Abstract
The Marathi dramatist Vijay Tendulkar (1928-2008) is undoubtedly a great playwright who is known for his versatile genius and prolific writing. As a leading Indian playwright, he has produced various short-stories, children's books, essays, novels and plays. He is widely applauded as one of the most influential dramatists of India, like Girish Karnad, Badal Sircar, Asif Currimbhoy and Mahesh Dattani. Some of his important plays are Silence! The Court is in Session (1968), Encounter in Umbugland (1969), The Vultures (1971), Sakharam Binder (1972), Ghasiram Kotwal (1972), Kamala (1982), and Kanyadan (1983). He is often considered as a “contradictory and revolutionary” playwright. His plays have created many debates and discussions regarding the subject-matter, style and views. As a social realist and a dramatist, he exhibits the black side of humanity in his plays. He also presents the image of women crushed under the forces of the patriarchal system. The present paper tries to concentrate on how Tendulkar presents the plight of Indian woman in the so-called modern society. The women in Tendulkar’s plays have no identity of their own; they are just puppets in the hands of their male counterparts. As a playwright, Tendulkar is deeply concerned with the exploitation and victimization of women in a patriarchal society.
Keywords: Empowerment, Equality, Exploitation, Gender, Identity, Patriarchy, Victimization, Women.
In the age of globalization, when we are trying our best to become a developed country, the issues like gender equality, women's emancipation, and women empowerment have become very significant. After many years of Independence, are the women really emancipated? Does our society still discriminate on the basis of gender? Does education improve women’s condition? We can easily find out the answers for all these questions through Vijay Tendulkar’s plays. The paper will concentrate on women's status, their humiliation as well as victimization by the patriarchal society in Tendulkar’s select plays: Kanyadan and The Vultures respectively. According to Feminists, one should be familiar with the term patriarchy in order to understand woman’s position in this world. The patriarchal system portrays man as a rational, bold, aggressive, dominating, independent, fearless and having a tendency to rule and control. On the other hand, women are supposed to be docile, timid, self-sacrificing, passive, submissive, emotional and dutiful towards their husbands and family members. Such a system of patriarchy is based upon the concept of hierarchical binaries of genders which proclaims man’s superiority over woman. It allows man to exhibit his authority in all possible forms in order to maintain stability and control in marriage and family.
Traditional Indian society accepts the laws laid by Manu and permits all power to man in order to control and suppress woman. Even after many talks about gender equality and women's emancipation, women are still dominated by men, in their personal as well as professional life. In our patriarchal society, woman has no right to assert her identity whereas a man usually enjoys control over woman and many a times it leads to violence and brutality. Critics have expressed their views regarding Tendulkar’s treatment of women’s issues, violence against women, man-woman relationships, conflicts and alienation of modern men and women. N. S. Dharan in his article “Gyno-centrism in Silence! The Court is in Session and Kamala”, states that “in these women-centred works feministic ideology which pits women in direct encounter with the chauvinistic male oppressor, finds its full and free expression”(Dharan49). Similarly, Veena Noble Das in her article “Women Characters in Vijay Tendulkar’s Plays” says, “he has succeeded in portraying them differently and raised the status of Indian woman from a weak person to a powerful one” (Das.14).
Tendulkar has treated his female protagonists with a great comprehension and sympathy. They reveal his intensive treatment of themes like social conscience and complex human relationships. He presents them in a natural form. They are all absolutely different in behavioural pattern, age, class and character. He tries to expose the deprivation, humiliation, commodification and suppression of women through these female characters and thereby investigates the plight and misery of women in the contemporary Indian society. His female characters belong to different strata of Indian society. Although they have different status and background, they are given the same ill-treatment in various situations by the male-dominated society.
Jyoti in Kanyadan is an educated and young but a meek girl belonging to rich class. Rama in The Vultures is a submissive and sensitive victim of the patriarchal set up. They are crushed, deflated and tortured by the males in one way or the other. Most of the male characters in Tendulkar’s plays are highly engrossed in patriarchy. Arun Athvale in Kanyadan and Ramakant, Umakant and Pappa in The Vultures all seem to be bias against women. They are the staunch believers of patriarchy and they justify limited freedom for women. Although the society makes claims of evolution, it seems to be in no mood to give women their equal share in real life.
The female protagonist Jyoti in the play Kanyadan is an educated girl. Although she belongs to the sophisticated class, she also becomes the victim of social injustice, oppression and dispossession inflicted by the patriarchal society. It becomes clear that even educated women have no right to take their decisions independently through the play. Even acquiring education does not give security against oppression and maltreatment by the patriarchal society. As a result, woman has no right to challenge and flout its social norms.
Nath Devalikar, Jyoti’s father, an MLA and a social activist, desires to bring a social change in society by allowing his daughter to marry a Dalit man, Arun. But he never thinks about his daughter’s future of how she will adjust with the different social culture of the Dalits class?
Jyoti denounces all social norms in order to marry Arun as it was a love marriage. But in return, he turns out to be a man who seeks vengeance on aristocratic class. He considers them responsible for the ageless deprivation and degradation of Dalits. She loves Arun wholeheartedly. In return Arun abuses Jyoti, beats her brutally and even kicks her when she is pregnant. He is an alcoholic who never does any work. Jyoti never thinks to take any step against her husband’s cruelty although she is educated. She believes in Pati Parmeshwar, a tag given by the patriarchal society. Nath Devalikar’s attitude is a typical male chauvinistic attitude which out rightly rejects his wife’s hesitation in accepting Arun as their son-in-law. In a patriarchal society a female has no personal opinion of her own. She has to remain subservient to her husband’s decisions.
Jyoti’s father Nath Devalikar preaches her that only a woman can change her husband’s life. Only she can turn him into a good man by her love and caring attitude. Thus, Jyoti seems to be following wrong notions and ideals taught to her by the male members of her family. Through Jyoti and Arun's relationship, Tendulkar draws attention towards the fact that discrimination and oppressive social division is also one of the important cause of rebellion and violence in society. In his plays, Tendulkar makes it clear that even educated and self-reliant women are not only humiliated and tortured but also subjected to various types of violence within or outside the home by their male counterparts.. Even their education also fails to remove such ingrained evils from society.
The Vultures Tendulkar’s next play puts forth another dimension of patriarchy. The play is a vicious representation exposing violence, avarice, selfishness, sensuality and sheer callousness. Violence against women in India is prosecuted irrespective of class, caste and creed. In Tendulkar’s plays, violence on females is unleashed by males in various forms and degrees to assert their authority in order to content their sadism and egotism. Physically, women are subjected to beating, thrashing and merciless slavery. Sexually, they are abused, subjugated and suppressed. A woman even becomes a victim of marital rape. Psychologically, they are inflicted with mental stress and torment. Emotionally, they are blackmailed, deprived and humiliated.
Tendulkar’s play The Vultures is a representation of cheating, mistrust, exploitation and humiliation in family relationships. And the worst sufferers are the women of the household. The father Hari Pitale, the elder of the family, cheats his own brother in business and became a prosperous man. His two sons Ramakant and Umakant and daughter Manik are the real vultures in the garb of humans. They are hoggish, mercenary, inhuman, brutal, ferocious and pompous. They would go the extent of killing anyone for money. Rama, the wife of Ramakant, a replica of traditional social norms, undergoes distressful experiences in her married life. On the other hand, Manik, the daughter of the house, has a western life style. She falls prey to many types of violence, even at the hands of her brothers. Now she has turned into a classic slut and is pregnant with her lover’s child.
In the play, Rama lives the life of a slave. She has only one wish in her life and that is to have a child which remains unfulfilled because of her husband’s impotency. But, Ramakant like any patriarchal husband never acknowledges his faults and calls her a barren woman. In the patriarchal society, if a woman couldn’t become a mother then she has to bear the humiliation. People taunt her by calling her infertile and barren. The patriarchal society never blames the man even though biologically he is incompetent to become a father. The blame is always cast upon the woman.
According to the society, the primary duty of a woman is to bear and rear children and look after her home and family. If she wants to get a respectable position in her family, she has to give birth to a male heir. In such a society, woman is often oppressed and subjugated. She is never allowed to speak against her husband, however callous he may become against her. Rama has hidden liking and admiration for Rajninath, Pappa's illegitimate son. But she is afraid of expressing her emotions openly. She is trapped in such a situation where she can’t live with her husband as well as not able to escape from him. She expresses her anger in front of Rajninath:
In this living death of my wifehood – I commit ‘Sati’ every moment! I am consumed! And do you know something? I wouldn’t lie to you – recently – for the past several years – I’ve never get up again. So, he’ll never show me to any new swami, astrologer or healer. So he won’t make disgusting drunken love to me. Won’t look at me with drooling lips – and talk to me of babies (Tendulkar 242).
Does a woman really ever get what she wants? The answer is no, as her life is decided by others so her choices are limited. She is the responsibility of her father during adulthood and after marriage her husband’s. And after husband’s death, the son dominates her personality. She is always considered as a liability or a burden to be got rid of. On the other hand, in the patriarchal system, the husband is free to have as many concubines as he wants. Through the husband-wife relationship between Rama and Ramakant in the play, Tendulkar makes a severe attack on the dual standards of the conventional morality which dictates a woman to be chaste and allows a man to go scot-free. Another female victim in the play is Manik. She suffers immensely because of her brothers' selfish and wicked plans for their wasted interests. Although, she is immoral, the treatment she receives by her brothers' is unjust. They abuse her, use indecent language against her and call her a buffalo, a bitch and a woman who often falls in the gutter.
Thus, Tendulkar portrays the unfortunate situation of women in patriarchal society. Both the above discussed plays exhibit that even independent and educated women characters are not only suppressed, but also compelled to fit in or accept the stereotyped familial traditions, ethical codes and social norms. And if she refuses to follow the rules, she has to undergo various forms of abuse, such as disgust, disgrace, violence and expulsion from home etc. What Simon de Beauvoir says of women is apt for Vijay Tendulkar’s women characters: “They have gained only what has been willingly granted; they have taken nothing, they have only received” (Beauvoir xv).
Both the plays show that the reasons for exploitation keep on changing, but the victim remains the same. The women want to articulate their sufferings but they have to strangle themselves. The institution of family and marriage also acts as a means of exploitation and suppression. The study indicates that women in the plays of Tendulkar are many times in a helpless situation because of the rigid atmosphere and rusted patriarchal system. However, it doesn’t mean that all women in his plays are innocent, since some women are themselves responsible for their pathetic condition.
As a social dramatist, Tendulkar shows his utmost dissatisfaction against the hypocrisy and hollowness of the contemporary society. That’s why his plays transcend the limits of time and clime. According to F. B. Mee:
I hope that each play will take people on a journey.....however, the journey need not be to India. It can be a journey into one’s own self from a silence outside one’s cultural view point (Mee 81).
Thus, Tendulkar presents the universal plight of women in his plays. She has no will of her own. She has to depend on male members. Even the independent woman’s scope of freedom is very limited. By projecting life at its worst, Tendulkar reveals his adherence to humanitarian values at its best.
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