A tigress to this day

“I’ve had a great life,” said Rasammah, whose daily motto is ‘To live, live for others’.

At 89, age has not slowed down activist and former freedom fighter one bit in fighting for a good cause

Freedom fighter. Women’s rights activist. Former principal of Methodist Girls School Kuala Lumpur. Datuk Rasammah Bhupalan’s resume is one of a formidable tigress.

As founder of the first Women Teachers Union in 1960, she fought for equal pay among teachers.

Then as co-founder of the National Council of Women’s Organisations (NCWO), she reminded women that having a ring on one’s finger didn’t quite seal the deal. Hubby had better keep up their part of the bargain too.

And as founder of the YWCA Vocational Training Opportunity Centre, she made it clear that “as sisters, we had to do it for ourselves,” to borrow the phrase from the ’80s hit song Sisters Are Doin’ It For Themselves sung by Eurythmics and Aretha Franklin.

She put this philosophy into action at her vocational school, where poor girls were given a chance to shake off the shackles of poverty through free training in hairdressing and beauty courses, computer and secretarial skills, and sewing and tailoring.

She nailed the goal of her cause squarely in an article she penned for The Star during the 100th anniversary special for International Women’s Day in 2011.

Rasammah receiving her honorary doctorate from the University of Malaya from the Sultan of Perak in 2014.

“We have come a long way. But how do we gauge the empowerment of women when we have only touched upper and middle-income women? What about the lower-income group? What have we brought to them?”

Rasammah was then 86.

Today, at 89, Rasammah is still a force to be reckoned with. She may sit in a wheelchair, needs a walker to move about and can get a little long-winded.

But the lady is still sharp. She remains as head of NCWO’s law and human rights commission. She is still a trustee at YWCA and continues to sit on the Methodist Education Foundation board.

“I’ll tell you what kind of background I came from,” said Rasammah, who fussed over her visitors with coffee, cakes and coconut water.

Her Sri Lankan father, she said, was a teacher who took a lot of pride in his mastery of the English language and was the type who chose his words with care.

“He abhorred the usage of slang. Once, he asked my brother how was school and my brother replied ‘OK’. My father made him write ‘I will not say ‘OK’ but ‘all right’, a hundred times,” she recalled.

Rasammah at age 16, when she joined the Rani of Jhansi regiment.

Naturally, she has taken to cringing at the thought of text speak and does not hide her disgust for people who think it’s okay to pepper their sentences with expletives.

Truly her father’s daughter, Rasammah would not be satisfied by simply labelling them as “rude.”

“I deplore people who use aggressive language. It’s unacceptable to an orderly society, not to mention impolite,” she said crisply.

Her interest in activism has its roots in 1942 when she and her family attended a mass rally at Ipoh Club Padang, Ipoh, to hear Subhas Chandra Bose speak about Indian women joining the Rani of Jhansi movement.

Bose’s plea made a lasting impression on Rasammah and her younger sister, Ponnammah. So, at age 16, Rasammah went to the training camp at Waterloo Street in Singapore where she learned about arms and combat skills.

Now, however, other than her various social responsibilities, she’s enjoying her days as a grandmother of seven.

Although she described her life as “hunky dory,” she had a close call when septicaemia floored her for five weeks last year. She recovered in time to be guest of honour at an event which saw another women’s organisation offer free tuition and computer literacy classes to children of Kajang Prison inmates.

Rasammah at age 21.

The organisation’s president was Universiti Pertahanan Nasional Malaysia Assoc Prof Dr Aruna Gopinath, author of Rasammah’s biography Footprints On The Sands of Time.

“Before I got ill, my daughter was already telling me, ‘Mummy, you do too much’. You are not 50, 60 or 70. You are 88 and you are sitting on six or seven committees,” she recalled.

But for a freedom fighter who as a teenager had been trained to throw a grenade and fire a sten gun, Rasammah was never the type to do what was expected.

Just as this interview was about to end, a knock on her apartment door admitted a group of women from a YWCA committee.

They were there to discuss some financial matters with Rasammah, the group’s appointed advisor.

“We are going to start a new group for 2016. Our challenge remains in finding ways to improve the overall picture. That will start with detailing the expenditure of the vocational courses and required cost to educate each student,” she said.

These group meetings, numbering no more than five, are frequent events at Rasammah’s house. They used to be held at the Selangor Club but for the sake of her comfort, the members now prefer to meet at her home.

“I’ve had a great life,” said Rasammah, whose daily motto is “To live, live for others.”

“I’ve never had a reason to be upset. As a leader, there are times when one has to be a loner to maintain integrity, accountability and honesty.

But then, I have never been the type to keep quiet when there is a need to speak up,” she quipped.