Constructing Women’s Citizenship: The Local, National, and Global Civics Lessons of Rajkumari Amrit Kaur

Rajkumari Amrit Kaur was an early leader of several important women’s organizations in India, including the All India Women’s Conference (AIWC) and the Young Women’s Christian Association-India (YWCA India), and she served as the liaison to Western-dominated international women’s organizations, including the International Council of Women (ICW). This article expands on Kaur’s discussion of social service and constructive citizenship while also exploring the concept in the context of national claims for women’s participation in the Indian state, the role of constructive citizenship in defining translocal social service, and the way that constructive citizenship helped Kaur to imagine the possibility of a global citizenship.