Voicing the Silence: Swayam Prakash’s women centered stories
A reading of Swayam Prakash’s women – centered stories show that the writer rises above the division of sexes, liberates himself from the chains of social conventions, overthrows cultural obstacles and writes about women. There is a deliberate and conscious leaning towards women’s issues. Woman is projected with all her fears, anxieties, insecurities, vulnerabilities, limitations, dependence, pains, and powerlessness. And although the focus is on women, Swayam Prakash succeeds in raising a number of disturbing issues.
Written in a deceptively simple manner Swayam Prakash’s ‘Ek Khoobsurat Ghar’ (A Beautiful Home) is a forceful comment on the patriarchal structure of our society. The woman has a secondary status and her life is limited to the four walls of her house and the needs of the people within it. The woman relates to the outside world through her men and is governed by their positions.
In this traditional setup a woman’s life revolves around the husband. He is the centre of her universe. And for him she sacrifices and gradually erases herself. The story is laced with a subtle irony. The house is a prison where the father acts as police, as judge, as watchman, as commander-in-chief. Everything significant is done by the father and nobody dares to oppose him or go against his likes/dislikes. Even the children are in awe of the father and find security in his being/presence.
On the other hand the woman’s work/role goes unnoticed, is considered insignificant. Swayam Prakash expresses the ironical paradox of a woman’s life – the woman works tirelessly to make a beautiful and comfortable home yet is not credited for anything. Her work and efforts are invisible. They are taken for granted. And this results in immense exhaustion of the heart and mind.
The patriarchal control and the female dependence are so strong that when the husband is delayed one evening, it causes a storm in the woman’s heart. She feels handicapped, helpless, is assailed by innumerable fears, and is not able to imagine her life without his reassuring presence. But when the husband returns, the storm within her breast does not burst out. It is buried within – ‘Mother did not say anything and went into the kitchen’.
The story ‘Manju Faltu’ describes a woman who becomes redundant. She immerses herself in her household duties and looses her contemporariness. The story showcases how it is a woman who has to compulsorily take on the upbringing of children. It is she who is expected to and has to stifle her desires, give up her job and look after the home and kids. Her involvement with these usually makes her a stranger to the outside world. When the children have grown up and do not need her anymore, she finds that the world has changed a lot and she does not fit into it anymore.
She desperately tries to regain her old, confident self, but time has slipped out of her hands. Her efforts to ‘update’ herself make her a butt of ridicule both at home and outside. And when the sense of failure finally drives home, she is on the verge of a mental breakdown. The story reflects the writer’s concern over the rapid progress which is not only making things but also people ‘obsolete’.
The story ‘Teesri Chithi’ (Third Letter) has a related theme. Here, too, the writer shows how the fast changing technology is making a whole generation of people – futile. This has its repercussions on their families and ultimately society. The writer’s criticism of the decline of moral values in the middle class society is apparent in the behavior and vacuous conversation of the four young men. They have a shallow, non-serious, irresponsible attitude towards everything. The story initially resounds with their frivolous laughter. To build up a contrast, the writer gives a poignant account of a desperate woman who is single not by choice but circumstance. She is looking for escape from her hounded situation through marriage or ultimately suicide.
The story ‘Agale Janam’ (Next Birth), presents a detailed and revealing picture of an agonizing woman during childbirth. It shocks because it exposes too much and more because it is written by a man. The story mirrors an ugly reality of the Indian society where only the birth of baby boy calls for celebration and the birth of a baby girl is mourned. The social conditioning is so strong that women more than men crave and feel fulfilled after a son’s birth.
The insensitivity of a woman towards another woman’s pain is seen in the mother-in-law’s reaction after Sumi, her daughter in law gives birth to a girl child. The husband’s response is the height of male chauvinism. He actually doubts the wives loyalty. The idea that only sons are born in their family is so deep rooted that he feels disgraced. Nobody rejoices in the birth of a new-life, not even the mother. The indifference of her family members makes Sumi turn her face away from her new-born baby. This turning away and the curse ‘go die’ is not a rejection of the girl child but of what the future holds for her. Sumi is not prepared for motherhood so soon after her marriage but she soon realizes that she has no say in the matter- it is her duty to bear a child as soon as possible.
The writer is laying bare the very social structure of the society which not only refuses a woman, a right over her own body but also blinds and benumbs itself to the pain and suffering a woman undergoes while delivering a child.
The character of ‘Ladki’ (Girl) in the story ‘Bali’(Sacrifice) initially offeres some hope. The reader is surprised to see a ‘resisting’ female character – a character that can see through the mirage of development, which cherishes her own tribal life, who revels in her freedom, who consciously tries to adapt to the so – called civilized society, to prove that the tribal people are nowhere inferior to them. She does all this because she wants to be treated as a human being and not as an uncivilized, barbarous creature. She is determined to go back to her native place the day her mistress begins to treat her as an equal. She actually feels richer and more fortunate than her employers as they have not experienced the beauty, colour , fragrance, feel of the natural world.
The suicide of such a sensitive and strong woman character at the end of the story jolts the reader. She gives in to the circumstances when she belongs nowhere. All her rebellion and resistance come to an end. We are left with the question: Why this had to happen? Why couldn’t the girl have lived after such a struggle?
But the writer would not have been able to shake the reader out of his complacency. Through the portrayal of the girl who is any woman and everywoman, Swayam Prakash is covering a whole gamut of issues – impact of industrialization/ urbanization/ modernization on tribal social life- uprooting a whole culture- the invasion of the culture of money and materialism- growth of poverty-man’s domination over woman’s body and life- indifference of parents, especially in the lower strata of society. The story ‘Bali’ puts a question mark on the whole idea of development as it is at the cost of one’s roots, culture, traditions, moral and social values, self-sufficiency.
All these stories are multilayered and incorporate a variety of themes and ideas. They reflect the writer’s perception, engagement and protest with a number of social and political issues. He voices the silence of the weak and the downtrodden. He deconstructs the notion that only women can write about women. Swayam Prakash successfully articulates women’s oppression in the patriarchal system, questions the restricted space allowed to her, her exclusion and impoverishment in the social system. The writer presents the reality of female life and evokes a response from the reader.
(Swayam Prakash is an Indian short story writer and novelist. He writes in Hindi)