Alice Garg (born 1942) is an educator and activist. She is the founder secretary of the ''Bal Rashmi Society'', a non-profit NGO. She established the ''Alice Garg National Seashells Museum'' in

Jaipur Jaipur (; Hindi Language, Hindi: ''Jayapura''), formerly Jeypore, is the List of state and union territory capitals in India, capital and largest city of the Indian States and union territories of India, state of Rajasthan. , the city had a pop ...

. She also campaigns for the abolition of

Sati (practice) Sati or suttee is a Hindu practice, now largely historical, in which a widow sacrifices herself by sitting atop her deceased husband's funeral pyre. Quote: Between 1943 and 1987, some thirty women in Rajasthan (twenty-eight, according to offici ...

and female foeticide. In 1997 she won the Special Social Lifetime Achievement Award under the Godfrey Phillips Bravery National Awards.

Bal Rashmi Society

Alice started the Bal Rashmi Society after resigning from her teaching job on 14 November 1972 with

Rs. Rupee is the common name for the currencies of India, Mauritius, Nepal, Pakistan, Seychelles, and Sri Lanka, and of former currencies of Afghanistan, Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, the United Arab Emirates (as the Gulf rupee), British East Africa, B ...

4000. The Society was concerned with "Relief, Welfare and Development of children, women and family at large who are poor, neglected, deprived and downtrodden and living in difficult circumstances and community development". The society presently houses 183 destitute and underprivileged children from oppressed

caste Caste is a form of social stratification characterised by endogamy, hereditary transmission of a style of life which often includes an occupation, ritual status in a hierarchy, and customary social interaction and exclusion based on cultura ...

s and has over 1640 children enrolled in its schools. The society has a presence in over 138 villages. It runs a large number of government programs in the slums of Jaipur and other villages, funded by both the

Government of Rajasthan The Government of Rajasthan is the supreme governing authority of the Indian state of Rajasthan and its 33 districts. It consists of an executive, led by the Governor of Rajasthan, a judiciary and a legislative. Jaipur is the capital of Raja ...

and the

Government of India The Government of India (ISO: ; often abbreviated as GoI), known as the Union Government or Central Government but often simply as the Centre, is the national government of the Republic of India, a federal democracy located in South Asia, c ...

In the news

Alice campaigned against those involved in the alleged rape of a woman by 15 people including the then Deputy Superintendent of Police at the J.C. Bose hospital in Jaipur in 1997. The campaign criticised the state government and raised its voice against the failure of the police to arrest the suspects. Three of the society's members, Abdul Sattar, Sita Ram and Satya Narain were arrested and, according to NHRC reports, subjected to mistreatment in prison. Alice went into hiding in order to avoid arrest. The Society was accused of rape, murder and embezzlement but was subsequently cleared of all charges. In Mrs. Garg's words, "We were booked for four rape cases, one murder and one threat and three misuse of funds. Fifteen of us were booked, and I was booked in all the nine cases. But I’m very happy to tell you that in the reinvestigation they did not get anything out of it and they have put out a final report in favor of us. But, you see, four people were there in prison for 17 months. My colleagues. And one fellow died — a young boy, leaving two daughters and one baby in the womb — out of shock".

Alice Garg National Museum

The Alice Garg National Museum is a private museum owned by the ''Rustomjee Memorial Foundation'' and is located in

Malviya Nagar (Jaipur) Malviya Nagar is an region in south Jaipur, Rajasthan, and one of the constituencies of Jaipur District. It is close to Durgapura, Jawahar Nagar, Jagatpura and Sanganer. The region is named after the freedom fighter Madan Mohan Malviya. Malviya ...

. It was set up by physicist K.B. Garg in his wife's name when their personal seashell collection became too large to be kept at home. It is the only museum dedicated entirely to seashells in India and has a collection of over 3000 sea shells.

Awards and recognition

* Jamnalal Bajaj Award, 2003. * Special Social Lifetime Achievement Award under the Godfrey Phillips Bravery National Awards, 2007.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Garg, Alice Indian women environmentalists 1942 births Living people Indian environmentalists People from Jaipur Women educators from Rajasthan Educators from Rajasthan Activists from Rajasthan 20th-century Indian women 20th-century Indian people