-
Rendering Voice To The Voiceless: A Critical Reading of Mahasweta Devi’s Plays
Mridula Rashmi Kindo
Abstract:
For sixty years, Mahasweta Devi has battled ceaselessly for the rights of oppressed women, primarily from the tribal areas. Her struggles to represent the subaltern are central to her narratives, whether plays or short stories or her activism in real life. She dealt extensively with women's and Dalit rights in her writings, which spanned the country and focused on the tribal people of West Bengal. Her provocative Bengali plays frequently portray the tyrannical rule of wealthy upper-caste landowners, feudal lords, moneylenders, and government officials over untouchables and tribal people, more so on women. Mahasweta Devi acknowledges that folklore, ballads, myths, and legends passed down through generations by ordinary people are a constant source of inspiration for her work. She has long believed that the commoners, the oppressed or the marginalised are the ones who create natural history. The paper “Rendering Voice to the Voiceless: A Critical Reading of Mahasweta Devi’s Plays” explores how the subalterns find a voice in Devi’s works when they are being oppressed to voicelessness in real life.