Ordinariness of Resistance

Hansda Sowendra Shekhar, one of the most assertive and creative of voices in contemporary fiction writing, is the first Santhali writer to be published by major English publishers. He narrates happenings found everywhere around us, but those we are afraid to speak out.  In a freewheeling chat with writer and critic Dileep Raj, Hansda talks about his choice of English as the language of creative expression and the strong women characters in his stories. Excerpts:

You being the first author from Santhal community to be published by English main stream publishers, how do you define your sense of belonging in the current times? Would you consider yourself as a writer primarily?
I am a Santhal and I belong to the community. That is all I can say. Writing is not my primary profession. My primary profession is my job as a government doctor.

How do you place yourself in the Santhali literary field? The propaganda against you by a certain section of Santhali intelligentsia of objectifying adivasi women through your writings had led to the ban of the book and suspension from service. Did you receive support from within the Santhal intelligentsia in countering these campaigns? How do you wage multiple battles while confronted with such intimate enemies?
It is only recently that I have started reading works in Santhali. Yes, I received support from the Santhal intelligentsia. I have two books coming this year and I am writing two more books, so where is the time to think about enemies?

Why did you choose English as the language of creative expression?
I chose English as my language of creative expression because I went to an English-medium school. My education has been in English so I felt more convenient to express myself in English.

Where have you done your schooling and higher education? Could you recollect your experiences of interactions in academic space?
I studied from LKG to Std. XII at St. Joseph's Convent High School, Mosaboni, Jharkhand. I did my MBBS from Mahatma Gandhi Memorial Medical College, Jamshedpur. I also spent a little more than a year studying Agricultural Sciences at the Banaras Hindu University.

I would choose to remember only the positive aspects of my school life and college life, and it is a fact that the positive aspects of my school life and college life far outweigh any negative experience. My interaction with people while I was in school and college was good.

Could you tell us about your entry into publishing world?
Ravi Singh chose to publish my first book, the novel 'The Mysterious Ailment of Rupi Baskey', and the editor on it was Anurag Basnet. The same team brought out my next book as well.

One could find that references to a wide variety of food items are abundant in your stories. How would you look at your experiments with food? Do you find interesting associations between smell and a taste that tempts? Is there any sort of food you wouldn't want to experiment with?
I am a non-fussy eater now because I have learnt the value of food. I was quite fussy as a child and I did not eat certain foods, like, I did not eat that vegetable kundri. But now I eat whatever food I get. Regarding smell of food, I love the smell of all food. 

Are one's culinary choice and encounters with food decided on community terms, or is it a result of inter community dynamics? From the description of each food item in your writings, I could see that your food culture is clearly distinct from that of the surrounding communities.
Among the Santhals, there is no taboo regarding food. We eat almost everything. But yes, there are some foods that some Santhals eat but I won't eat, like, the meat of monitor lizards and frogs, and that is because reptiles and amphibians give me creeps.

Let me ask you, is there a possibility that you might come out with a whole novel figuring food as the major motif? 
It is a good idea and I might try it one day, but it is still quite early to say anything.

All of your women characters are empowered in their own ways. They are cunning, sexual and   provocative. Can you share the sources of such strong women characters?
I have seen strong women in my life, so I think the inspiration for strong women characters in my stories comes from them.

Narrating the Everyday

While the whole of Kerala was teeming with concern over the potential genocide of Adivasis, none seemed to have noticed that an acclaimed Adivasi writer, Hansda Sowvendra Shekhar, had visited Kochi for a literary festival. This was hardly surprising as the organizers of Krithi Litefst themselves did not attach any importance to the visit. The official website of the event did not list Hansda as a speaker! Neither did their Facebook page. Initially, I was assigned the task of engaging Hansda, one of the most assertive and creative of voices in contemporary fiction writing. I welcomed the opportunity and reread the author's works closely, preparing myself for the session. But, I wasn't intimated about the details of the session schedule even when the date was nearing. The printed schedule announced that Narayan would moderate the session. When I wrote to organisers seeking clarity, they reassured that the session would be a conversation between me and Hansda. They also promised to correct the website, though they didn't. Following this I wrote to them that I was not interested in displacing Narayan. I expressed my displeasure over the insult I had suffered and made it clear that I had no plans to attend the session.

To withdraw or to utter a ‘no’ is an act of resistance, not necessarily pre-planned. It is also a spontaneous act that asserts your dignity in situations where you suffer insults. The Adivasi will not Dance written by Hansda is a short story in the anthology with the same title that upholds this act of resistance. The story is in the form of a monologue of an old man, farmer/artist, who refuses to perform in the presence of the honorable President of India who has come to inaugurate a function convened by the miners' firm. The old man's refusal is his resistance, and is significant because the mining firm had seized the land from its original owners, including his daughter. His refusal to dance is nothing less than an emphatic no.

Land as resource and metaphor
Adivasis in Kerala have often refused to be the passive beneficiaries of government projects, and have carried out active struggles that asserted their status as citizens. It need not be said how the public conscience in Kerala operates even after such successful struggles. This was once again revealed when an adivasi youth Madhu was lynched to death recently. As per 2011 census, adivasi population in Kerala is 484,839 comprising just over 1 per cent of the Kerala population and 92.36% of them live in about 4,645 colonies.

They lost their land through internal and external migrations /encroachments of other communities. Adivasi and dalit struggles for land in Kerala have exposed that the government does have cultivable land at their disposal. Yet their demands for land are never met.  The Adivasi Will not Dance depicts how other communities displace adivasis from their own land. It points at the impossibility of a civil society when such grave genocidal situation prevails. At the same time his stories do generate optimism regarding solidarities among the marginalised, adivasis, dalits, sexual minorities, women, Muslims and others. This underlines the fact that a conversation is always already on with his writings. Philosopher Akeel Bilgrami, in one of his speeches coined the word, "cognitive genocide". He was responding to a remark by Amartya Sen on Nandigram which pointed at the inevitability of 'progress'. Bilgrami observed that such developmental discourses deny people living in different temporalities any space in future. Adivasis in Kerala have been raising their voice for implementing the Forests Rights Act, and Panchayati Raj Extension to the Scheduled Areas (PESA) for quite some time now. Hansda's narratives posit a pure Santhal space even while showing instances of inter-community communication and solidarities.

 

Ban and after Jharkhand government had banned  The Adivasi Will not Dance following protests and campaigns from a section alleging that his writing objectifies the Santhal women. Protests happened, and his effigy was burned. Hansda is a doctor and had been suspended from service on technical grounds for writing The Adivasi Will Not Dance.  Hansda is least bothered about the pressure from within community to depict a sanitised picture of it in order to resist negative stereotyping. His writing shows the difficult path he travels, even when he does not gloss over community concerns and is alert to internal tensions.

Narrating the Everyday
The ordinariness of Hansda's stories is the source of their dynamic nature. There isn't anything exotic in them. They narrate happenings found everywhere around us, but those we are afraid to speak out. In the story,  Sleeping with the Enemy, we find all sorts of queer alliances within heterosexual familial spaces. Female sexuality is not treated as frozen and domesticated. Mobility is the mark of women characters in such stories.

Though the author's location is elite, the narratives always unfold in the vulnerable contexts of everyday life. The spontaneous resistance from women in the story "They Eat meat", for instance. When the only Muslim family is surrounded by communalists, it is the women in the neighborhoods who resist them using kitchen utensils. Effortlessly, the women upturn their vulnerable position. Hansda's characters subvert the expected and established ways of acting and living. The sources for such resistances are found within the community history and everyday practices. Thus these stories abound with friendships, food, celebrations and solidarities.

(Dileep Raj, assistant professor, Department of Philosophy, Brennen College, Thalasserry, is a writer and critic.)