Tracing the rights of the minorities through select works of Premchand

1. TRACING THE RIGHTS
OF THE MINORITIES: A
READING OF SELECT
WORKS OF MUNSHI
PREMCHAND
Joshua Gnana Raj P
St. John’s College, Tirunelveli,
joshuaraj10@gmail.com

2. EVOLUTION

4.  “What had religion to do with eating habits and
customs … I may commit theft or murder or deceive
someone, but my religion won’t disown me, but if I
drink water from the hands of an untouchable I lose
my religion, what kind of religion is this? We
cannon relate at the level of the soul to anyone
outside our religion. Religion has tied down souls,
has restrictions even on love. This is not religion,
this is a disgrace to religion.” (Premchand, 2009, p.
82)

5.  In the work The Thakur's Well an untouchable
woman, Gangi rebels against the caste laws that
forbid untouchables from using the same water
that the villagers use. She reasons within herself
saying, "Why are we considered low and these so
people high? Is it because these people wear a
thread around their necks?" (Orsini, 2004, p. 85).
 , “the same event or situation does not leave the
same impression on everyone. Every person has a
different mentality and point of view”.
(Premchand, 2004, n. pag.)

6.  In Karmabhoomi he again satirizes education of
the west, which has its base only upon the idea of
business where one has to pay for everything in
the process of education. No one is free from it,
the protagonist of the novel Amarkant, runs
away from school only owing to the money to be
paid as fees.

7. PREMCHAND AS A FEMINIST
 Women characters of Premchand are not to be seen as total
slaves of men. They refuse to keep calm, and so does
Kalyani also do with her words fighting up with her
husband saying,
 Kalyani-Then manage your household too! I’ve no desire to
have anything to do with a house in which I’m treated
without respect. I have as much as right to this home as
you. Not one whit less! If you think of yourself as some sort
of king, I’m no less than a queen in my own eyes. You’re
welcome to this house of yours, I will not want far a few
rotis to feed myself. You can do as you please with your
children, feed them or starve them according to your fancy.
So long as I don’t have to see anything it happened, I will
be spared the pain. Out of sight, out of mind! (Rubin, 2006,
p. 9)

8.  The very sentence of saying this doesn’t make to
look as if she doesn’t looks to be caring towards
her children, and not be taken as to the effect of
radical feminism, modernity, on the side of
Kalyani. For after leaving her husband she goes,
and talks to one of her child saying with tears,
and said “No, my loved ones, I will not abandon
you. For your sake, I’ll put up with everything-
insult, humiliation, outrage, harsh, cruel words,
this and more I will endure for your sake.”
(Rubin, 2006, p. 11)

9.  She cares much more for her sons than she does
for her daughters ... She owned a house, she had
some ready cash, jewellery worth thousands, but
still had to bring up her two sons, see them
through their education. Another daughter will
be ready to marry in another four or five years.
This is why she cannot even think of giving a
large sum of money as dowry; after all, the boys
must get their due. (Rubin, 2006, p. 34)

10.  This anger is seen different in Nirmala on her
mother, is also revealed. It also shows how a real
young bride would feel while she is married off to
a man older than herself:
 Everytime Nirmala dressed up in all her finery
and stood in front of the mirror, admiring her
radiant beauty, her heart would fill with longing
and desire. She would be consumed with a
burning sensation in her heart. She felt like
burning the house down. She felt angry with her
mother, of course; but her greatest anger was
reserved for poor Munshi Totaram. This burning
resentment was always with her. (Rubin, 2006, p.
40)

12.  "a balanced, realistic level" (Schulz, 1981, p. 18)
that surpasses his earlier works, and manages to
"hold his readers". (Schulz, 1981, p. 18).
 Three generations of Indians have wept with her
and, despite the immense changes that have
come to India during this time – changes in
attitude, sensibility and aspiration – it is very
likely that generations to come will continue to
sympathise with this girl whose greatest sin was
to require a husband who would accept her
without a dowry. (Rubin, 2006, p. 32)

14.  Finally most critics believed that the nationalist
movement in India was borrowed from English books.
It is also said that Indians learns their ideas of
freedom from English books. Even, Gandhi declares
his philosophy, by changing the phrase from the Holy
Bible as, hate the sin but, love the sinner. Premchand
was also a follower of Gandhi, and also Premchand
talks of exploitation, equality, and fraternity; which is
said to be attached to Marxism, for it was originated
from the west. However, Premchand approach goes
into the process in a very different way. Premchand
justifies that violence is not bad for the defense of
one’s dignity for peace is to be won at times by
“war!”

15. MUNSHI PREMCHAND