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ISSN: 0974-892X

VOL. IV
ISSUE II

July, 2010

 

 

Manvi Agarwal

Excerpts from the personal interview with Mahasweta Devi on 12.2.2008

I: Good evening Mam, myself Manvi Agarwal, I am a research scholar; researching on your few novels like Rudali, Mother of 1084, The Glory of Sri Sri Ganesh, After Kurukshetra, Bedanabala.  Can I ask you some questions?
M.D:  Yes, Sure.

I:   From where have you got the plots of your novels?
M.D: I was just explaining it a few days ago to someone that I have never gone through sick of Marx, or Lenin. I have read plainly history, sociology, just like that. More important is that I have gone to people. I have been going to the people for many-many years. You might say… from the end of 60’s… anyway. So all these books are rooted in the people, from what I have seen about people, what I read about them, what I learnt about them, just like that.

I: While you were writing ‘Mother of 1084’ novel, basically what was in your mind: Sujata’s character or Naxalite Movement?
M.D: ‘Mother of 1084’ was written in the background of 70’s Calcutta. That time at Calcutta so many naxalites were killed all over Calcutta. I remember I was going to villages all the time. So one day I still remember the young boys came, they didn’t enter my house; they stood outside the veranda and told me “You are writing about the villages in the rural context…. Who will write about us? We are being killed on the streets all the time.” It was true, it was true, that in 70’s plenty Naxalite boys were killed over the streets here and there, here and there all over, out of that, the time also very upsetting, very moving. Everything together, street like this.

I: What is the basic reason for characterization of Sujata?
M.D: There are so many Sujatas, so many Bratis. It happened when I wrote ‘Mother of 1084’. I lived by writing so it was the puja time, I wrote this ‘Hajar Churasi ki Ma’ in Bengali. After it came out so the book was published so many women came to me and said, “How can you write about my son?”  There were so many women who had lost their sons.

I: You have said that what you have seen, you have written that in your novels
M.D: No, No, It’s not like that, what I have seen, I had written, what I have seen, I didn’t write that. I write it more from what I feel, I wrote about the worries of the people.
I: What do you think that in ‘After Kurukshetra’ the main reason was the suffering of Nishadin and others?
M.D: ‘Nahi, Nahi’, I just removed some stories from that. I have in the mind to write many more- more stories. I wrote Draupadi.

I: What is the main reason of Sanichari’s sufferings?
M.D: It is simple; I have seen in Calcutta burning corpses also when someone rich dies. They actually hire mourners who beat their chests and weep loudly. Apart from that they get rice, they get money, and they get food, things like that. Because I have seen their houses. Among common people when someone dies, you see mother is beating her chest, cries loud and it goes up. But when rich man dies, they hire mourners, things like that.

I:  Sanichari was a woman, that’s why she suffers a lot?
M.D: No, No. That’s a profession, they are the professional mourners. Because when someone rich dies, they have no other option of income, so they go and beat their chest and weep loudly, Things like that, the great show of grief, you know! They get rice, they get money, and they get clothes. It is the way of living. Living matters most, how to live, how to eat.

I:  As Ganesh is always considered as a symbol of ‘goodness’ but in ‘Glory of Sri Sri Ganesh…?
M.D: Ganesh is Ganesh. Sri Sri Ganesh Mahima. You understand the word ‘Mahima’, ‘Glory’?

I: But ‘Mahima’ is a word which always looks in positive sense, but here ‘Mahima’ means some bad character?
M.D:  ‘Uski mahima yahi hai, Isme wo ek aurut ki life haram kar deta hai na’? It was only this evilness. It’s positive, very positive.

I: ‘Evilness’, was positive?
M.D: Yes, why not! Is it, Ganesh continuing this story……….  Written by caste prejudice how that upper caste owning much land, having property class….??

I: In ‘Bedanabala’ you just want to show that the prostitutes should be given another chance to come in the society again?
M.D: Let them be free… why jack a prostitute, because prostitution is also a profession. In Calcutta there are many strong organizations moving about. Try more organizations. They also get organized. They have their own rights. Just like that.

I: Basically in Bedanabala, you have shown the main reason of becoming a prostitute. i.e. some sort of poverty or troubles of woman, that’s why she becomes a prostitute, that’s why she could get another chance to come in society?
M.D:  She could have another chance… In common people women who come to work and are in service,  are very sharp, very intelligent; given a chance of education they could have much. We find such human beings around us.

I: Are you a feminist?
M.D: I am not a so-called feminist… I have no idea why you people have thought so. It’s up to you.

I: In most of the novels which you have written about woman, you have taken the feminist perspective, you have shown how this is the male dominating society?
M.D: Society remains male-dominating. What can I do?....I have no idea why you people are researching on my works. It’s up to you, you have read women based novel, not another, that’s a difference.

I: Have you written about human beings or human sufferings?
M.D: I have not always written about sufferings alone. I have written about many types of human beings.

I: Right now are you doing some social work?
M.D: Yes, yes, I do not know any social worker; I am a social and I am working.

I: What is your message for us? For young students?
M.D: No message…. Be yourself. Act independently.

I: What about communist? Are you inspired by that?
M.D: You see, at my age, there is no one to be inspired… at that time there was a CPIM the party.

I: Have you found any difference from this? ‘After Kurukshetra” is the story of near about 5000 year back. Do you find some change in the position of women of the past and of the modern times?
M.D: Oh! Whatever happened at that time, whatever happened before is going on, types have changed differently.  So many laws are made, so many good acts made; nothing made is enacted, but still all India suffers from hunger, from starvation, from exploitation, no education for the poor. Nothing is happening which didn’t happen before.