SHANTIES AND THE CITY

The sprouting of slums is concomitant with the development of small and big cities. The slums are appalling and they stand as a sore thumb on the seemingly beautiful, developed landscape of our cities: the glass and sparkling steel against a clear blue sky. We extrapolate the degree of development and progress from the height of the skyscrapers and other markers of wealth and prosperity are the basis for our claims of a progressive and happy nation. But in all of these eulogistic discourses of how India is progressing, we overlook (or give superficial attention to) the millions of poor in the rural hinterlands and the slums of the city.

            Delia Maria Knaebel, the Pune-based researcher and activist who has some roots in Goa, is the author of a self-published book – a novel to be precise – set in Chavanagar, a slum in Pune. Delia personally handed me a copy of her book when I met her a few months ago in Pune and also confided in me that the book was primarily published to help other social workers and NGOs working to alleviate the problems of the slum dwellers, particularly the issues concerning women. In the foreword of her novel Delia says, “This novel depicts what it was in the India of 80s and 90s for a woman living in an urban slum. This is told through the story of Lata, a woman who faces multiple oppressions; poverty, handicap, caste, colour prejudice and discrimination, both domestic and in the working (sic) place. There are thousands of such women in the country whose stories are similar but have not been written.”

            Many of the women of Chavanagar work as domestic help in middle-class flats/bungalows where the mistresses are very exploitative and unyielding. “In many ways the middle classes were more communal minded than the poor, though many labeled them backward as (sic) narrow-minded,” Delia informs when she talks about the encounters of slum women with middle class women. Along with the main characters – Lata and Tara – this novel also tries to weave the stories of other women whose lives cross paths with the central characters.

There is a genuine concern that Delia has for the slum dwelling women and certainly, her voice is valuable. However, this is Delia’s first book and that too self-published and hence in the writing and presentation this book does reflect a certain rawness.

           Though it is claimed that Lata is the protagonist of the novel, her role is just marginal in the novel. Lata, the protagonist and her sympathetic middle-class friend, Tara themselves flit in and out of the book. Tara and Lata take an active part in an NGO working for the slum-dwelling women but we are not told anything about Tara’s background and the reasons that move her to sympathy for the slum dwelling women. In trying to pack as many stories of slum women in the book, the central plot and the flow of narration is lost.

However, if one considers just the story of Lata in isolation, then Delia has done a very good job of crafting this character for there is nothing amiss in her prose. Delia had great scope to develop her characters in greater detail so that the finer subtleties and nuances of what it means to be a low caste slum dweller (and particularly a woman) would be clearer and would also act as a terse political statement against elitist mentalities. Though the point that Delia tries to make is a very valid one and most welcome in terms of the politics of gender, caste and class one cannot help but notice that this point tends to be lost in the pages of the book.

Delia prefers to identify her slum dwelling women as “working class women”. In India, more than our class we are stratified in caste which has a direct bearing on whether we are going to enjoy better life chances or not. My disagreement here is that if a woman is financially and sexually exploited, it is not just because of her position as a woman but a large measure of her oppression would/could result from her caste position. The same happens when the slum-dwelling, low-caste women encounter middle-class women who belong to a particular caste (arguably upper) and who bicker and bargain for every paisa and benefit that the domestic help from the slum ask from their employers.

         The reason why caste needs to be included in the discourse of such subalterns as Delia’s slum-dwelling women who are trapped in a world of poverty, abusive and drunken husbands and exploitative in-laws along with class is because caste is not theorized enough. Bharat Patankar writing for Kafila.org (Caste and Exploitation in Indian History translated by Gail Omvedt) says, “Class has beentheorized extensively in terms of exploitation; to some extent gender also, butnot caste. Exploitation as (sic)women in various forms has also been a reality for thousands of years; thisalso is not through ‘class’. This reality from throughout the world gives ablow to the idea that exploitation can only be class exploitation.”

Rather than a novel Delia could have presented her stories as an anthology of short-stories celebrating the resolute spirit of women oppressed due to financial, sexual and caste exploitation. And before I end, I would like to reiterate something that I have said in the past elsewhere. It is not easy to self-publish a book. My heart and thoughts go out to people like Delia who are engaged in such enterprises. 

The River Weeps: Life and Sexuality in a City Slum by Delia Maria Knaebel (Pune: Self Published), 2011; pp. 153, Rs. 99 [ISBN: 978-81-8465-344-1]

e-mail: shalom2000@rediffmail.com

(A version of this article appeared on Gomantak Times, dt: February 24, 2012)

MANGOES, TOURISM AND OTHER BLAH

We all love the mango. The sweet and succulent meat of the King of Fruits is hard to resist. So when a book titled Mango Mood was spotted in a bookshop in distant Baroda (Gujarat), which contained satirical articles that discussed Goa and which claimed to be like the soft flesh on the outside with a hard core within, it proved very hard for me to resist purchasing it. Though, it took me a few months to actually open and read it!

           Sharmila Kamat, the author of the book, is a very established writer having published in major national and international mastheads as well as Goan publications. But most importantly she is an astrophysicist who “studies the constitution of the Universe, particularly what makes the hidden mass we call dark matter.” Reading through the book, more than the actual essays, I felt I should rather dwell at length on the two introductions to the first and second editions of this book. For one feels that these two introductions can be much more useful to understand Sharmila and her writings than the actual ‘pieces’ themselves.

            Sharmila earnestly tries to move us away from the whole sun-sand-surf-fenni-bikini-hedonism Goa, and as such a major chunk of her book is taken up in discussing tourism. The next major theme is the local politics: the horse-trading that Goa became known for post ’90s as well as the communalism that has seeped in contemporary political life and the docking of the casinos.

           One major problem that I have with everyone and anyone who claim to take us away from the tourism brochure-produced image of Goa is that they themselves, in the bargain, reinforce this image. For instance, Sharmila starts her first edition introduction and many of the essays with the oft-repeated sun-kissed beaches, palm-trees, natural beauty, paradise and such blah-blah-blah. The cover of her book uses a picture of a “sun-kissed” seashore. In other print spaces, the columns and features which try to do the same are, ironically, named “Beachside” or would have pictures of white men and women accompanying the text. Now I do understand that not everything is in the hands of the author, especially when national and multi-national publishers and newsmagazines are concerned where one’s work needs to pass through the hands of many editors. But I digress…

            In this long introduction, Sharmila makes some statements and comments that on one level could have been done away with (or at least written in a smarter way) and at other times these statements and comments could prove highly politically problematic and shows the author’s inability to assess the political situations that she is commenting on. In trying to retell the story (or rather the history) of Goa, Sharmila not surprisingly falls back on the Lord Parashurama myth. I am not comfortable when the authority of brahmanical texts is invoked (even in a lighter vein) and passed as history for the simple reason that they are myths having their own elitist agenda and by no stretch of imagination can they be called history.

            And then, in this retelling of history we come to the time of the Portuguese. “Like all colonial rulers,” Sharmila says, “the Portuguese came uninvited, and then proceeded to dig themselves into the woodwork for the next 451 years.” Nothing could be further away from the truth! Sharmila fails to recognize the complicity of the native upper-caste elite in the colonial projects; be they British or Portuguese. It is through statements like these that the reading and retelling of Goa’s history (which the blurb call pièce de résistance) by Sharmila is very facile. Clearly Sharmila’s book has reached a wider audience than a paper or book on Goan history can ever hope to enjoy such readership. In repeating the same old clichés, myths and images we are not really moving away from a conception and idea of Goa that is very upper-caste, orientalist and biased.

           In the introduction to the second edition, Sharmila talks about the linguistic politics surrounding Konkani. “Around the time of the first edition of the book, they [Goans] were out on the streets protesting against the second-class treatment meted out to the mother tongue of most Goans – Konkani. No sooner was this grave error rectified than the protestors were back on the streets – to hyperventilate over the first class treatment meted out to Konkani,” she says. Again, the issue here is too simplified and too watered down. Protagonists of Konkani (or Konknni/Concani) in the Roman script (who are sometimes branded as anti-nationals, agents of the Portuguese etc. by extremists of the one-script-one-language persuasion) are protesting against the step-motherly treatment meted out to “their” Konkani. Are these the same people who are “hyperventilating” against the “first class treatment meted out to Konkani” or are they somebody else? Whether they are the same people or not, the issue about the complexity and diversity of the linguistic politics of Goa is something that is not reflected in the understanding and conception of Sharmila’s Goa.

            There is one article that I really enjoyed titled “Special Topics in Calamity Physics”. Being a big fan of the American sitcom The Big Bang Theory, and enjoying to the core the remarkably funny moments produced by the use of physical and other scientific references to portray the life of four nerds, I found in the abovementioned article, moments when one could say that the astrophysicist in Sharmila is now really speaking! Coming back to the cover, apart from my complaint that it reinforced the whole “sun-sand-surf…hedonism narrative” of Goa, it is also badly done.

            So henceforth when we talk about Goa – anything about Goa – what do we look for and what do we give our readers and audience? Certainly not the old, anachronistic rubbish. How about something new, something that is – even if we are trying to be funny – boldly iconoclastic?

Mango Mood, 2^nd edn. by Sharmila Kamat (New Delhi: Rupa & Co.), 2011; pp. xli + 166, Rs. 195/- [ISBN: 978-81-291-1722-9]

Web: www.rupapublications.com

(A version of this article appeared on Gomantak Times, dt: January 31, 2012)

AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF STIGMATIZATION AND DISCRIMINATION

India is a diverse country of varied heritage where Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs and Christians live in peace and harmony; this is an oft heard refrain. But did it ever occur to us that in this country there are other identities that are not Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs and Christians? Tribal groups, low castes and host of other subalterns do not fit the broad categorization mentioned above. They are so isolated from us socially and politically that one never has any idea about their existence and their miserable plight. Crushed by grinding poverty and the caste system, their voice barely reaches our cities – big and small – where all the power is concentrated.

            The Branded: Uchalya is the eye-opening autobiography of Laxman Gaikwad, translated from the original Marathi by P A Kolharkar. Gaikwad belongs to the community of Uchalya/Pathruts, a tribe notified by the British Raj as criminal under the Criminal Tribes’ Act, first passed in 1871 (but now denotified). They generally engage in odd jobs that are seasonally available. Due to crushing poverty and the stigma of belonging to a ‘criminal’ community, the tribesmen of Laxman Gaikwad has no choice but to resort to stealing or theft. Gaikwad tells the story of his early life along with the people and the significant others who surrounded and shaped him. Gaikwad prefers his book to be read from a sociological perspective rather than a literary one.

            Gaikwad’s community involved themselves in pick-pocketing because the caste-ridden hierarchy had rejected this group and consigned them to live as animals. Every novitiate ‘thief’ is initiated into the art of stealing. Since a gang member should not reveal his accomplices to the police, a novice is deliberately subjected to severe beatings that make them ‘immune’ to police torture. Gaikwad gives a terrifying picture of such an initiation. The Bharat blade used to cut the pockets is always worshipped like a deity before a thieving expedition because it provided them their livelihood.

            Gaikwad gives a crude and at times graphic description of the pitiable condition that he and his extended family had to endure, the difficulties his family faced to get proper meals and how they were beaten, harassed and hounded and their women molested (generally on false pretense) by the police. Such a description in coarse and crude language of the atrocities caused by the system in which these groups are forced to live would not go down well with people who are used to the luxury of shiny cars and air-conditioned buildings or who are just born in an upper caste family.

            The Pathruts never usually school their wards. So when Gaikwad finds himself in a school because his father believes strongly in education, they both have to face adverse reaction from the family and their community. One thing that struck me about Gaikwad’s schooling experience is that the ‘ideal’ is far removed from (his) ‘reality’. Consider this, “When I used to open the text-book for Marathi, on the first page, I used to see: ‘India is my country…proud of its rich and varied heritage.’ I used to wonder why if all this were true, we were beaten with false allegation of theft…I often wonder why if Bharat is our country, we are discriminated against, why our race is branded and treated as a thieves’ community.”

            While in school, Gaikwad is attracted to bhajans and kirtans and excels in performing them. Participating in these religious functions, the effects of Sanskritization start affecting his mind. “I began to say that eating crabs, fish, pigs every day was a sin. I began to observe Fridays and Saturdays in Shravan month as fasting days,” he says.

            In due course of time, Gaikwad moves to the nearby city of Latur for employment in a textile mill. The urban organization of society, to a certain extent, does not support the rigid patterns of discrimination of the rural areas. Gaikwad says that he, “…remembered the days when I was spurned and even shouted at: ‘Lakshya! Pathruta!’ But here in Latur I was addressed as Laxman Gaikwad and that too by Maratha [upper caste] boys…What was I once, I thought, look at the respect I am getting now!”

            In the textile mill, Gaikwad starts speaking on behalf of his colleagues for better working conditions and wages. As he was used to public speaking right from his school days, he stands up and publicly denounces the mistreatment by the factory management. He gets ‘noticed’ and becomes politically active. All this while, his family is living a hand-to-mouth existence. Money is always short but his idealism to work for the betterment of the oppressed never wavers. Their financial and housing situation is so bad even in Latur that when his father dies he writes, “…his eyes are covered with ants. I brushed away the ants with my hand and closed his eyes.”

            Due to his protests against the factory management (or capitalists) Gaikwad loses his job and has to do many odd jobs wherever he can find them. But when any news reaches his ears about any tribal being harassed (as by now he is an established leader who helps people), he immediately pays a visit and tries to bring about justice and remedy the situation.

            Towards the end of his story, Gaikwad is approached by the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) to contest the Lok Sabha seat. BSP promises him funds and other necessities for campaigning. But the money never pours in. Still, with his loyal supporters Gaikwad hits the campaign trail but there is no food for his campaigners and money to pay the pending bills. Eventually, he decides to lend his support to the Congress candidate. Dejected, he says, “I had learnt my lesson. In this country it is not enough to possess good workers and volunteers to win elections; you must also possess wealth, social prestige and the quality of having been born in one of the higher castes.”

            The overall translation of the book lives up to a fairly good standard. But on some occasions it falls prey to literal translation. The numerous typos in the book could have been corrected considering that this is the third reprint that I read.

            After reading the last line of this engrossing book, I could not help but ask this question: Who stole what? A hapless tribal a pocket or a dominant class/caste the right from a human being to live in dignity?

Name: The Branded: Uchalya

By: Laxman Gaikwad

Translated from the Marathi by: P A Kolharkar

First published: 1998; 2009 (third reprint)

Publisher: Sahitya Akademi

ISBN: 81-260-0486-X

Web: www.sahitya-akademi.gov.in
(A version of this article appeared on Gomantak Times, dt: June 14, 2011)