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Is there any logic in banning books? What is 'offensive', and who decides it is? A look at The Adivasi Will Not Dance by Hansda Sowvendra Shekhar.
Is there any logic in banning books? What is ‘offensive’, and who decides it is? A look at The Adivasi Will Not Dance by Hansda Sowvendra Shekhar.
The reason the book intrigued me was the fact that it was banned due to “political” reasons in Jharkhand. The offended lot, who incidentally were Santhal people themselves, said that the Santhal women have been wrongly portrayed, that some details are even “pornographic” in nature. The author was suspended from his position of a medical officer for writing this book, for writing what he felt about his own culture.
Yes, the writer is an Adivasi himself from the Santhal tribe. Who can tell the world about his own tribe other than the person living and breathing it all the time? I found the ban and the suspension strange. So I decided to do what I do fairly okayish. Read and analyze what might have gone wrong.
Yes, the book is disturbing in some places. Especially the story in question, “November is for Migration”. This was the story that irked all who were offended. The portrayal is as raw as raw could go. I flinched. Cried a few tears as well.
But you know what I found the strangest? This wasn’t really a story of one Santhal woman or even sex/porn. It was a story of extreme poverty. It was a story of trying to get two pakoras to feed a hungry stomach. The meaning of “survival” laid bare without any unnecessary sheens of tact. While we sit in our cemented houses and do not give a second thought before wasting that extra pakora off, this is a story of a woman who was hungry for quite a while, and decided to do what she has been told she does the best.
The strange thing is, clearly everyone from the offended lot decided to ignore the hunger and desperation and chose to focus on the sex part of it. This brings us to the heavier question – morality or survival? And no, let us not attempt answering that question unless we have been really hungry till our bones ache and we still have chosen morality despite death looming over our heads.
I believe such books should be written, for if no one shows the world the ugly truth that other humans are being subjected to, nothing would change.
I also gave a thought as to who has the right to be offended. The people about whom the book is written, yes. Offence should be taken, else there is no learning. But offence unfortunately is taken to remain stubbornly regressive and that is disconcerting. If things weren’t written about Sati in the past, we would still have wives burning at the pyre of their husbands. Someone who witnessed this, took offence and decided to turn things around.
There are other stories in the book too. It is a compilation of short stories and there are some brilliantly liberating short stories as well. The story that tore my heart up was about a woman who was ostracized by her own sons as a “dahini” or a witch. Brutality knows no bounds when one is blinded by superstition.
It is an introduction to tribal life for the novices like me who have been gorging on our privileges quite unconsciously. I would recommend the book as a must read because a peep into the lives of those who were born on the wrong side of the caste structure is the need of the day.
Published here earlier.
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Neena was the sole caregiver of Amma and though one would think that Amma was dependent on her, Neena felt otherwise.
Neena inhaled the aroma that emanated from the pan and took a deep breath. The aroma of cumin interspersed with butter transported her back to the modest kitchen in her native village. She could picture her father standing in the kitchen wearing his white crisp kurta as he made delectable concoctions for his only daughter.
Neena grew up in a home where both her parents worked together in tandem to keep the house up and running. She had a blissful childhood in her modest two-room house. The house was small but every nook and cranny gave her memories of a lifetime. Neena’s young heart imagined that her life would follow the same cheerful course. But how wrong she was!
When she was sixteen, the catastrophic clutches of destiny snatched away her parents. They passed away in a road accident and Neena was devastated. Relatives thronged her now gloomy house and soon it was decided that she should be married off.
Women today don’t want to be in a partnership that complicates their lives further. They need an equal partner with whom they can figure out life as a team, playing by each other’s strengths.
We all are familiar with that one annoying aunty who is more interested in our marital status than in the dessert counter at a wedding. But these aunties have somehow become obsolete now. Now they are replaced by men we have in our lives. Friends, family, and even work colleagues. It’s the men who are worried about why we are not saying yes to one among their clans. What is wrong with us? Aren’t we scared of dying alone? Like them?
A recent interaction with a guy friend of mine turned sour when he lectured me about how I would regret not getting married at the right time. He lectured that every event in our lives needs to be completed within a certain timeframe set by society else we are doomed. I wasn’t angry. I was just disappointed to realize that annoying aunties are rapidly doubling in our society. And they don’t just appear at weddings or family functions anymore. They are everywhere. They are the real pandemic.
Let’s examine this a little closer.
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