Kamla Bhasin (24 April 1946 – 25 September 2021) was an Indian developmental feminist activist, poet, author and social scientist.

Bhasin's work, that began in 1970, focused on gender education, human development and the media.

[4] She was best known for her work with Sangat - A Feminist Network and for her poem Kyunki main ladki hoon, mujhe padhna hai.

[5] In 1995, she recited a refurbished, feminist version of the popular poem Azadi (Freedom) in a conference.

She had always maintained that in order to usher effective change, sloganeering must be accompanied by community mobilization.

Afterward, she taught at the Orientation Centre of the German Foundation for Developing Countries in Bad Honnef for around a year.

That was manifest in the fact that Brahmin's wells would never go dry as they received state funds to drill every year.

[4][6] She lamented later that at that time, in the 70s when the subcontinent was gripped in mutual animosity and war, it was difficult to create networks and come together as South Asians.

She thus, moved to Bangladesh in 1976 and worked with Gonoshasthaya Kendra, a rural public health organization.

[10] It was where she met Zafrullah Chowdhury, a Bangladeshi public health worker and activist, who changed her perspective about a lot of things.

Her book, Laughing Matters, that she co-authored with Bindia Thapar, first published in 2005 was republished in 2013 and now has a Hindi version (Hasna Toh Sangharsho Mein Bhi Zaroori Hai), Feminism & Its Relevance in South Asia.

Other important writings by her include: Borders & Boundaries: Women in India's Partition,[11] Understanding Gender,[12] What Is Patriarchy?

In her writings and politics, she envisioned a feminist movement that transcends class, borders and other binary social divisions.

[13] At a 2013 One Billion Rising event in New Delhi, she recited her famous Azadi poem to much acclaim and public participation.

She resented that South Asia's women are shackled by a myriad of social customs and beliefs that embrace and straddle the patriarchy.

[4] She challenged patriarchal ideas in language, and questioned the validity and history of everyday words.

[6] She adjudged all these customs against the constitution of India that offers every woman the right to equality and the promise of a dignified life.