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Touchable
theories
Ramesh Bairy T S
Deccan Herald, Sunday, June 27, 2004
While the argument for an autonomous
Dalit publishing network is undeniable, what the
focus of such efforts-from-‘below’ need
is some thinking through.
Each of these booklets is excellently produced
and each makes its point rather competently. The
trouble is in understanding the claims that tie
them together in the form of this publishing enterprise.
Yet, may be, an introduction to the publication
venture of Navayana will surely be a step ahead.
Navayana is a publishing
initiative that intends to be a ‘new vehicle’
to debate such "issues neglected by mainstream
publishers" and will feature "tracts
on a range of issues related to society, culture,
literature, history and politics" through
the prism of "identity politics and caste."
Touchable Tales: Publishing
and Reading Dalit Literature;
S Anand (Ed.);
Pondicherry: Navayana;
pp 45. Rs 45
Touchable Tales… in
many ways grounds the perspective of the Navayana
group. It records interviews with 12 activists,
thinkers, academics, writers and publishers -
both Dalit and non-Dalit - seeking to understand
the contemporary surge in the "mainstream
publishers’ interest in Dalit literature."
The question that has bothered the group is what
this spurt means to the ways in which the dominant
have seen and interacted with the Dalits, and,
consequently, to the Dalits themselves.
That is, has it merely become
politically fashionable to publish/teach/read
Dalit literature while the continuing fact of
caste oppression and inequality remains unattended
to? And, is Dalit literature - it is primarily
the autobiographies that the publishers have taken
a liking to - nothing more than a safe way of
dealing with the upper caste/mainstream guilt?
Regarding the fashionability of Dalit literature,
almost every respondent remains unsure even as
more of them are certain of autobiographies having
become a safe and thus touchable entity.
These interviews help in critically
introducing one to the current interest in Dalit
literature. Yet, it is not certain how helpful
such one-off conversations are in initiating a
dialogue. Many of the interviewees disagree not
only with the interviewer but also among themselves
and, accordingly, it would have been far more
enriching if they were all brought together for
a discussion.
Ambedkar: Autobiographical
Notes;
B R Ambedkar;
Pondicherry: Navayana;
pp 31, Rs 40
Ambedkar: Autobiographical Notes
brings together some of the available reminiscences
penned by Ambedkar that delve on the experience
of ‘being’ untouchable/Dalit in his
times. Ravikumar, noting the paucity of information
on the private/personal life of Ambedkar, observes
that a Dalit always feels the pressure to merge
his/her individual self in the collective/communitarian
and public self of being Dalit. While one expects
Ravikumar to say something more substantive on
this interesting lead, it somehow sits uncomfortably
with the very burden of the Touchable Tales volume
which was one of deriding the mainstream obsession
with Dalit autobiographies.
Brahmans and Cricket:
Lagaan’s millennial purana and other myths
S Anand (Ed.)
Pondicherry: Navayana
Pp 60, Rs 60
Brahmans and Cricket… contains
the polemical battle that broke out between Anand
and others, in the Himal magazine, on understanding
the politics of the film, Lagaan. The tract opens
up, for scrutiny of a national obsession, cricket,
in a cogent and non-dense manner. The debate in
short is this: Anand argues that Lagaan re-enacts,
through the motif of cricket, the project of Hindu/
Gandhian (this interchangeability itself might
need some rethinking) nationalism, subverting
even while seemingly accommodating the concerns
of the oppressed like the Dalits and the women.
Coming to the history of cricket
in India, he finds that all along it has been
a game dominated by the Brahmins, and consequently
by serving a heady mix of cricket and cinema,
Lagaan furthers a dangerous political project.
With Deshpande’s response to Anand getting
bogged down by an argument of "in the absence
of something better, we’ll make do with this,"
some interesting points that he makes about colonial
agrarian relations and the differential reception
the film received are lost.
Postmodernism… contains
Meera Nanda’s critique of the discipline
of Science Studies, Anand’s review of her
earlier book and an interview with her conducted
by Anand and Ravikumar. Nanda argues that postmodernism
and other such ostensibly progressive theoretical
streams that sustain on their critique of modernity
have turned into convenient weapons in the hands
of the religious right, and thereby undoing the
small but significant gains that modern ethos
had achieved in the Indian context.
That, in brief, was what one
gets in these tracts. While the argument for an
autonomous Dalit (?) publishing network is undeniable,
and these booklets demonstrate the need for it,
what the focus of such efforts-from-‘below’
need is some thinking through.
Polemics has its values but left to itself, it
might cease to be illuminating. Many categories
- which we take for granted but which are the
most primary resources that we have in understanding
the world around us - need explication, thinking
and scholarly engagement. For instance, a category-cluster
like the Brahmin-Brahminism-Brahmin- ial is something
the contemporary polemics take to be self-evident
but even a cursory examination of what it entails
will demonstrate how loose it is.
This is apparently the case with
many such categories and this is a task that Navayana
could fruitfully engage with, which will certainly
be a contribution to not only the existing scholarship
but also to the passionate, even if its coordinates
remain as yet hazy, political project that Navayana
sees itself as anchoring and furthering.
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