Md Aslam Parwez
Ara, Bhojpur, Bihar, India
&
Talat
Patna, Bihar, India
Abstract
It is an attempt to critically analyse Joothan a revolutionary and autobiographical book of Valmiki that records the history of oppression and pain from birth, upbringing to the age of being a writer. This autobiography not only records and narrates a lived experiences of the author as an individual but also his community fated with multiple marginalities. The ongoing struggle and suffering of Dalits written by the author trace out a wrongly described and misrepresented history of Dalit community and also critiques caste system as too nefarious and racist in nature. Valmiki’s writing is a deep urge for Dalit community to form their perspective, agency and identities of ‘dalitness’ irrespective of the shared idea of sympathy with them. The paper is mediated by its own theory of ‘dalitness’ and infused with a distinct yardstick mediated with subaltern study. Valmiki comes out with some underlined issues as Resistance Literature, Records of pain and oppressions of Dalit Community through this autobiography. The paper also nurtures interest to have dialogues on Dalit literature and spread its social content worldwide.
Keywords: Caste, Dalits, Dalitness, Resistance literature and Marginalities
Introduction
Academicians, scholars and activists always communicated to the system with the idea of shaping, critiquing, accepting and rejecting what it deserves. The paper is concerned with the contributions of the scholars who gave dissent and resistance in their theories and practices against cunning tradition, inhuman practices and overall oddities and always stood with unprivileged and marginalised for equality, liberty and fraternity across the world. The voices of some great figures of the past are adorable for their revolutions and are highly remembered for their historical changes and betterment of the society. In this regard, we remember Voltaire, Rousseau, Marx, Lenin, Luther, Fanon, Gandhi, Mandela and Dr. Ambedkar and timeless revolutions to settle the trouble of time. Those revolutions are still remembered for timeless struggle. Of course, the revolutions can be highlighted for the battle against the Class system across the world and the Caste system especially in India. Common people also stood side by side to be present with the voice of those revolutionary figures. The way, the whole world fought against the class system, India is still battling against the Caste system. Caste system sprouted in the imposition of homogenisation of identities and divide and rule theory under Brahminical/feudal/Elite society.
Our society has an insane practice to the subject of purity and impurity that also corresponds to the western form of class or race system. By the time, it has poisoned the mind of people and spread hostility within society. The politics of hatred bifurcated and rifted social mixup in terms of sphere, culture and practices. Our identity and existence are defined by the caste indicators in Indian. We deserve to be awarded and punished by the keeping the indicator of the caste. Caste discrimination is always justified while the judgement passes to the individual. Nonetheless, our constitution protects for equality and fraternity and instructs us to say no for the caste system, but our thought procedure has been shaped to be biased and preoccupied with discrimination to the caste system from learning at home.
So many years have passed and several laws have been implemented but people have not changed their mindset towards the caste system. Still we come across chaos, rape, deprivation, parading a Dalit girl naked, gazing Dalit women as sexual commodities, burning of Dalit basti and all sort of atrocities and madness persecuted on Dalit community. It still exists in our society because it is backed up by the Varnashram dharma. In reaction to above mentioned inhumanity, Dalit Literature emerged as the literature of resistance and records of their painful history. This new trend of writing came into the larger picture during 1960s and 70s in different genres of its own literature. Dalit and no-dalit writers critiqued the caste system prevalent in society through their own way of representation. This literature of margin is celebrated by Dalit and non-dalit Poets, writers and activists in smashing the issues of caste oppression, Untouchability, poverty, repression and some other forms of repressions on Dalits in the past and even at the present.
To define Dalit literature, it can be extensively discussed that it is a literature of broken, neglected, humiliated and oppressed people religiously, socioeconomically and politically; it compiles and narrates painful experiences, battle against a cancerous ideology like caste system, years of silence and insensitive people towards victims, homeless and destitute. Sharatchandra Muktibodh in his essay defines Dalit Literature: “Dalit Literature is the literature produced by the Dalit consciousness. Human freedom is the inspiration behind it. That is its implied value. The nature of this literature consists in a rebellin against the suppression and humiliation suffered by the Dalits in the past and even at present-in the framework of the varna system...” (Muktibodh 267). It is literature of lived experience of pain of Dalits rather poverty and suffering of individuals. Pains and poverty of individuals might be there with non-dalits but it is not with Masses at all. So far as Dalits are concerned, it must be said that they are poor because they are Dalits. As a matter of fact, their content is essentially social and diagnosis of social reality. It is very important that Dalit scholars must have their own point of view as Muktibodh says: “The Dalit sensibility shows deep concern for the Dalit point of view and an outstanding work of Dalit literature would be born only when Dalit life would present itself from the Dalit point of view”(267). Since the larger population in Indian society is following Varna-system, they have accepted the pathetic condition of Dalits as inherent. Limbale writes in Towards an Aesthetic of Dalit Literature: History, Controversies and Considerations: “Indian literary history and theory, as well as the teaching of Indian literatures, are spectacularly silent about Dalit literature. Yet, Dalit cultural and critical productions make a significant critical intervention in the thinking and writing about Indian society, history, culture and literature.” (Limbale 1). It is true that Dalit literature is a literature of social consciousness and revolution to subvert the literature that incorporates racial distinction, punishment for broken and formulate a theme of Untouchability.
This awareness in fact asks for equality, freedom and demands for egalitarian society. It also teaches and strikes the inner acceptability of actual readers and respond to the reflectiveness of swarna theoretical scholars who have been busy and sparing their time in just giving allegations and sheer mockery to Dalits and Dalit literature. Valmiki in his autobiography Joothan writes: “we need an ongoing struggle, and a consciousness of struggle, a consciousness that brings revolutionary change both in the outside word and in our hearts, a consciousness that leads the process of social change.”(x) Valmiki is specifically meant here that Dalit literature is not mere just compiling narratives to enlarge readership but it is an ongoing project of human liberation and revolutionary change in the heart of their own people and also in the heart swarna people. For Dalits, Dalit autobiography has been important device to correspond to society regarding their wretched and painful conditions. Dalits autobiography is vital approach to narrate Dalit experience to upper caste people because they have visceral impact on them in writing the burden of caste identity of two thousand years
Objectives of the Study
This paper aim to cover the following objectives:-
- To understand the purpose and meaning of Dalit Literature
- To overview multiple oppressions such verbal and physical violence and mechanism for deprival
- To analyse the need of ‘dalitness’ and Resistance
- To Examine the hypocrisy in social reformation
Research Methodology
The research paper is explanatory in nature. It critically examines narratives of pain, resistance and identity of Dalits on the basis of information, derived from secondary sources i.e. books, journals, magazines, published articles and websites.
Review of Literature
Mukherjee, Arun Prabha, Joothan (2007) writes that Joothan is one among a body of dalit writing that is unified by an ideology, an agenda, and a literary aesthetic. It provides an apt introduction to this newly emerging school of writing that is not just a school of writing but that sees itself as part of a social movement for equality and justice.
Deeksha Sharma in the book review of Joothan (Internal Feminism - Desi Style May 27, 2021) states that Om Prakash Valmiki’s autobiographical account Joothan highlights that untouchability was practised by the educators, educated – like minded upper caste people, and his relatives belonging to same community. Through Joothan, he reveals that the instances of violence caused due to caste system remains etched around throughout one’s life.
Mohd. Asaduddin on Valmiki, Joothan: an Untouchable’ Life (H-Asia, H-Net Reviews. April) says in his review that in Joothan, Omprakash Valmiki deals with the issue of humiliation meted out to the Dalits by India society, no matter where they lives. This humiliation stems from the fact that Dalit inferiority has gotten embedded in the psyche of the upper caste, the members of which have developed an extraordinary repertoire of idioms, symbols, and gestures of verbal and physical denigration of the Dalits over centuries. It is embedded in the literary and artistic imagination and sensibility of the upper caste. Even the Hindu epics, the Ramayana and the Mahabharata, are replete with examples of this denigration where the ‘shudras’ and the ‘chandalas’ are shown to be treated as less than human. Dalit writers feel that the mainstream literature in Sanskrit and many other Indian languages foster these built-in assumptions of Dalit inferiority and thus they need be critiqued, subverted and deconstructed.
Mohan, Anjaly in the research article published in IJELLH (August 2014) comments on Joothan: The pain and humiliation of those bitter experiences in life could be communicated with their authenticity and immediacy only in a language and style which openly questioned and subverted the conventional aesthetic canons and frameworks.
To have description of purpose and meaning of Dalit Literature, it appears to be a long journey to history and multiples cultural poetics because the root of Dalit Literature is too deep. It becomes essential to revisit and voice for Dalit history and literature that talks about equality, liberty, fraternity and justice and human literature as well rejecting all sort of inequalities and discriminations in the name of caste. Dalit literature fights with strong psychological commitment in order to settle their lives and history at right. The conflict begins from the ancient time when Manu had legalised the caste system and conceptualised it as divine rule in the religious text, Manusmriti. The coded rule carried a foolish mechanism to rule over Dalits and served intelligent interest for Brahmins. Christophe Jaffrelot depicts a pyramidical structure of the coded rule as it is stated “…The formula of equating different classes to the different parts of the body of the creator has this advantage. … The Brahmin is equated to the mouth of the Creator. Mouth being the noblest part of the anatomy, the Brahmin becomes the noblest of the four classes. As he is the noblest of the scale, he is given the noblest function, that of custodian of knowledge and learning. The Kshatriya is equated to the arms of the Creator. …. The Vaishya is equated to the thighs of the Creator. …The Shudra is equated to the feet of the Creator. The feet form the lowest and the most ignoble part of the human frame. Accordingly, the Shudra is placed last in the social order and is given the filthiest function, namely to serve as a menial.” (Jaffrelot 34-35) Though, this rule is deliberate and unnatural, unfortunately people still follow the above. The purpose and meaning of this literature is precisely to get liberation from the burden of the caste identity and fight for equality. In broader context, it also fights against unemployment, poverty, communal conflict, the din of Hindutva forces and various injustices. Limbale says: “Dalit literature, I mean writing about Dalits by Dalit writers with a Dalit consciousness. The form of Dalit literature is inherent in its Dalitness, and its purpose is obvious: to inform Dalit society of its slavery, and narrate its pain and suffering to upper caste Hindus.” (Limbale 19) He precisely states that a Dalit Life is meant to have equality, liberty, and dignity and other form of justices that is the meaning and total revolution of Dalit Literature.
Oppressions and marginalities of Dalits can be analysed at multiple levels, all cannot be presented figuratively. If some may be in few figures, but many are unreported and untold due to the feudal system but all those untold ones are narrated through experiences in their autobiographies. In this regard, Valmiki also defines Dalits in his autobiography Joothan: “Dalit life is excruciatingly painful, charred by experiences. Experiences that did not manage to find room in literary creations” (Joothan vii). He expresses a deep concern over social and political repression of Dalit Community by state and elite class machinery. Dalits could have been more talented and more constructive to society, if they had been given socio-political uplift and empowerment. Living in the dungeon of humiliation and oppression, they could not build up their creative faculty for their own representation, art and activism. Since their content is essentially social and diagnosis of social reality, it is very important that Dalit scholars must have their own point of view. Muktibodh writes for Dalit point of view that is quite essential: “The Dalit sensibility shows deep concern for the Dalit point of view and an outstanding work of Dalit literature would be born only when Dalit life would present itself from the Dalit point of view.”(Muktibodh 267) He is meant that they must have their own agencies to speak, write and share to the world. Swarna agenda have been directly and indirectly active to forge their deliberate target and to make them remain at their own places broken, unvoiced and submissive.
Valmiki shares painful experience regarding shattered life and poverty. His community i.e. Chuhra community cannot survive if they don’t earn wages daily. Finding employment is a big challenge for them because even government and non-government institutions are not untouched by caste chauvinism. Even different sources of employability is under the control of feudal class, landowners and elite people; they treat dalits their slaves and impose them only menial jobs due to their caste identity. Valmiki highlights the exploitations of his community in the field. They had to go to landowners for harvesting or cutting the sheaves in the heat of the day and rain, after evening they came back in the weary way with some wages of ‘joothan’ and unpaid as well. Valmiki describes: “The sun pouring on your head. Fiery hot ground underneath. The roots of the cropped wheat plants pricked upon feet like spikes. ..… The leaves are sour and stick all over the body during harvesting. Even bathing does bit get rid of them” (5-6). He transforms his literary faculty into pictorial language through which he mentions the poor condition of his own people working in the field. They lived such empty stomach life from generation to generation and spared collecting their ‘joothan’ and mercy bred wages from the landowners.
He shares one incident and weeps bitterly for casteist comment for his family and entire community when went to school: “‘Abey, Chuhreka, he has come dressed in new clothes.’ If one went wearing old and shabby clothes, then they said, ‘Abey, Chuhreke, get away from me, you stink.’”(3) Verbal and physical violence was commonly perpetuated by high caste students including teachers on Valmiki. Ignoring Tyagis’ children was supposed to be a crime. They used to wait for opportunity of negligence done by Valmiki and his friends so that they could inflict atrocities and beat them. Once they got the same opportunity and moved to thrash and beat Sukham Singh and Valmiki himself.
The autobiography produces Dalit literature as a discourse of resistance in the form of the resistance done of the mother of Valmiki. Though the resistance is symbolic but it carries a wide significance in the context of Dalit resistance literature. Limbale defines: “Dalit literature is precisely that literature which artistically portrays the sorrows, tribulation, slavery, degradation, ridicule and poverty endured by Dalits. This literature is but a lofty image of grief.” (30) Such a situation of grief, poverty and resistance as well described in one of the episodes of the text when the mother of Valmiki goes to collect ‘joothan’ at Sukhdev Singh Tyagi’s home. It was the occasion of the marriage of Sukhdev Singh Tyagi, a landlord and upper caste man of the area, the mother works a lot to the best of her capacity just to give dignity to the name of Sukhdev Singh Tyagi and her daughter. Now, after getting enervated from the exhaustive work, she wishes to come back home with some ‘joothan’. But collecting ‘joothan’ by the mother, it creates an envy to Tyagi, he cannot digest that a Dalit woman can have so much food. He cannot digest a Dalit woman with sufficient food. It has become a mindset of Brahmins to push the existence of Dalit lives into troubled and chaotic situation; perhaps, it can produce pleasure for them because it is guided by Manusmriti. He shouted with terrific shrieking, sound and fury as if she had done some capital offence. Such indignity and insult cannot be tolerated by her, she knows that on this earth, one must live with liberty and dignity. The treatment was beyond her capacity to tolerate such language and abuse, she overturned a basket, full of ‘joothan’. In this way, she has shown her defiance, resistance and responded to him with the same fury. This particular scene is directly depicted by the writer as the discourse of resistance in Dalit literature.
Valmiki critiques the hypocrisy of teacher whose job is to do reform act irrespective of caste, religion and territory but teachers in Valmiki’s life treated him with partiality and hatred. The narrative describes the terrible condition with Sukham Singh who had got a boil on his belly, it was an extremely painful to be there in the classroom and sit properly. By the way, he used to keep his shirt uncovered so that the boil could remain untouched and also the clothes could be saved from the puss. One day, a teacher hit the boil; he shrieked with pain and the boil got burst. After this incident, Valmiki got terrified and felt insecure to be alive. The teacher was alleging and abusing him instead of settling the issue and consoling the young Valmiki. Valmiki got the image of a teacher as monster and oppressor who took pleasure from the pain of students and hunter who hunted students for identity of their caste. As he writes: “The ideal image of the teachers that I saw in my childhood has remained indelibly imprinted in my memory. Whenever someone starts talking about a guru, I remember all those teachers who used to swear about mothers and sisters. They used to fondle good looking boys and invite them to their homes and sexually abuse them.” (4) Valmiki saw teacher as scapegoat who wanted to build the unshakable foundation of Brahmin society and its education. For them, Dalits job is to cleanse the field and latrine room of the school campus. Valmiki comes across such bestiality of the teacher as he writes:
“One day the head master Kaliram called me to his room and asked:
‘Abey, what is your name?’
Omprakash, I answered slowly and fearfully. Children used to feel scared just encountering the headmaster. The entire school was terrified of him.
‘Chuhreka?’ Headmaster threw his second question at me.’
‘Ji.’
‘All right… See that teak tree there? Go. Climb tat tree. Break some twigs and make a broom. And sweep the whole school clean as a mirror. It is, after all, your family occupation. What is your name?” (4)
As Valmiki cleaned the room of the headmaster, he was ordered to clean the whole ground. It was beyond the capacity of the baby Valmiki. As he cleaned the whole ground, he got the body ache to death. It was really a deadly day to Valmiki. But the very next day, he ran for the school with a new hope for learning, he got the same situation. Just entering into classroom, he was attacked by the verbal violence given by the loud roaring of the headmaster: “Abey Chuhre Ke, mother fucker, where are you hiding………..your mother….” (5) Just listening to this loud voice of the headmaster, Valmiki got threatened and stood with a body without blood. One of his classmates informed that he was sitting on the back bench, here the master came and grabbed his neck as a wolf grabs a lamb by the neck, he was dragged out of the classroom and thrown out on the ground. He was harassed with strong shouting; “Go and sweep the whole playground…otherwise I will shove chilies up your arse and throw you out of the school.” (5) He began to sweep the whole ground as it was considered as their duty. He sobbed not because what the physical torture was inflicted over him but a Dalit unfortunately would not take the bliss of education. After this disappointed lines, Valmiki’s father visited to the school and got shocked by the pathetic condition of his child; he asked that you had been sent to school to get education not for the job of sweeping the field of the school and classrooms? Valmiki’s father got ablaze with wrath and put a strong threat and protested like his own wife who threw her basket full of Joothan to Tyagi. He shouted, “who is the teacher, that the progeny of Dronacharya, who forces my son to sweep?” (6) Valmiki for the first time saw his father very strong and courageous. Though, the headmaster wanted to put Valmiki’s father down, it did not make any effect on him. Valmiki’s father thought that if he did not teach today, in the future, the door for Dalits would be closed. The headmaster Kaliram roared, “Take him away from here…..The Chuhra wants him educated… Go, go…..I will have your bones broken”. (6) The father challenges the headmaster that since you are a teacher, so I am leaving you, but let me take the word that my son will be here for the study and there will be many more coming to school as Dalit students.
Conclusion
The autobiography, Joothan - A Dalit’s Life is the documentation of suffering, burden and oppression suffered by Valmiki himself. It is a text of a lived experience of Valmiki as a growing child and also a voice against the oppressive caste system in our society. He too critiques how the education system is handled by casteist teachers and they don’t want dalits to be educated and competent. Untouchability is the best instrument to keep Dalits away from opportunities and bliss of education. Valmiki resists and fights for his write-up and proves this genre carries a visceral impact upon Dalits. For sociological and literary consciousness, he appeals his people and readers to the wider acceptability of Dalit literature. Valmiki urges “Dalit writers should write autobiographies so that not only our history will stay alive, but also our true portrayals of wrongdoers. Dalit autobiographies will provide inspiration to our future generation” (Valmiki xxviii). He struggles a lot to say his words and achieve honour. Still Valmiki’s society is at an on-going fight for a just and egalitarian society.
References
- Jaffrelot, Christophe. Analysing and Fighting Caste: Dr. Ambedkar and Untouchability. Delhi: Permanent Black; 2005.
- Limbale, Sharankumar. Towards an Aesthetic of Dalit Literature. Tr. Alok Mukherjee. Kolkata: Orient Black Swan; 2010.
- Muktibodh, Sharatchandra. “What is Dalit Literature.” in Poison Bread. Edited by Arjun Dangle. Hyderabad: Orient Longman; 1992.
- Valmiki, Omprakash. “Joothan: A Dalit’s Life.” tr. Arun Prabha Mukherjee. Kolkata: Samya; 2007.
