Communication

K. Satchidanandan, in a perceptive and panoramic analysis of Indian Writing in English, ‘Mother tongue, the other tongue’ (Seminar 600, August 2009) invites readers to ponder over the question: Why are there no movements like the Dalit movement in IWE? This question reminds one of a critical encounter recorded in the noted Dalit Hindi writer Omprakash Valmiki’s Dalit Sahitya ka Saundarshastra (Aesthetics of Dalit Literature).

‘It is not necessary to be a horse to be able to write on horses,’ asserted Kashinath Singh (Hindi fiction writer).

‘How will you understand the inner pain of the horse, his emotions toward his master once he is tied to the khunta after a whole day long labour, hungry and thirsty?’ (Omprakash Valmiki)

In India Marathi, Telugu, Tamil and Hindi have in plenty what English lacks (almost) absolutely. That ‘substance’ is what is denoted by the widely accepted critical term ‘Dalit consciousness’, the indispensable energy behind a literary endeavour which claims to write on Dalit themes. Indian writing in English does not have this energy. This lack is part of the situation in which, as Makarand Paranjape in his Journey to Ithaca: A Letter on Recent Indian English Fiction says, ‘It suffers from a crisis of legitimacy and authenticity at home.’

‘Dalit consciousness’ is a term often used in discussions of Dalit politics and identity. Political leaders and concerned commentators on Dalit issues refer to it in terms of political awareness in the sense of consciousness-raising among the marginalized sections of the Indian society. Sometimes, it also refers to the notion of collective identity among the diverse Dalit communities. These two uses are fundamentally the same in their emphasis on the need to be aware of the age-long exploitation based on caste. By way on an example, one can cite Badri Narayan and A.R. Mishra, who wrote about the impact of Swami Achhutanand’s newspaper Achhut in the early 20th century. They say, ‘No event in modern times has played such a significant role in awakening Dalit consciousness as the print medium, and Swami Achhutanand was its architect in the northern belt of the country.’ Similarly, Gopal Guru, reflecting on the context of naming and identity presided over by the term Dalit, laments that, ‘Although the Dalit category has been put to political use by various agents at the all India level, it has yet to become an integral part of the deeper Dalit consciousness.’ Another remarkable commentator on Dalit issues, Eleanor Zelliot, in an essay entitled ‘The Roots of Dalit Consciousness’ (Seminar 471, November 1998) described those elements in Dalit collective culture ‘which allow pride, self-respect and a vision of the future.’ These uses of ‘Dalit consciousness’ are genuine attempts to understand the shared constructions of understanding the self that are both a product of history and the struggle to change its legacy.

But in recent years Dalit writers and critics in both Hindi and Marathi have developed a more specific definition of ‘Dalit consciousness’, one that is said to drive the expressive effort and is discussed in the interpretive pieces of literature. Simply said, the practices of writing and reading about Dalit issues in a literary way occasion an articulation of this consciousness. Given the remarkable work in this area by authors and critics writing in Hindi and Marathi, one can safely claim that the term ‘Dalit chetna’ has greater expressive power than in its English equivalent. The critical commentaries, which have the potential to embody an emerging theory of Dalit aesthetics, deploy this chetna as a fundamental component. Omprakash Valmiki’s Dalit Sahitya ka Saundarshastra has a full chapter devoted to the definition and correct understanding of Dalit chetna. Some years prior to Valmiki’s work, i.e., in the later part of the 1990s, Ramnika Gupta edited three anthologies of essays, interviews, poems and stories in which Hindi Dalit writers and critics debated the specific understanding and applications of Dalit chetna. More recently, we saw Alok Mukherjee’s English translation of Sharankumar Limbale’s critical work in Marathi, Towards an Aesthetic of Dalit Literature: History, Controversies and Considerations. The very first line of this book – ‘By Dalit literature I mean writing about Dalits by Dalit writers with a Dalit consciousness’, explicitly sets out the premise that Dalit consciousness is the yardstick by which the Dalitness of Dalit literature is measured.

Limbale defines this consciousness as ‘the revolutionary mentality connected with struggle,’ and locates Ambedkarite thought as its dominating inspiration. For him, the distinctiveness of Dalit literature lies in this consciousness whose objective is to make ‘slaves conscious of their slavery.’ For him, as with all the Dalit critics and authors, this consciousness makes Dalit literature a tendentious creative effort on the path of emancipation. The thoughts of Baba Saheb Ambedkar remain a persistent source of inspiration of struggle and emancipation in Dalit literary imaginations. As Omprakash Valmiki writes, ‘Dalit chetna obtains its primary energy from Dr. Ambedkar’s life and vision. All Dalit writers are united with respect to this truth.’

The concept of Dalit chetna is directly linked to literary production. Even more it governs their critical re-reading of ‘mainstream’ established literary texts. Bharatiya Dalit Sahitya Akademy President, Sohanpal Sumanakshar argues that the characters of Ghisu and Madhav in Premchand’s Kafan (Shroud) are not realistic, because their characterization does not match his notion of realism, which he claims is inseparable from the requirements of honour and forthrightness outlined in the concept of Dalit consciousness. He writes that Premchand portrayed the lower caste characters in this story in the way he did ‘so that he could win the praise of the upper caste Brahmins and have them call his work "literature".’ Omprakash Valmiki, himself a celebrated Hindi Dalit writer whose autobiography Joothan was recently translated and published in English, is also of the opinion that Premchand was mistaken in conflating Dalits with farmers and peasants who are the victims of economic exploitation but who do not suffer the pangs born out of caste inequality and untouchability. ‘The characters of Ghisu and Madhav in his story "Kafan" are Chamars, but the story does not raise any issue that is related to the problems of Chamars or Dalits. There is only a detailed depiction of their idleness and heartlessness.’

There are other Dalit literary critics who are engaged in an analytical re-reading of various literary texts, basing their critical analysis on the concept of Dalit consciousness. Mohandas Naimishray asks, ‘Was Premchand a storyteller with a Dalit chetna?’ and answers that this concept is ‘so well-defined that it is not possible to attribute it to Premchand.’ Generally, with respect to Premchand, though Dalit writers and critics appreciate his depiction of low caste characters as simple, morally strong, hardworking and compassionate despite their long victimization by the caste system, they also note a confusion between caste and class, leading to his failure on the touchstone of Dalit chetna. As they write, in Premchand, sometimes, because of this conflation the corruption of the social system spills into the portrayal of corrupt victims as exemplified by the central Dalit characters of Kafan who come across as slothful and immoral. Dr. Dharamvir, a noted Dalit Hindi literary critic, in his book Samant ka Munshi (The Writer of the Feudal Lord) suggests that in Kafan Premchand would have been on the side of Dalits if only at the end of the story he had written that the Dalit woman Budhia, whose painful death in the course of delivering a baby lies at the poignant centre of the story, was made pregnant by the lumpen son of the village zamindar.

One may disagree with the critical stand based on the concept of Dalit consciousness, but its salutary effect in expanding the horizon of literary appreciation of texts can hardly be denied. The same cannot as yet be claimed about Indian English writing, partly because this tool has still to be employed on a large scale. Fortunately, the more recent publications in English, starting with the English translation of Sharankumar Limbale’s Towards an Aesthetic of Dalit Literature, provide greater hope that this concept will not remain in critical limbo for long. It is bound to become a part of the post-colonial critical repertoire, and thus enrich the critical-analytical scenario of English literature produced by Indians. In 2003, three Dalit autobiographies came out in English translation – Omprakash Valmiki’s Joothan: A Dalit’s Life; Narendra Jadhav’s Outcaste: A Memoir and Sharankumar Limbale’s Akkarmashi: The Outcaste. These works foreground the interface between authenticity of experiences and creative endeavour, as far as Dalit life is concerned.

The emphasis on the concept of Dalit consciousness is a search for the subject position. The analytical act of reading a text, keeping in mind a separate set of theoretical tools, encourages the Dalit readers to occupy the position of subject, to be those writing, rather than simply being written about. Possibly one can suggest that the now famous question, ‘Can the subaltern speak?’, posed by Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak with reference to the colonizer-colonized framework, has been answered by the Dalit literary critics in the changed context of the caste-based socio-cultural and economic structure of Hindu society. The element of Dalit subalternity speaking to the high caste literary metropolis is unmistakable in the stress on the concept of Dalit consciousness.

R.P. Singh

Dongargarh, Chhattisgarh