Writers Editors Critics (WEC) (eBook)

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Sharan Speaks: Colours of Resistance and Emancipation on the White Paper

Jaydeep Sarangi

Abstract: Dalit literature intends to articulate this social, cultural, political and religious oppression perpetrated in this country. Awareness of this age-old practice does not simply manifest itself in torrid descriptions of dalit life. Rather, it attempts to derive out of these experiences a new value system that would help dalits to carve out a new social reality. The dalits are determined to narrate the dalit agony, assertion, resistance, anger, protest and mobilization. It is important to note here that while responding to the past experience, the dalit writers are conscious of the present and give hint of the future. They make a fervent plea for a complete overhaul of society by questioning all notions of caste and class. Sharankumar Limbale’s poems unfold a rich mosaic of discourse; a discourse of resistance, protest, angst and liberation.

Keywords/phrases: poisoned bread, Brahminical, mortgaged man, liberation, emancipation.

Dalit does not signify a particular caste but stands for an active awareness of the everyday lived experiences of those human beings belonging to the lowest strata of caste hierarchy in a stratified society in India. The feeling is of oppressed and deprived by the age-old stereotypes. Dalit literature intends to articulate this social, cultural, political and religious oppression perpetrated in this country. “Awareness of this oppression does not simply manifest itself in torrid descriptions of dalit life. Rather, it attempts to derive out of these experiences a new value system that would help dalits to carve out a new social reality.” (Jatin Bala 167-68) The dalits are determined to narrate the dalit agony, assertion, resistance, anger, protest and mobilization. It is important to note here that while responding to the past experience, the dalit writers are conscious of the present and give hint of the future. They make a fervent plea for a complete overhaul of society by questioning all notions of caste and class. Thus dalit literature serves as a protest and reaction against the caste system and the age-old tradition of discrimination, exploitation ruthlessness and deprivation. Kalyani Thakur, a renowned dalit feminist writer from Bengal, during an interview with Jaydeep Sarangi and Angana Dutta claimed, “For me, writing poems is participating in cultural movement. I write poems to register my thoughts and feelings. It does beyond the literary boundary. My poems address social issues. They are the poetics of age-old oppression against the dalits.” For Sharankumar Limbale, “The rebellion mood became important tone of our expression. So, dalit literature is not only corpus of pain and suffering, but it is revolt against inhumanity” (“Interview with Jaydeep Sarangi”). Dr. Ambedkar once said India needs social democracy. Sharankumar Limbale spreads the values for stronger society worldwide.

Arjun Dangle, the editor Poisoned Bread, defining dalit literature, says, “dalit literature is not simply literature … (it) is associated with a movement to bring about change … it (is) strongly evident that there is no established critical theory behind (dalit writings); instead there is a new thinking and a new point of view.” It is said that it caste system was born was out of varna system and one of the most exploitative, unbearable, and torturous aspects of Hindu social system for dalits was untouchability. Further, it was a matter of great shock and surprise that the system of untouchability was supported and justified by some Hindu “religious” scriptures such as Manusmriti. The problem of untouchability is really a class-struggle between caste Hindus and untouchables and this seems to be a never-ending conflict. Under the rule of the Peshwas, in the Maratha country, the untouchable was not allowed to use the public streets if an upper-caste Hindu was coming along lest he should pollute the upper caste Hindu by his shadow. In Pune (Poona), the untouchables were required to carry an earthen pot, hung in his neck wherever he went, for holding his spit lest his spit falling on the earth should pollute a Hindu who might unknowingly happen to go that way. The untouchables were not allowed to inhabit a certain place for a long time. In case they stay for a long time at one place, they should be immediately driven away. Though equal rights have been granted by the constitution of India to ensure better living for every citizen but even then these policies failed to eradicate some deep rooted problems of Indian society. The menace of caste system engulfed the entire society with the caste discrimination. The prejudice is still prevailing in society as a result Dalits have always been mired to be treated equally for which they are the perpetual victims of social and economic exclusion. Dalit literature proved its importance in portraying the stigmatized and hapless conditions of Dalits, upstaging the subjugation of caste oriented society.

The necessity to write dalit literature arises because, we have seen that, very few writers from the so-called upper castes have written about the miserable plight / lot of the dalits. These uppercaste writers don’t have firsthand experience of the problems which hit the dalits. It is this practice of subjugating the dalits to inhuman tortures which made Dr. Ambedkar realised that he had no motherland. This was the feeling which Dr. Ambedkar expressed during one of his dialogues with Mahatma Gandhi in Yerawada prison in Pune, Maharashtra during Mahatma Gandhi’s historic fast against Dr. Ambedkar’s demand for separate separate electorates to dalits for electing members of state legislative.

It will have to be noted that, of all the Indian languages, it was in Marathi that Dalit literature was written first. So, dalit literature in Marathi initially functioned as some sort of a lighthouse for dalit writers in other Indian languages. Kisan Fagu Bandsode, Kerubaba Gaikwad, Poet Dinbandhu, Narayan Gangaram Surve, Namdeo Dhasal, Keshav Meshram, Waman Nimbalkar, daya pawar, Tryambak Sapakale, Pralhad Chendavankar, Arjun Dangle, Yashwant Manohar, Raja Dhale and many others championed the cause of the dalits in Marathi language. Poetry became a powerful genre for dalit activists in Maharasthra. Sharan Kumar Limbale is a worthy entry into this legacy.

Akkarmashi, the masterpiece by Sharankumar Limbale, was originally published in Sharankumar’s mother tongue, Marathi in 1984 when he was 25. Considering its significance and demand it wastranslated in different languages including English. With correction and re-correction, editing and omission finally OUP has published Akkarmashi as translated The Outcaste. The Outcaste is the heart piercing picture of the fourth world Indian humanity. The text is nothing but the unknown, unnoticed, unwanted Indians’ real saga with a passion to create first as the human identity and then, human acceptance. In The Outcaste literary discourse is neither an imagination nor a fantasy but unimaginable crude reality, practiced by the powered people of the same homeland on the powerless people of their homeland. Stomach does not know anything except fill it up. Remembering the unbelievable events of childhood Sharankumar writes about Santamai, the writer’s grandmother, who had to eat the bhakari from the corn collected out of animal dung. Appropriately Lambale has highlighted the fact;

Hunger seems no bigger than our open palm, but it can swallow the whole world and let out a belch. When Limbale was a student of college even at that time his guardians, Dada and Santamai, had no their own shelter. They had to live in a village bus station Sharankumar writes; “My house was our village bus stand.” (The Outcaste: 96) The first phase of Sharan Kumar Limbale’s experiences as an outcaste begins from his school days. School is considered as the doorway of education, and education has perhaps been considered the most important and a powerful ammunition by experts and educationalists to bring about a revolutionary change in society whether be it in social, cultural, economic, political or religious aspect of life in general and an individual’s success in life in particular. The right to education for Dalits was banned by the Brahmanical laws justified by religious scriptures, and from then onward an opportunity of getting fair and equal education is still an incomplete dream for them. Limbale remembers one of his schools time’s picnic day-out experience, “The Wani and Brahmin boys played kabaddi. Being marked as Mahars we couldn’t join them. So Malya, Umbrya, Parshya, all from my caste, began to play touch-and-go. We played one kind of game while the high caste village boys played another. The two games were played separately like two separate whirlwind. Play over, we settle down to eat. Boys and girls from the high castes like Wani, Brahmin, Marwari,...