The Perspective of Women in terms with Bama Karuku

Journal of Research and Development Peer Reviewed International, Open Access Journal. ISSN : 2230-9578 | Website: https://jrdrvb.org Volume-17, Issue-10(II)| October2025 77 The Perspective of Women in terms with Bama Karuku Mario Cassion Anand, Assistant Professor, Department of English, Loyola College of Arts and Science Mettala. Email-ca[email protected]m Manuscript ID: JRD -2025-171016 ISSN: 2230-9578 Volume 17 Issue 10(II) Pp. 77-79 October 2025 Submitted: 27 Sept. 2025 Revised: 10 Oct. 2025 Accepted: 17 Oct. 2025 Published: 31 Oct. 2025 Abstract: The most noteworthy devotions of Indian English writers of narrative have been the artistic construal of the Indian society and its culture. Dalit literature as a genre was established in the 1960's and 1970's when a spurt of Dalit writing was published in Marathi and Gujarati. The growing part of subaltern writings, poems, novels and autobiographies, conversely, seeks to mend the sensation of suppression by probing the nuances of subaltern culture. Tamil Dalit writing marked its identity in the literary map of Tamilnadu, a Dalit woman nonetheless has exemplary endurance and the indomitable spirit to bounce back against all odds. Faustian Mary Alias Bama’s works are seen as embodying Dalit feminism and are famed for celebrating the inner strength of the subaltern women. Dalit women are suffering from multi-disadvantages. This paper deals with the issues of Dalit community like daily extortions of rape, sexual assaults, physical violence at the workplace, in public arena as well as violence at home. This paper portrays identity crisis in the select novels of Bama. The paper summits the pathetic real-life events and struggles. Key Words: Dalit, Caste system, Resistance, Subjugation, Oppression Introduction: The term Dalit derives from Marathi language which means, "oppressed" and "rooted in the soil". The term itself grown popularity in Tamilnadu only in the 1990's. The caste system in India has alineated thousands of Dalits from common society to a sub-human and underprivileged life. The Dalits are mindful of their dehumanized nature and need to be released from the clangs of untouchability, through economic security and education. Dalit Movement is started to battle against the caste conflict that lies in the forms of segregation from common civic responsibilities, discrimination between upper and lower caste people, inequalities based on economic status, oppression of selfhood etc. Dalit's writing sought to produce in the hands of upper caste forces the suffocation and the trauma experienced by the untouchable. Dalit writers felt the impulse to articulate themselves, as they could not only turn to themselves but also share their experiences. Autobiography has become an appropriate vehicle for express the struggles of Dalit community so the writer chosen this as a medium of expression. Bama wants Dalit people to put an end to all the atrocities unbridled on them for centuries. She wants them to erase the stigma of their birth and show the world that they can live with dignity. She visualizes a future society in which they can live in peace. She wants her people to rephrase Indian history and hopes that they will inoculate a new implication into the tones of history and civilisation. Bama’s Sangati, Karukku are the novels which is not only the portrayal of the struggle of Dalit against poverty, oppression, ignorance and illiteracy but also it transforms into the common story of every Dalit woman who has the dream to overwhelmed all the difficulties and cross all the boundaries, which she faces in her dayto-day life. The Dynamic Intersection between Gender and Caste: The influence of the upper castes has been suggestively felt in the social, religious and culturallives of the demoted sections over the years. Quick Response Code: Website: https://jrdrvb.org/ DOI: Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0) This is an open access journal, and articles are distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International Public License, which allows others to remix, tweak, and build upon the work noncommercially, as long as appropriate credit is given and the new creations ae licensed under the idential terms. Address for correspondence: Mario Cassion Anand,Assistant Professor, Department of English,Loyola College of Arts and Science Mettala How to cite this article: Mario Cassion Anand,(2025). The Perspective of Women in terms with Bama Karuku,Journal of Research & Development, 17(10(II)),77-79 Original Article Journal of Research and Development Peer Reviewed International, Open Access Journal. ISSN : 2230-9578 | Website: https://jrdrvb.org Volume-17, Issue-10(II)| October2025 78 Dalit literature is one of the most domineering literary movements that took its offshoot from underprivileged untouchables to make its appearance in the post-independence India. The upheaval of the denounced identity of these so-called ‘untouchables’ to a self-chosen identity as Dalit is a story of communal struggle remunerated over centuries. Bama‘s autobiographical narratives Sangati and Karukku, potrays the Dalit patriarchy as an important subject of concern. Bama evaluates the domestic violence and abuse of Dalit women at home by Dalit men and sexual and workrelated pestering faced by women in the Dalit community outside their homes at the influences of the upper caste men and the police. Dalit women face more atrocities due to caste and gender discrimination. Dalit women are subjected to systematic oppression and physical violence both from the wide-ranging civic and from within their own community and their families. The socio-economic status of the suppressed Dalit woman increase the incidence of violence against them. Bama’s Karukku ,a Symbol of Expression: Bama’s autobiographical narrative novel Karukk pictures the Self-reflection of the Inner Self of the writer and it’s a master piece of subaltern Literature. This autobiographical narrative, which gives deed of experience of poverty, violence, dejection and desolation that every Dalit woman experiences in rigid caste hierarchies and a social critique as well as a carefully structured and well-written literary narrative. The narrative presents a powerful critique of Brahmanic hegemonic caste structure, Indian civil society, the education system. The female child in Dalit households gets an guaranteed meal once a day only in such a circumstance the girl child have been suffered for their daily needs. Bama describes intensely in her autobiographical novel Karukku that she came to "realise, distinguish and felt humiliated" almost her existence and born in an untouchable caste. Karukku is not only the portrayal of the struggle of Dalit against poverty, oppression, ignorance and illiteracy, it transforms into the common story of every Dalit woman who has the dream to overcome all the obstacles and cross all the boundaries, which she faces on a daily basis. Bama evaluates the way the difficulties faced by the downtrodden people by means of poverty, chastity and obedience that nuns had to take actually separated them from the reality of ordinary lives and ‘put them at a great remove, as if they belonged to a different world’ She writes as a Dalit woman about the experiences of Dalit women in her community and urges women to emerge victorious in bringing out their identity to independence. Bama’s gender confounds her Dalit identity as much as her Dalit individuality complicates her position as a woman. Dalit students are especially targeted for ridicule, denunciation and public embarrassment because of their social category. Bama pictures the life of the girl child in Dalit families gets an assured meal once a day so they are forced to sent to school for the free meal in the afternoon.A female child in every Dalit house holds suffers for a meal that would enable her to struggle, fight and mark a great effort to fill even a pitcher of water at the village hand pump site in the evenings. Bama recounts vividly in Karukku that she arose to "realise, recognize and felt humiliated" about actuality of a girl child born in an untouchable caste. Bama confesses the fact that it is very difficult for a isolated woman to survive in the patriarchal society. They are sexually abused in every nook and corner. The women always remain unprotected in our society."The motivating factors that formed the book are those who cut me off like Karukku, and bleed me; unequal societal systems that plummeted me into ignorance and locked me in and suffocated me; my suicidal desire to disrupt them, cast them away, and break them; and when the bonds were torn into pieces, the blood that was then divided; all these taken together”. (Karraku,5) Reflections of Dalit Feminist Voice in Bama’s Sangathi : Bama’s attention transformed from begging Dalit victim hood towards focusing on the interrelationship between suppressed caste and patriarchy society in her writings. She excitedly evaluates the repetition of untouchability in the caste badgered Indian society. Bama‘s best portrayal of her writings of the Dalit community has been best pictured in her Sangati and Karukku, The protoganist in her novels exposes the Dalit patriarchy and the subject of concern in the novel vividly pictures the sufferings based on the Christian people who wont allow the Dalit girl in to church. Bama assesses the domestic violence and emotion and as well as psychological abuse of Dalit women at household by Dalit men and sexual and professional annoyance challenged by them outside their homes at the hands of the upper caste men and the society. Dalit women face more slaughters due to caste and gender discernment. In Sangati, the writers's cousin, Mariamma, gets wounded and got many fractures in her leg and she is lying up eight months in bed while holding stones inside a well. Bama’s style in writing was at its finest expression and daring exposure of the real personality,unabashedly radical, shaped by the strength of personal experience. The Dalit castes are mainly classified in to two they are Pallars and Paraiyars who occupy such gruelling farm jobs. Other Dalit castes,commonly considred in their community such as Chakiliyars, Kuravans (gipsies) accomplish life by eradication drains, whirling baskets, selling beads, and so on. At the lowest of the caste ranking, Pallars and Paraiyars work hard. They are being handled in the sector worse than bonded workers. Among these two castes, the tradition of untouchability is closely and meticulously practiced. The opposition the two Dalit castes Pallars and Paraiyars is most belligerent, fierce and toxic. In spite of Paraiyar's best efforts, the caste enmity between the two races is not stuck but is accompanied by rampant police fierceness, the triumph that cause issue among young men and adult males to either corrosion in the prisons or to run or Journal of Research and Development Peer Reviewed International, Open Access Journal. ISSN : 2230-9578 | Website: https://jrdrvb.org Volume-17, Issue-10(II)| October2025 79 save their life. Women in Sangati as Dalit's ambassador that advocate their open-minded conduct to ensure social justice. Bama exemplifies her own life experience in her novel about this social phenomenon. Bama believes that if the suppressed spirit of Dalits like her is ignited through transformative education, they will mutually be efficacious in breaking their restraints, which they have unknowingly co-opted for generations as their unchangeable destiny. The autobiographical novels of Bama reveals how the Paraiyar’s women were presented as daily labour and it is up on them that the they are struggling to make the both ends to meet together to run their family. Bama speaks about the anguishes of women who live in Bama’s own community. Those females are also continuously defenceless to sexual harassment and physical abuse at their work place. The organizational power of their society chiefly concerned with men or patriarchy. She engraves about the dealing of violence of women by their family members like their father, husbands, brothers and other higher caste patriarchal. Beyond all she defines domestic violence, physical harassment and quarrels which are based on publicly is the major difficulty of the Dalit women faces day by day. Dalit feminism has been labelled as a “discourse of discontent,” “a politics of difference” from mainstream Indian feminism, that has been appraised for marginalizing Dalit women. If a woman so much as stands alone and by her somewhere, all sorts of men gather towards her showing their teeth. However angry you get, however repelled by their expressions and their grimaces, even to the point of retching what can you do on your own...We are compelled to wander about, stricken and unprotected. (Sangati, 102) It clearly sends a message that education and self-reliance are vital to uplift social status and achieve empowerment. The life struggle of Bama swears to the assumption that education plays the role of a catalyst in women’s development by enabling women to transform themselves into free intellectuals and, progressive through the medium of rational development, they become audacious enough to progress ahead for liberating and uplifting themselves. Dalit feminism and Black feminism both evolved out of the ramifications of exclusion from the mainstream and are intrinsically analogous in aiming at restructuring, re-formulating, re-conceptualizing and re-framing the existing stereotypical social hierarchy. Conclusion: In India, Dalit literature is a weapon that challenges the various caste system, the experiences of discrimination, inequality, violence, injustice and poverty of the Dalit community. The imbalanced position of men and women that is being unremitting and besides strengthened in sovereign India is due to the faulty way of approach in implementing laws and guidelines towards the society. Bama is more than a writer; she is ‘a chronicler and recorder of Dalit life and struggle. The overpowering of the upper caste poeple is being projected from her view that hard work and other tedious labour are intended only for those who want to work hard. Bama’s writing booms on minimalism and, probingly for someone who has traditionally been seen as non-literary or even using impolite language, she more often makes her points with a certain indirectness, almost without emphasizing them, proving her ability to fight for Dalit community. References 1. Bama, “Karukku”, Oxford University Press; 2014 2. Bhargava, Rajeev, and Amiya Kumar Bagchi and R. Sudarshan.“Multiculturalism, Liberalism and Democracy.” New Delhi: Oxford University Press. 2009. 3. G. S. Gaana Reddy (2018). “Position of Religion in Dalit Literature: A Case Study of Bama’s 4. Karukku” Shanlax International Journal of English: 6. Volume: 6. Special Issue: 1: pp. 94-96. 5. Kamila, A. (2018). “Marginalization and Discrimination of Subaltern in Bama’s Karukku.” Shanlax International Journal of English, vol. 6, no. S1: pp. 103–107. 6. Angela Teresa Kalloli (2019). “Bama’s Karukku as a Testimony of The Triple Jeopardized” LUX MONTIS, Vol 7. No. 2. pp. 105-117. 7. Nishat Haider (2015). “Other Tongues: A Study of Bama’s Karukku and Sangati.” Volume-30, Issue 2, pp-333-358