HYDERABAD: It took firebrand Leftist authors in the pre-Partition era to stir controversies and be summoned to the courts for their radical thinking. Saadat Hasan Manto and Ismat Chugtai faced the flak for speaking the truth: naked, wrapped in its ugliness which, of course, was quite indigestible and remains unchanged even after 70 years of India’s Independence. That’s how when authors like Hansda Sowvendra Shekhar, who hails from Pakur, choose to write about the plight of humans, especially women in distress, he’s labelled as a porn-writer, trolled online, his effigies are burnt and the government of Jharkand state orders ban on his book ‘The Adivasi Will Not dance’. A collection of 10 short stories, in the book, Sowvendra depicts the lives of lone, poverty-stricken Santhali women who have to make a choice to live or not to live.
How it began
Though the book by the 34-year-old author, who himself is from the Santhal community, was published way back in 2015, a fresh onslaught of hatred was unleashed on him. Jharkhand chief minister Raghubar Das on August 11 ordered that all copies of Hansda’s book be seized and legal proceedings be issued against him. The issue was raised in parliament by opposition MLA Sita Soren, of Jharkhand Mukti Morcha, who had alleged that the book portrays Santhal women in bad light.
BJP MLA Laxman Tudu, also said the same thing. Right after this the leader of the opposition Hemanta Soren demanded a ban on the book. Allegedly, a group of tribals in his hometown burnt his books along with his effigy shouting slogans. One of the slogans written in Hindi read as: “Tum apni bahno ka lekhak ke dwara balatkaar karana band karo. (Stop the rape of women through a writer’s words)” And this isn’t enough, there’s a Facebook page named ‘Pornocopeia’ active in the smear campaign of the author that didn’t spare even Sahitya Akademi. One of the posts reads: ‘Sahitya Akademi recognizes Porn-Literature, awards Yuva Puraskar (Youth Award) to Dr. Hansda.’ [sic]
Hansda Sowvendra Shekhar, was awarded Sahitya Akademi Yuva Puruskar for the novel ‘The Mysterious Ailment of Rupi Baskey’. He has been suspended from his government job as he worked as a medical officer in the state health department in Pakur. He has been called a ‘porn writer’ who writes about prostitutes, who coincidentally happen to be from the same community. Rues Sowvendra, “I wonder if it is wrong to be a “porn writer”. Also, if people who have perhaps not written a single paragraph in their lives think that I am a porn writer, I really do not know what to say.”
Tales through an insider
The mental spectrum of Indian society is such that it chooses to reject what threatens its definition of women and the contexts in which they are represented or portrayed. Even though the fair sex as the subaltern has striven hard to break the confining circumference, yet the different microcosms exist the way they existed during Dark Age – the victory of man over women has been reported and at the same time portrayed in different books though in different time lines and time zones.
That’s how even when, as an insider from the community, Sowvendra has depicted troubles of a human, especially of a woman, people are unable to grasp the depth and on the contrary accuse him of ‘hurting the dignity of tribal women’! In one of the stories entitled ‘November is the Month of Migrations’, he writes how for a piece of cold bread pakora and paltry 50 rupees, a hungry lone Santhal woman Talamai Kisku sleeps with a railway police jawan who abuses her saying: ‘Saali, you Santhal women are made for this (sex) only,’ He’s taken a Chekhovesque take on the robotic business-like gesture of the woman who ties her petticoat, takes her ‘earnings’ and goes away.
There have been acidic reactions on another of his story titled ‘Semen, Saliva, Sweat, Blood’. Some have gone ahead and said that the author has used name of a leader in the story as a baddie, who played an important role in the Jharkhand Movement. Wonders Sowvendra, “How can anyone assess the merit of a work which they haven’t read?” At the same time more than the zero sensibility of ‘sheeple’, it’s the government which put the final nail by banning it. The novelist shares, “I was suspended from my government job and the reason was that ‘I didn’t take permission before printing my book!’”
Double trouble?
The foreseeable hatred didn’t start out of the blue. Way back in July 2015 Sowvendra wrote an article in Scroll on Ol-Chiki script of Santhalis, which is officially accepted by the Government of India, and immediately after that he was trolled. Shares the author, “A lot of people within the community couldn’t take it that I am an animist Santhal was supporting an old script. So the trouble started from within the community.” The protesters called him ‘shaitan’ while burning his effigies. One of the placards read: ‘Tum Santhal samaaj ke shaitaan ho’.
Rues the troubled short story writer, “There is no concept of shaitan (satan) in Sarna faith of Adivasis, then how come they labelled me with that word? For us animist Santhals, all spiritual entities are “bonga” (literal meaning: god). So, if a bonga is good, it is a good bonga; if a bonga is bad, it is a bad bonga. We have to worship all bongas, good or bad. Of course, we ordinary Santhals would not worship the bad bongas.”
He hints that it’s a particular section of Santhals who began the smear campaign against him which kept on growing and is still the same. His sharp critic Ivy Hansdak, an academic, who wrote a letter to Sahitya Akademi questioning the selection criteria of the book, wrote in one of her Facebook posts:“Yes, even i don’t have the nerve to read his second book bc i heard horrible things about it. I only have the first novel which i bought out of curiosity...” [sic]
Support wise
There are some members of the Santhal community who have come forward in solidarity of the author such as the Indian Writers’ Forum, the International PEN, the Indian PEN, the German PEN, the Amnesty International along with the intellectuals in Ranchi. It’s noteworthy that women have strongly supported the author. Ruby Hembrom, founder of Adivaani, the publishing house that focuses on writings by the tribals said to one of the media houses that as a Santhal woman herself she finds Sowvendra’s stories depicting the plight of Adivasi women. The small group that smeared the author actually triggered political attention and incited the banning of the book.
Senior writers and artists like Nayantara Sahgal, K Satchidanandan, Githa Hariharan, Anand Teltumbde, TM Krishna, and Jerry Pinto have criticised the ban on the book. “Also, I must mention those 13 Adivasi intellectuals – academics, filmmakers, etc., who were keeping an eye on the smear campaign against me were the first ones to issue a statement in my support in Scroll,” he signs off. But despite the support he stays suspended from his job and there’s no sign that the ban from his book will be lifted.
History has witnessed several book burnings known as tomecide:
In 221 BC China, all power was in the hands of Emperor Qin. He was always suspicious about scholars and hence ordered thousands of their books to be burnt. He wanted to write history in his own version. He even got one thousand scholars buried alive.
By the end of World War II, around 16 million books and manuscripts were burnt in Poland by the
Nazis to erase the documentation of their culture.
During World War II, in Germany so many books and libraries were burnt that it’s difficult to estimate as to know how many books were destroyed. The novel ‘Book Thief’ has portrayed one of the book burnings poignantly.
The National and University Library in Sarajevo, Bosnia had 1.5 million books. The library was burnt in a heavy shelling by Serbian troops in 1992.
The recent massive book burning happened in 2013 in Timbuktu,Mali. The insurgents set buildings on fire that had books written in 1200 AD.