Dattani’s Politics
In spite of the many challenges that the Indian English playwrights have faced in the past, Mahesh Dattani has managed to carve a niche for himself as a playwright as well as a director. The credit of this acclaim goes to his compassionate treatment of invisible issues of our society, which needs to be brought to limelight so as to make the world a better place to live in, so as to give the marginalized and the underprivileged the rights that are due to them and also the context in which they can enjoy those rights. On the surface of it “Tara” is the story of conjoined twins: Tara and Chandan who have been surgically separated and yet emotionally entwined. As the story unravels, however, it becomes evident that the play is not so much about the twins’ being conjoined but about people and personalities and some important social issues related to them. What the play deals with is the politics of patriarchy as it is being carried out in our society in such a manner that we are unconscious of it and yet we live by it at every moment of our life. What is extremely significant is that what we cannot see with our open eyes, needs to be presented to us on stage so as to have a better view of the same. Mahesh Dattani is making effort to do the same in Tara and thus his politics is very significantly manifest in the play.
MAHESH DATTANI’S POLITICS
We have seen some aspects of Dattani’s politics in the last Unit which discusses the themes of the play Tara. The themes probably have given you a broad parameter to think about the concerns of the dramatist. In this unit, the focus in especially to discuss the political aspects of Dattani’s Tara. 3.3.1 Politics and Literature Politics is usually thought to be a word which is related to the world of governance and also has some negative connotations as it is usually thought that the politicians are corrupt and use their political power to attain things for themselves by depriving common and poor people. It is therefore advised that one should try to be distant from the world of politics. But when one thinks of politics in such a manner, one is looking at a very narrow significance of politics. Politics is not just about what the political leaders do; but everything in this world is political. ‘There is nothing personal, everything is political’ – this has been the motto of the cultural theorists across the world. All personal spaces that we think exist are nothing but manifestation of certain political choices we make. In such circumstances, the choices that a writer or a playwright makes to represent in his or her works are choices that cannot be termed personal as these are political choices. In that sense, every writer makes political choices; but in case of some writers the choices are prominently political as they try to go question the dominant order / ideology of the society so as to assert the newer voices which seeks attention to come to a new world order. It is true that traditions are significant for us; but not all traditions are beneficial for the present times and therefore it is always necessary that we look a closer critical look at the traditions. Some aspects of the tradition may appear to be useful in the present context; while some may appear outdated and rigorously oppressive and suppressive which we need to do away with so as to establish a better social and cultural order. What is required is a critical study of the said 3.3 MAHESH DATTANI’S POLITICS 3.2 UNIT OBJECTIVES 191 | P a g e © Department of Distance & Continuing Education, Campus of Open Learning, School of Open Learning, University of Delhi Introduction to Literary Studies traditions and then do a ‘selective assimilation’ of the same depending on which traditions are worth imbibing in the present context. 3.3.2 Dattani and Traditions There are scholars across the worlds who think that they need to uphold the traditions so as to continue with the cultural heritage and to moreover reestablish and preserve those heritages for the future generation. These scholars blindly follow what is there in the past without questioning their veracity and thus try to perpetuate what is being inherited by them. But there are “Organic Scholars” such as Mahesh Dattani who do not want to accept the traditions without questioning them. For such scholars, the traditions are nothing sacred and they need to be questioned to figure out if they are of any use to the present context. Moreover, these scholars feel that the traditions which are outdated and oppressive, they need to be discarded so as to establish a better society. Mahesh Dattani is one of the new voices of India who takes a closer critical look at the traditions and tries to present a sane voice to the audience so that they can also think deeply about the issues that the playwright wants us to think about. In the play Tara, Mahesh Dattani dealt with many issues which we have discussed in the last Unit. The issues probably has made it clear to you that Dattani has tried to deal with these issues that he wants his audience and readers to think about them. In that sense, what Dattani does though his plays is to build up a consciousness so that the norms that are detrimental for the society at large are being rooted out. Biases against girl children, gendered discrimination, gender violence, privileging of the boy child as an heir to the family, misuse of medical science, etc are some of the issues that Mahesh Dattani has presented in Tara. By presenting those issues and critiquing them, Dattani has tried to form a consciousness which cannot be termed personal in any way. It is political as it is a critique of patriarchy. 3.3.3 Patriarchy Patriarchy is a political system where the males try to dominate, oppress and suppress women so as to have privilege over them so that makes enjoy certain privileges by curtailing the same for women. Moreover, patriarchy is a system where the women are being made to subdue to male whims and whishes in such a manner that they are conditioned to think and act in the same manner as males want and this perpetuating the patriarchal set up. The colonization of the female mind by male ideology is another manifestation of patriarchy. It has become so prevalent from time immemorial that it is thought to be normal to believe in the ideology of male dominance and to practice it in everyday life. In our normal everyday life, we carry on living by this ideology of patriarchy in such a manner and to such an extent 192 | P a g e © Department of Distance & Continuing Education, Campus of Open Learning, School of Open Learning, University of Delhi B.A. (Hons.) English/B.A. (Programme) that it does not seem to be an ideology anymore. It has been made to appear so common sensical that the masses do not realize that they are living by an ideology which is making them submit to the patriarchal system. Gramsci used the term “lived ideology” for some common sensical ideology that we live by in our everyday life which we even do not accept to be ideological. 3.3.3.1 Patriarchy and Tara We all know that male–dominance or patriarchy has been not only detrimental for women; but few of us are aware that it is similarly so for men. Men are also victims of patriarchal system which mostly they do not think to be true. For example, in the play Tara, it is being shown that – “The men in the house were deciding on whether they were going to hunt while the women looked after the cave.” This analogy is very significant as men decide that they will hunt and even decide that women will look after the cave. Many questions arise from this simple sentence – (a) Why should men only hunt (in the sense of earning money)? Why can’t women also participate in hunting? Why the access to the outer world is only allowed for men? (b) Why should women only look after the cave (in the sense of looking after the household)? Why should women be under bondage to be always within the household? (c) Why should the men decide that the women should look after the cave? (d) Can sex (biological factor of being male or female) be the basis of decision of who does what work? (e) Why it is that women’s work in the cave is be thought to be less respectful than that of hunting? Many such questions arise which only goes on to prove that gender roles are decided by patriarchy and the people living in a patriarchal society are meant to follow those codes in a strict manner. Following those codes means that one follows patriarchy. Men continue to follow these codes thinking that they are have the privileges of being at the helm of affairs without realizing that these codes make them follow only what is allowed for them to follow. Even if a male wishes to remain within the “cave”, he can’t; as patriarchal system does not allow him to make such a choice. In the play, Chandan is provided with the leg which was not due to him (though it is of no use for him in his later life) and yet we see that he cannot take the privilege of that leg and moreover finds himself to be remorseful as he thinks he got what he didn’t deserve. The patriarchal system made him have something what is not due to him and throughout his life he had to bear the brunt of that burden which not 193 | P a g e © Department of Distance & Continuing Education, Campus of Open Learning, School of Open Learning, University of Delhi Introduction to Literary Studies only distances him from his family, but also at the same time makes his live a lonely life. So not only Tara, Chandan also seems to be a victim of the patriarchal system. It is to be understood here that patriarchy tries to present itself to be a social and cultural order which is just and manifests itself to be beneficial for the society as it makes people believe that women are inferior to men in many ways and that women should be subordinate to men so as to maintain peace and order in society. Moreover, it maintains that women should be under strict control of men so that they do not go astray which they usually have a tendency to do. Women are thought to be transgressive by nature and therefore there is a need to control them which the patriarchal system likes to believe as well as perpetuate amongst both men and women so that the repressive dominance of patriarchy carries on. As gender stereotyping and conditioning happen in both men and women that they follow the strict gender codes of patriarchy and do not in any way think or act in a way which will question and critique the order. With the changes that started occurring in India, (which we have discussed in the earlier unit) from the nineteenth century as the western educated youths of India wanted some changes to take place to the plight of women and started questioning the Hindu shastras so as to destabilize the cultural order of the patriarchal structures. But in spite of the efforts of the people starting from nineteenth century for more than a century, we see that the plight of women did not change much leading to conscientious people like Mahesh Dattani take up the cause of the women and speak about the same in his works. It is to be acknowledged here that it is not that Mahesh Dattani is not only interested in the plight of women as in his other works he deals with the other marginalized sections of the society. The marginalized, the subaltern people and their concerns have been the focus of much of Dattani’s works as he believes that it is by portraying the plight of the marginalized that he can give true meaning to his works. In case of Tara, as we have discussed earlier, he deals with gender politics which he thinks to be one of the gravest concerns of present day India. To present the same, he takes up the idea of a ‘conjoined twins’ (conjoined twins usually are of the same sex, though he twists it to make Chandan and Tara belong to different sex) from a medical journal where the twins are separated and the third leg that the conjoined twins shared between themselves which rightly fully should have belonged to the girl Tara is being given to Chandan as he is the heir of his family and is going to amass a great fortune from his maternal grandfather. 194 | P a g e © Department of Distance & Continuing Education, Campus of Open Learning, School of Open Learning, University of Delhi B.A. (Hons.) English/B.A. (Programme) We have discussed earlier that boys are preferred over girls (gender bias against girl child) and that this preferential treatment results from the patriarchal mindset which likes to believe that men should inherit the property of his parents and grandparents. Women from the ancient Hindu civilization (from Later Vedic Age) were not given the right to education, the right to inherit property, etc. These rights were taken away from them as giving these rights to them would make them powerful to questions the patriarchal structure. This tradition still carries on in India where even though the constitution gives the girls/ women the right to education and right to property; yet for all practical purposes women are not able to enjoy these rights as the traditional mindset of the people haven’t changed. It is therefore necessary that writers and dramatists like Mahesh Dattani and others should take up the mantle of informing and sensitizing as well as educating the mass. The dissemination of these gender specific ideals needs to reach the mass, not only to the uneducated who are living in the thralldom of poverty and hell; but also to the supposedly educated (literate but not educated in the right sense of the term) such as Patel, Bharati and her father, or Dr. Takkar, who being educated still cannot understand and see the crime they commit when they distinguish between a girl and a boy. This patriarchal mindset needs to be put into question so as to make the society a gender equitable one and to look forward to justice for women. In those terms, Mahesh Dattani can be called a feminist as Feminism can be defined as “a political position against patriarchy” and feminist criticism as “a specific kind of political discourse: a critical and theoretical practice committed to the struggle against patriarchy and sexism.” (Toril Moi, 117). Feminist criticism is an interdisciplinary approach which focuses on ‘gender politics’ though feminism rather than confining itself to textual analysis has a broader perspective in terms of having the political aim of seeking a just world for females and an end of all kinds of suppression and patriarchal oppression against women. It is with this aim that Mahesh Dattani has written Tara and therefore his feminist viewpoint is more than perceivable to anyone reading or watching the play. Frederic Jameson in his controversial essay “Third World Literature in the Era of Multinational Capitalism” have tried to posit the idea that that the “third-world” literature is primarily national allegory and that “the story of the private individual destiny is always an allegory of the embattled situation of the public third-world culture and society” (69). In other words, he is of the view that in a national allegory, the personal is the national. This view has been challenged by many third world critics including Aijaj Ahmed on the basis that its reductionist arguments; yet many still prefer to view the literature written in the third 3.4 TARA AS A “NATIONAL ALLEGORY” 195 | P a g e © Department of Distance & Continuing Education, Campus of Open Learning, School of Open Learning, University of Delhi Introduction to Literary Studies world primarily to be “national allegories” as most literatures from the erstwhile colonized countries make attempts to aid in the construction of the nation. During the colonial times, the Indian literature focused on the idea of instilling a national consciousness amongst the mass and similarly in the post-independent India, the efforts of the Indian writers was to build India. Sometimes in the process of this nation building, the writers attempted to create characters who voices critical concerns with the idea of the nation as does Salim Sinai in Salman Rushdie’s Midnight’s Children. Often the concerns of the subaltern, the oppressed, the suppressed and the marginalized and victimized are brought forth by the writers so as to bring their concerns into the ambit of national discourses. For example, untouchability was brought forth in Mulk Raj Anand’s novel The Untouchable. It is not only that the voices of the under-privileged are voiced and debated in literary creations, but often a roadmap is also presented for their development within the national developmental framework. Mahesh Dattani’s Tara can be considered to be a national allegory as it is seeking a just and equitable world for girls and women. It is asking people to draw their attention to the ways in which girls are being victimized in Indian society and how this patriarchal mindset needs to be changed. In that sense, Dattani is writing an allegory of the Indian nation which needs to pay its urgent attention to this dire problem of discrimination against girl child
1. What do you think is the politics of Mahesh Dattani in the play Tara? 2. What aspects of the traditions does Mahesh Dattani deal with in the play Tara? How does he deal with those traditions? 3. Can we say that the play Tara is a “national allegory”? Give reasons for your answer
