Section-2 : Themes in Tara
Your reading of Mahesh Dattani’s play Tara probably has made it clear to you by now that the play deals with the question of gender, which is also being mentioned in this self instructional material from Unit One itself. Probably, by now you have also figured out for yourself how and why Mahesh Dattani thought that the Gender issues in India needs to be presented through his play before the audience. This Unit will specifically focus on the themes of Tara so as to make you have a better understanding of the play as well as focus on the contemporary nature of the play. This unit is especially focused on Gender issues in India and will make us have a better understanding of Gender in the Indian context.
Themes
Theme can be said to be a common thread or idea that is incorporated throughout a literary work which binds the work together. A theme is a thought or idea the author presents to his or her reader(s) which the reader explores while reading the text. The author utilizes the characters, plot, and other literary devices to assist the reader in this endeavor. In truly great works of literature, the author intertwines the theme throughout the work and the full impact is slowly realized as the reader processes the text. The ability to recognize a theme is important because it allows the reader to understand part of the author’s purpose in writing the work. It is true that a work usually is written keeping in mind a single theme; but often multiple themes and sub themes also comes into the purview of the work and make the literary piece complex and interesting. For example, in Mahesh Dattani’s Tara, the dramatist has consciously and conspicuously tried to present the theme of Gender oppression and repression in Indian society in such terms that the readers become aware how a family (Patel Family in the play Tara) suffers because of a wrong decision to give certain unlawful, immoral advantage to the boy child over the girl child. Thus the dominant themes that the play deals with are – (a) Gender Politics (b) Bias against Girl Child (c) Familial relationships (d) Disability (e) Science and its misuse, etc. In the course of this Unit, these themes will be taken up in details so as to acquaint you with the intricacies with which Mahesh Dattani dealt with these themes in Tara. 2.3.1 Gender Politics in India and Dattani’s Tara Gender politics in India can be termed as a set of movements aimed at defining, establishing, and defending equal political, economic, and social rights and equal opportunities for Indian women. It is the pursuit of women’s rights within the society of India. Like their feminist counterparts all over the world, feminists in India seek gender equality: the right to work for equal wages, the right to equal access to health and education, and equal political rights. Indian feminists also have fought against culture-specific issues within India’s patriarchal society, such as inheritance laws and the practice of widow immolation known as Sati, etc. The history of feminism in India can be divided into three phases – • The first phase, beginning in the early nineteenth century, was initiated when male European colonists began to speak out against the social evils of Sati and banned it in legal terms (Raja Ram Mohun Roy), championed widow remarriage and got it legalized (Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar), when tracts of Women’s education started coming out (Rev. Krishna Mohun Banerjee and others) and women started slowly gaining some respectful status in society. In Bengal, the Brahmo Samaj movement made rapid progress, arousing a new desire among women for freedom. There were women too who participated in these reformist movements and the famous ones among them are Pandita Ramabai and Savitri Bai Phule who respectively worked on the young widows and women’s education. A few women also overcame their social handicaps and achieved positions of distinction. They included Toru Datta, Ramabai, Swarana Kumari Devi and Kamini Roy. These attempts notwithstanding, women did not get the benefit of Western education. Women of upper classes suffered from the custom of enforced widowhood and a ban on divorce. Among the lower classes the practice of “Devdasi” was in vogue. Apart from these, from about 1878, university studies particularly medicine began to attract Indian women and around 1888 some women went across the seas even to America to seek new knowledge. As early as 1892 the first Indian woman took her Civil Law degree in England. • The second phase, from 1915 to Indian independence, started when Mahatma Gandhi incorporated women’s movements into the Indian Freedom struggle. Gandhi legitimized and expanded Indian women’s public activities by initiating them into the non-violent civil disobedience movement against the British Raj. He exalted their feminine roles of caring, self-abnegation, sacrifice and tolerance; and carved a niche for those in the public arena. Peasant women played an important role in the rural satyagrahas of Borsad and Bardoli. Women-only organizations like All India Women’s Conference (AIWC) and the National Federation of Indian Women (NFIW) emerged. Women were grappling with issues relating to the scope of women’s political participation, women’s franchise, communal awards, and leadership roles in political parties. Women joined men in equal footing during the great struggle for Indian’s Independence. This participation of women in the national struggle loosened the social bondage in which they were held. Their equal participation with men in the struggle led to the breakdown of traditional conceptions and brought about a profound change in the attitude of women. The ban on women practicing law was removed in 1920 in England. Among the first batch of women to be called to the London Bar was an Indian woman. During the non-cooperation movement launched by Mahatma Gandhi, he directly appealed to the women of India that led to the awakening of thought in women. • The third phase began when independent women’s organizations focused on fair treatment of women at home, after marriage, in the work force and right to political parity, etc. The improvement in women’s position and status became further evident when immediately after 179 | P a g e © Department of Distance & Continuing Education, Campus of Open Learning, School of Open Learning, University of Delhi Introduction to Literary Studies the independence, Indian women made their mark by becoming Governors, Cabinet ministers, and ambassadors. Several measures were taken by the Government of India to assign equal status to women in the economic, political and social fields. When in the 1970s women’s movement was at its peak in the west, many women in India as well as the feminists carried on fighting for the cause of women. More avenues were opened to them to show their talents and have a sense of participation in national activities. The Constitution of India pledges equality of status and opportunity to men and women. The passage of several Acts by the Parliament and the process of social change brought about by industrialization and urbanization during the last few decades have done much for women’s emancipation both legally, politically and socially. Mrs. India Gandhi, the first women Prime Minister of India, is the pride of India’s women folk. She served for fifteen years and remained the undisputed leader of the most powerful party in India. She was considered to be the most powerful woman in the contemporary world. • The Constitution of India provides for equal rights for all, irrespective of caste, creed and sex. The Fundamental Rights guarantees equality of men and women in every walk of life. Article 15 assures that the State shall not discriminate against any citizen on grounds of sex and says: “Nothing in this Article shall prevent the State from making any special provision for women.” Women’s issues began to gain an international prominence when the decade of 1975–1985 was declared the United Nations Decade for Women. In spite of so many efforts across centuries, the position of women in India has not reached the state where we can proudly say that Indian women enjoy all the rights and privileges that Indian men have. If that state would have been reached for the Indian women then the need for writing Tara would not have arisen. That a play like Tara needs to be written and presented before the audience only goes on to show that Indian women still are living under patriarchal oppression, suppression, violence and silencing. The women are made to live in a state of continual fear and subjugation where they cannot live their lives according to their potential and moreover many young girls and female fetus are killed everyday across India because of the gender bias. Mahesh Dattani, as being stated in Unit One, is a committed writer and thinker and therefore thinks that it is his task as a writer / dramatist to represent the tales of women to his audience so that they are able to see the state on women once again on stage which they experience all the times in their daily lives. By rendering an artistic representation of the everyday tortures of women in India, Mahesh Dattani wants to get it registered in the minds of his audience and readers in such a way so that next time when they act in a patriarchal manner their conscience pricks them and they are led to act in a just manner. Probably, Dattani’s project is not just artistic, but also has a social implication to it. Similar to George Bernard Shaw, the famous English dramatist, who said “I will not take the pains of writing a 180 | 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) single sentence for the sake of art”; Dattani is also a committed artist who writes his plays so that he can make his audience see what they often lack to see in their lives. One of the function of art is to make everyday occurrence lay bare to the readers / audience in such a manner that the readers become much more aware of the same and are made to act in a conscious manner leading to some kind of social and cultural change in the society for good. Such thoughts must have occurred to Mahesh Dattani when he chose to write a play like Tara where he tries to present the biases that a girl child has to face in the Indian society. 2.3.2 Bias against Girl Child It is a typical feature of the patriarchal thought and culture all over the world, more so in India, that the girl child is mostly not welcome in this world. This leads to female feticide as well as killing of girl child even after they are born. In different parts of India therefore one can perceive that the gender balance in the society is much misbalanced as girl children in many cases to do survive because of the neglect that the Indian society shows towards them. Mahesh Dattani finds this injustice towards the girl child to be very much prevalent in the Indian society and therefore felt that he should take up the issue in the third play that he wrote and consequently Tara was written so as to make the Indian mass be aware of the ways in which women in general and girl child in particular are victims of the patriarchal social system which does not allow them to live life. What is rightfully due to women and girl child is consciously and deliberately taken away from them and they are left to be victimized and oppressed throughout their lives. Tara narrates one such tale – a tale which every Indian should come across so as to change their worldviews and look forward to not only safeguarding the girl child, but also giving them what is due to them. The question which naturally arises – why is it that a boy is given preference over a girl child? Probably all of us know the answer. Probably all of us have experienced the differential treatments towards girl child – probably all of us have seen how girls are not provided with as nutritious food as the boy, not as expensive clothes as the boy, and not as better education as the boy child. All these discriminations have to be encountered by the girl child and even after that they emerge victorious in lives often, though many of them are left to die or suffer unjustly. It is not that all girl children go through discriminations, but in most cases the girls do undergo various kinds of pressures on them from the family and society which somehow curbs their natural instinct as well as their natural psychological growth. Simone de Beauvoir in The Second Sex rightly says – “One is not born, but becomes a woman.” What she means is the difference between sex and gender. Sex is a biological 181 | P a g e © Department of Distance & Continuing Education, Campus of Open Learning, School of Open Learning, University of Delhi Introduction to Literary Studies construct where as gender is a social and cultural construct which we, humans, have made in such a way that women are made to be victimized and oppressed and yet they will never talk about this victimization and oppression as from their childhood they are being made to learn that their salvation lies in obeying the male whims and wishes and to serve them. So, even though they are victimized, yet they will not put up a voice against the victimization as they are being made to believe that this victimization is natural and it is a part of their lot. In India from the ancient times onwards, (probably from the later Vedic Age) we see that women are being subjected to various atrocities because the shastras, especially The Manusmriti provided women with the status of secondary citizens who need to be kept under the check of patriarchy /male domination. It is not just true of the Indian civilization, but also in the West, we can see a similar kind of treatment being meted out to women. It is only in the twentieth century that vehement protests and movements against the patriarchal system started gaining momentum in the West (feminist movements) so as to not only give women the right to dignified existence, but also to live life according to their own desire. In India, too, women’s issues started gaining momentum as some of the educated Indians felt that it is not necessary that women be given their due not only in society but also in their private lives. One such voice which took up the issue of Gender/ women in India very seriously is that of Mahesh Dattani who thought that it is through his dramas as well as cinemas that he can try to create awareness amongst the Indian mass about the ways in which women are being victimized and oppressed for generations. The play Tara is an attempt in that direction where the playwright shows that what is rightfully due to Tara is being given to her brother only because he is a male. The privileges that the male child enjoy in India, and also elsewhere, make him grow up thinking that he has a right over women and that he can carry on doing any kind of atrocities on women. Similarly, girl child from their childhood are made to learn that if they are beautiful according to the male standards of feminine beauty and if they can learn how to be subservient to men and obey their order then she can grow up to be an ideal women. This kind of education makes children grow up with gender biases which perpetuates their whole life and carries on from one generation to another leading to the perpetuation of the patriarchal thoughts and practices. It is against these thoughts, prejudices and practices that Mahesh Dattani is revolting against in his play Tara where he makes an attempt to lay bare the ways by which the society perpetuates such abnormalities in the name of doing good to males. 182 | 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) The plot of Tara deals with the lives of a conjoined (Siamese) twins – Chandan and Tara – son and daughter of Mr. Patel and Bharati. The twins are joined together at their hip and can be separated only through a surgical operation which could have meant danger to one of them. Bharati and her father decide that the third leg of the conjoined twins be given to Chandan so that he may lead a healthy life though the leg rightfully belongs to Tara. Medically, it should have gone to Tara, but Bharati and her father bribe the Dr. – Dr. Takkar – so that he does the unjust thing medically to give the leg to Chandan. Mr. Patel, the twin’s father, remains a mute spectator to the whole thing, though he can sense the gross injustice that is meted out to Tara. The operation leaves Chandan with a slight limp and Tara crippled. Thus it turns out to be futile for both children as neither Tara nor Chandan could really do much with the third leg that they shared between themselves at their birth. This shocks Bharati to a great extent as she realizes that she has done gross injustice to Tara and therefore tries to compensate that with more affection and love. This incident is the crux from where the play is initiated – in the sense that how the girl child are usually being victimized in Indian society as they are thought to be of inferior than the boy child who can achieve supposedly greater things and can keep the family name shining with his efforts. So usually sons are given preference over the daughters, whose manifestation we can always carry on seeing in our daily lives all around us. Female foeticide and infanticide are therefore a grave concern in the Indian society as girl child often face the discrimination not only when they are born but also when they are in the womb of the mother. In a society which is so gender biased, it is essential that a conscious dramatist like Mahesh Dattani takes up the theme of Gender based violence and discrimination of the girl child as one of the significant topics to be discussed in the play Tara. But at the same time, to merely say that the play Tara is about Gender discrimination and injustices would be to draw a limit to the play and not look at the complex contours that the dramatist brought forward in his play. It is to be understood here that Gender is a significant aspect of the play and yet to explore the contours of gender constructs in the society what is needed is to study the society, family and culture in much more detailed terms. Therefore familial relationship is one of the foremost aspects that the play also deals with. 2.3.3. Familial Relationships in Tara Familial relationship is one of the prime issues that the play Tara deals with. As soon as Mr. Patel and Bharati are married, Mr. Patel is forced to leave his parental home as their relationship was not accepted by his parents. This leads to a host of problems for him as he is not able to assert himself in the way he should. Being assertive here does not mean that he 183 | P a g e © Department of Distance & Continuing Education, Campus of Open Learning, School of Open Learning, University of Delhi Introduction to Literary Studies should have been patriarchal in terms of being a husband who thinks he should be assertive only because he is a male. But when the time comes for the surgery to be done by Dr. Takkar to separate the conjoined twins and Bharati and her father asserts that the third leg should be given to Chandan which rightfully belonged to Tara, Mr. Patel could not and did not oppose it. As Mr. Patel did not have support of his parents, therefore he seems to be isolated leading to a situation when he knows that gross injustice is being done to his newly born daughter and yet he could not do anything to stop it. As at the right moment Mr. Patel could not be assertive therefore his whole family starts suffering – (a) Chandan gets the third leg, but still it is not of much use to him. Moreover, when he grows up he suffers from a sense of remorse. (b) Tara remains crippled throughout her life. (c) Bharati, to some extent, becomes insane and starts showing extra love and affection to Tara so as to compensate for the injustice that she has perpetrated on Tara (d) Mr. Patel becomes violent and aggressive. Thus, a surgery which is done to give certain advantage to Chandan only because he is a male child, ruins the whole of the family as everyone in the family suffers due to it. Therefore it can be easily said that though the play starts with the premise of a Siamese twins and how the leg that the twins shared is given unjustly to the male child because of the gender bias in the society and the minds of the parents of the twins; yet the play deals with much more than that when it tries to probe the ways by which the familial relationship are ruined and how each member of the Patel family suffers from a sense of agony. It is significant to note that Tara is discriminated against by her own mother. Even being a woman she is not able to feel and act for Tara as she is conditioned to think in a patriarchal way. It is the tragedy of women that they are so deeply conditioned in the gendered existence by the patriarchal society that they cannot and do not realize the ways the male-dominated society victimizes the women; and moreover they themselves become the perpetrator of gendered violence on other women. Bharati feels that by giving undue advantage to Chandan she will help him in acquiring the huge fortune of her maternal grandfather. In the process, she commits a crime against her own daughter, though at the same time this should be kept in mind that Mr. Patel is also to be blamed for this crime as he does not take a stand against this gross injustice being done to Tara. 184 | 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) As a consequence, Tara becomes an innocent victim of the patriarchal injustice and throughout her life, till her death, she had to suffer for the same. In the course of the play, we see that she longs for her two legs, when she says: Tara: I would wish for both…I would wish for two of them. Chandan: Two Jaipur Legs? Tara: No, silly, the real ones. As a compensation for the gross injustice that Bharati does to her daughter, she tries to excessively love her in the later part of life. In this phase, we again see in the play that Mr. Patel is excessively concerned with Chandan and his career, making Tara feel that she is not loved by her father so much. We see that Mr. Patel makes plans to send Chandan to college, but he does not make any such attempts for Tara. Where as we see Bharati concerned about Tara as she remarks to Chandan about Tara – “The world will accept you-but not her! Oh, the pain she is going to feel when she sees herself at eighteen or twenty. Thirty is unthinkable. And what about forty and fifty!” Thus throughout the play, we see that Tara is being treated differently as she is a female and that leads to her trauma. The patriarchal society fails to understand that women should be given as much opportunities as men so that they can also realize their potentials. But in a patriarchal society, it never happens and therefore women suffer agony without even being able to share it with anyone. Though the patriarchal society does gross injustice to women and then leave them to suffer in their loneliness; yet in the play Tara, we see that all the major characters – Bharati, Mr., Patel and Chandan suffer from a sense of remorse and therefore suffer from psychological turmoil. Amidst this, we see Tara to be a strong woman who has come in terms of her wooden leg and is not at all perturbed by the same. Her bold stance shows that she has accepted life and have made her mind to move on. As her confidence in herself is supreme therefore she describes herself as “Strong. Healthy. Beautiful.” Later she had to go through a kidney transplant and suffers an untimely death. Tara’s death makes Dan distance himself from his family. Dan starts believing that by being irresponsible towards Tara for taking away the leg from her which rightfully belonged to her, Dr. Thakkar along with his parents have taken away the possibilities of a better life from Tara. So he decides to write a play named Twinkle Tara and dedicate it to her. The play that he is writing seems to be some kind of a purgative 185 | P a g e © Department of Distance & Continuing Education, Campus of Open Learning, School of Open Learning, University of Delhi Introduction to Literary Studies aspect of his being as through writing this play he wants to get away with the guilt conscience that is pestering him though he is not at fault as he didn’t decide that the third leg should come to him. 2.3.4 Disability Physical disability is phenomenon which has been into much focus in today’s discourses as it is thought that those who think of people with some physical disability to be disable are themselves mentally challenged as physical disability does not make a person inferior. If nature has made the disabled person in a particular manner then it does not mean that they suffer from a lacuna; moreover they need to be respected and cared for as they fighter more odds to emerge victorious in life. But in Indian society, traditionally, it is being perceived that disabled people are often made more a victim of social and cultural ostracism then what nature did to them. People are culturally conditioned in such a manner that they think the disabled people are a burden to society and therefore we see that Tara becomes a victim of certain kind of social ostracism because of her being physically challenged. In the play it is being shown that nobody wants to befriend Tara. Bharati had to go a step further to bribe Roopa with cosmetics and other stuff that she is nicer to Tara; yet we see that Roopa has a dislike for her. Roopa places a poster in the wall of their residential area – “We don’t want freaks” which is meant for Chandan and Tara. This poster demoralizes Chandan and Tara as they are not able to deal with the societal pressure that works against the physically challenged. By portraying these kind of incidents in the play, Mahesh Dattani shows that he is very much concerned with the disabled people and through his play wants to create a consciousness amongst the mass that we should change our mindset towards the physically challenged. We should not act in a manner to make their lives more difficult. They are as much a part of our society and no way are “freaks” and to think of them to be “freaks” can only be done by a freak. One needs to understand that till the time we do not change our mindset towards the physically challenged we will remain under some kind of mental retardation. In a situation when the society does not accept them (Tara and Chandan), we find that they develop a strong emotional bond between themselves. The bond was always there – from the time of their conception in their mother’s womb till the time they are physically separated by Dr. Thakkar, their physical separation could not severe their emotional connectedness and dependence on each other. It is Chandan (Dan) who tries to expose the 186 | 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) tragedy that Tara went through as he feels for her. But at the same time, it is also true that the realization makes Chandan understand that life is also bleak and absurd for him. 2.3.5 Medical Science and its Misuse In the stage setting, Dr. Thakkar is provided the highest plane where he sits throughout the play with his “god-like” presence which makes us realize that the play also deals with how Medical science has been used by the medical practitioners for their own good than for the benefit of the humanity at large. This is also another significant issue that the play Tara deals with as we see in the play that Dr. Thakkar is bribed by Bharati and his father to separate the conjoined twins (Chandan and Tara) where the third leg which rightfully belonged to Tara is unjustly given to Tara only because she is a girl child. The gendered decision of Bharati and her father (also Patel through his silence is to be blamed for it too) to be unjust to the girl child makes Tara and Chandan suffer throughout their lives. (It has been discussed throughout this unit and therefore not elaborated any more at this juncture.) Some people may argue that Medical science is to be blamed for such injustice as Dr. Thakkar is the one who does the surgery. But one needs to understand here that Medical science is not to be blamed as it is meant to be for the benefit of the humankind. If a medical practitioner like Dr. Thakkar does unjust things to make extra money that does not take away the achievements and progress of medical science. It is to be kept in mind here that it is actually people like Dr. Thakkar and their unethical immoral choices which bring shame to medical practitioners. Instead of having a “god-like presence”; we can say that it is because of his evil presence that Bharati and her father could take an unjust decision to provide the unjust privilege to Chandan. Mahesh Dattani, thus, brings to the fore another pressing issue of the time which needs to be thought with much care and attention in the present circumstances where the medical practitioners need to be much more ethical to their responsibilities and get over their petty gains.
1. What do you think is the most significant theme that Mahesh Dattani deals with in the play Tara? Why do you think so? Give reasons for your answer. 2. Do you feel that gender discrimination is still prevalent in India? With reference to the play Tara, write a critical note on the contemporariness of the theme of Gender discrimination in Tara. 3. Disability and its study are not only limited to social sciences, but form the core of literary studies too. In reference to the above statement, write a short critical note on Tara. 4. Bias against girl child and cultural preference of boys is one of the manifestations of patriarchal mindset. Do you agree? Give reasons for your answer with reference to Tara. 5. Medical science is shown to be misused in Tara, but it is not the main theme of the play. Do you agree? Give reasons for your answer. 6. In what ways, do you think Mahesh Dattani has written a play which deals with contemporary issues? Give reasons why you think so
