Book Review #32: Daatu by Dr. S.L. Bhyrappa

This is an another masterpiece novel from my favorite author Dr. S.L. Bhyrappa. Written in the early 70's with a backdrop of much debated caste system that was deep rooted in the country, makes this book as one of the excellent attempt by the author. The intricate explanation and detailed narration of each and every castes and cultures is a shellshock experience for the readers.

This book was way ahead of time if we consider the time of its publishing. As expectedly, this book has won the Kendra Sahitya Akademi Award in the year 1975. The title Daatu can be literally translated to english as CROSSING OVER. Crossing over the boundaries of castes and colors.

The subject with which the novel was based is an excellent one, yet dangerous. It would have easily flare up communal clashes around in the country. After all, though the government has abolished all the caste systems in public life to some extent, there is still this practice of upper caste, lower caste, untouchables or popularly called as Dalits, etc..

This novel describes the story of a small village called Tirumalapura, situated in Tumkur District of Karnataka. This village consists mainly of the Brahmins, followed by the other caste people. There is also a Gowda family, that was popular among the neighbour villages as one of the respected family, and this family stood as the flag bearer of the village, though there were many Brahmins who were silently opposing to such cult worshipping.

As far as the protagonists are concerned, there is a Brahmin family headed by Venkataramanappa and there is a flag bearer Gowda family, headed by Tirumale Gowda who became a Rajarshi after studying all the major vedic scriptures, that was reserved only for Brahmins long long ago. The main plot opens up, when, Satya a History Graduate, daughter of Venkataramanappa decides to marry Srinivasa, the grandson of Tirumale Gowda, the son of MLA Melegiri Gowda. What follows after this, is a family dispute that leads to fights among these 2 families, fight among 2 castes, fight among villagers, over which caste is better. Both families tries all their might to stop this marriage and eventually succeeds in it. Venkatesha, elder brother of Satya decides to make a pact with Melegiri Gowda and comes to a common judgement to stop this marriage, considering their reputation in their village and in neighbourhoods.

As the story progresses further, author tries to explain all the major reasons for the caste and cultures. He explains various causes and reasons for all these caste systems, thereby describing the misunderstanding of the of Purusha Sukta from Rigveda, in which majority of the people believed that, all the 4 caste (Brahmin, Kshatriya, Vaishya and Shudra) systems or VARNA systems are born out of mouth, arms, thighs and feet of Bramha. It was misinterpreted by every major translators throughout the history. This verse from purusha sukta describes that, the occupation of a man becomes his caste and not his birth. Through his protagonists, Author tries to explain that, everyone can attain the status of Brahminhood by just working towards it and there is no need of consenting someone for this.

In another part of the novel, author brings up the case for Dalits or untouchables through the characters like Bettayya an MLA and his son Mohandasa, who believes that only revolution and rebel nature brings out the justice for their caste. The interesting case arrives, when Satya decides to help out Mohandasa by writing a book on his request. This book helps all these Dalits or Untouchables to understand the injustice that they have faced in all these years. As this attempt became popular, Mohandasa decides to form a group of young rebels from his own community for a coup to enter the village temple that was banned for Dalits. He succeeds in his attempt even. But to his dismay, he became unconscious right after entering the temple. This incident made the upper caste Brahmins to scare away all those Dalits who were entering the temple. They scared them like, this is the wrath of god, and you people should remain  outside the temple and that is what has been practiced since time immemorial.

I stop it here.
I have just given a glimpse of the novel in my review. You will get to read so many cases like I mentioned above in the book. But for sure, it won't give you a concluding answer for which caste is first and which one is last, which one is upper and which one is lower, who is Brahmin and who is Untouchable. It just gives you a platform to think about what happens when one sticks to this kind of casteism. What one would even achieve by practising casteism?. It brings us to question ourselves much deeper, after all, what one would even gain by acting as if their caste is superior and others are inferior. Everyone must question themselves and start living life like a human. There is no upper or lower, no superior or inferior!!

I recommend this book to be read by everyone. It is once in a lifetime experience to read such novels.

My Rating:
5/5

Book Review #10 - Parva By Dr. S.L.Bhyrappa

Parva (Source: Internet)

 I wonder how many times such masterpieces can be possibly written ?. The experience of reading such books is out of the world. The vaccum it occupies once you finish those books and the impact it leaves behind is magnificient. Out of those books, this awesome book PARVA certainly tops the list. I recommened this to every reader who is intereseted to learn the alternate Mahabharata.

 Foremost Kannada Novelist, Writer, Philosopher, Thinker and Professor Dr. S.L. Bhyrappa has put in lots of efforts for this book, where the actual research of the author lasted for 7 long years!!.Written with great eloquency and massive research and surprisingly presented the household Mahabharata story as a fictitious story requires great conviction.

Though his every work is bitterly fought over by critics on their interpretations, though I must confess that I am in no position to offer my experience of his other works. I just started his works by reading his popular novels first, may be, by the time I finish reading his every other novels, I get a sense of his writing style. But PARVA, perhaps the best book I have read under the fiction category. Categorizing this book under fiction category makes unjustifiable. One would not get a thought to rewrite the entire Mahabharta until and unless he is S.L. Bhyrappa.

PARVA is not just a masterpiece; it's a brilliant masterpiece. It is the "MAGNUM-OPUS" of the Kannada literature world. Reading a book in its original language is priceless. This book has been translated to English by Dr. K. Raghavendra Rao. This requires a great composure to translate a book of nearly 700 pages without diluting the effect. He has done full justice in his translation work.

In Short, PARVA is a Mahabharta in reality. Every character is HUMAN. Each and every character created is a complex package which feels a gamut of emotions be it jealousy, romance, politics, anger, forgiveness. Pandavas fight among themselves is as much as each of them introspect into their own lives and decisions which gives rise to several important questions of the basic epic. Few instances like "Does Pandavas actually depicted the epitome of brotherhood among themselves?" Or "Are there any instances of fight between themselves for petty things?", "Was Draupadi being forced while getting married to 5 Pandava brothers?", "What was their actual food habits?", "How did the political alliances have made between other kings?", "Does Dritharashtra has fathered 101 kids in reality?", etc... These kind of doubts never seems to appear in the actual epic of Mahabharata. But, PARVA certainly seems to questions these things!!

There are no gods here, no demons, but just humans. If we were to beleive that Mahabharata as a factual incident, then we have to certainly ponder over such things. If Pandavas has 7 Akshohiny troops and Kauravas had 11 Akshohiny troops, does Kurukshetra was wide enough to accomodate such battle to take palce ?. Krishna is as much as human as Ghatothkach. The sheer brilliance of the author comes in when, he disapproves of any godly references that normal Mahabharata refers to, and thereby gives his work a rational perspective as well as historical insights into the life of those times. Without any doubt, PARVA is an interpretation of Mahabharata in reality with ordinary people, ordinary rules and ordinary battle.

In all his other books, Author Dr. S.L. Bhyrappa tries to tell us the story by creating a main character which narrates the story to a third person. And like his every other book, there are female protagonists. In PARVA also, all the other characters seems to be unimportant compared to the characters of Kunti, Draupadi, Gandhari, etc...

He also tries to enlighten us the readers about the age old ancient practices (Though there is no practical proofs of such practices in this current society). This is NIYOGA. NIYOGA actually refers to having an extra marital affair when any of the spouse is found out to be infertile. Through Niyoga, anyone can have a child which is completely law abiding. In the book PARVA, Kunti actually undergoes the Niyoga system to have children, with the mutual consent of Panduraja, her husband. Having said that, Author tries to remove any magical references to the DEVLOKA (God's Kingdom). There are no gods here and no magical powers of gods. Here, the Gods actually means a tribe of people who were lived in the forests of Himalayas. Through them, Kunti decides to have relationship, only for the purpose of having children.

Author also explains us about Draupadi getting married to all 5 Pandava brothers. Infact, this system is still in practice in some of the remote parts of Eastern India and some parts of Tibet. A single woman marries all the brothers of a single family. Author had adopted this method of marriage for Draupadi's wedding. It was because of Kunti's request that Draupadi agreed to marry all 5 Pandava brothers.

Author had imagined brilliantly by creating a fictitious work on the birth of Kauravas. According to this book, Gandhari had only 14 children of her own. The other 86 children were born to the slaves of Dritharashtra. YUYUTSU is one among those 86 children, who at the time of war, changes his side and fights for Pandavas. Since, he believed that, Pandavas are following the Dharmic principles. We cannot read this part of story in actual Mahabharata.

The heart wrenching episode of war is brilliantly imagined and written, which cannot be read in the actual epic. It is believed that the war had took place for almost 18 days. As the days of the war progressed, imagine the foot soldiers who have to fight all day long have to step on the dead bodies that were lying in the battle field. They have to step onto the beheaded bodies of the dead corpses and animals. Thousands of Elephants, Horses that were killed. None of us would have imagined that what happened to those animals after all. Did they conducted the last funeral rites for all the soldiers that were dead in the battle.?. Hundreds and Thousands of broken chariots that were still stuck in the middle of the battlefield. Was there any space available to continue the war despite all these difficulties?, only time can answer all these questions, raised by the Author in this fiction work.

These are just some of the glimpses of what is known to be a humoungous volume of nearly 700 odd pages of book. Surely, if this book would have published in this modern era, it would have gone to unimaginable heights.

There lies in the beauty of the book. It captivates and holds you with such fervor that not for a moment do you think are in the present, but always a feeling that you are with them, seeing it, and feeling it. The master stroke lies in the last 15 pages of the book and a single paragraph of last 9 pages that describes the end of the war and its after effects. Every frame of the war between Pandavas and the Kauravas will stay on in the mind after you have read the book.

As I pondered at the end of the book, there is just one question. If this is what the author aimed at, I bow to him for, I too have changed. Emptiness beyond the deepest well had overtaken me too at the end of this fascinating book. Beyond the waves, the rain, the silence, laid the emptiness of having accompolished something. I was almost there to witness the silence of war, the thundering clouds, the violence of the rain and the anger of the waves upon the lands that fought the war in the name of Dharma. An empty feeling had overtaken me as I flipped the last page of the book.

My Rating: 5/5