralysis.
The nuns at Maria Nivas, Jeppu were taking care of her. She had donated her house to St Vincent De Paul Society. Her 85th birthday was celebrated last month.
Born on December 22, 1931 to Konkani poet and journalist Aloysius I Mascarenhas and teacher Magdalene, Judith completed her studies from Madras University, after which she took up teaching as a career at Cambridge School, Bengaluru, and continued at Capitanio Junior College. She was teacher for 22 years before taking voluntary retirement.
A dedicated social worker, 'Judy Bai' as she was fondly known, founded the Preethi Neethi Trust in 1991 for uplifting the poor and destitute. She held several other posts, as founder member and treasurer of Link De-addiction Citizens' Committee, member of Mangalore Railway Station Consultative Committee, treasurer of Mahila Vedike Nagara Parisarasaktha Okkoota, joint secretary of the DK Association for the Blind, director of DK and Udupi Zilla Mahila Co-operative Bank, director and vice-chairman of MCC Bank, director of the Canara Catholic Co-operative Educational Society, to name a few.
She served the city of Mangaluru as deputy mayor for two terms, and as corporator for three terms.
In the field of journalism, she served as editor of Konkani Youth Monthly 'Yuvak' for five years, editor and publisher of Kannada bi-monthly 'Deepika' and editor and publisher of Kannada monthly 'Nagara Deepika' for 15 years each. As corporator, she ran her own local newspaper.
For her achievements in various fields especially in social work, she was awarded the district Rajyotsava Award in 2015, Lifetime Achievement Award by St Agnes College Alumnae Association, social service honour a DK Kannada Sahitya Sammelana and many more.
Among her other achievements, Judith represented Catholic women of India at the International Catholic Women’s meet in Rome. She was also a member of a team from India that participated in the International Conference on Women and Politics in Asia (WPA) in Pakistan in 2005. She also represented Karnataka at the South Asian Countries Conference on Gender Concerns in Politics in Sri Lanka in 2006.
She was a nominated member of the government-appointed Coastal Agenda Task Force and was chairperson of its sub committee for social and human development. She was also the executive member of the Mangaluru diocesan committee on planning and implementation.
She leaves behind her siblings Benedict, Sr Jose Marie, Sr Terese, Sr Noelline and Sr Olive.
Mortal remains will be brought to the residence 'The Flowerette', Comd George Martis Road, Mallikatta on Wednesday January 11 for public homage from 1 pm to 2.30 pm.
Funeral cortege leaves residence at 2.45 pm to St Sebastian Church, Bendore followed by public homage from 3 pm to 3.30 pm. Mass at 3.30 pm followed by burial at Bendore cemetery.