Emergence of the New Indian Women: Shashi

Emergence of the New Indian Women: Shashi Desphande’s Novels

The writings of women writers are marked by concern for love, problems of the middle class, the unsavory treatment meted out to women by the society and the need for sensitivity in human relationships. The first generation of writers in Indo Anglican literature, like Kamala Markandaya, Anita Desai, Ruth Prawar Jhabvala, Bharathi Mukerjee and Nayantara Sehgal provided the necessary impetus, which is followed by an opulence of literary talent.

Of the second generation writers, Shashi Desphande displays her artistry and craftsmanship by dealing with the sensitive issues of the middle class educated Indian Women. The protagonists of all the three novels The Dark Holds no Terrors, Roots and Shadows and That Long Silence depict a picture of the new woman who is educated, intelligent, disciplined, mature and capable of bearing the stress and strain of life. Through her method of using the stream of consciousness technique along with the flash technique, Shashi Desphande reveals to us the socio-economic status of the middle class Indian women and their inner conflicts.

The protagonists of the three novels under study – Santa or Saru (as she is often referred to in the novel), Indu and Jaya are all educated women hailing from orthodox Brahmin families. All the three of them were mentally conditioned from childhood to accept their status in society as secondary to that of man’s.

In The Dark Holds no Terrors, protagonist Saru was unhappy as a child due to her mother’s discrimination in favor of her younger brother Dhruva. Dhruva was given importance, as he was a male child. In the Indian middle class family a male child is considered as an asset, as one who will look after his parents in their old age, propagate the family lineage and light the funeral pyre of his parents, whereas a girl child is considered as a liability and a burden which should be disposed off as quickly as possible through marriage.

Deprived of love in childhood Saru is elated when Manu expresses his love for her and marries him against her parent’s wishes. Her happiness is short lived as Manu begins to resent her superior status as a doctor. Her marriage, which begins well, starts deteriorating as her status as doctor starts ascending. Manu, a personification of the typical Indian male ego, is unable to accept the reversal of his status as Saru’s husband. This makes him assert his manhood through aggressive lovemaking in the nights. Terrified and humiliated Saru suffers the physical and mental torture silently. She even decides to give up her profession to restore peace and happiness in her marriage. But Manu points out to her that ‘there can be no going ’. ‘They have to go on’, as they cannot give up the comforts that they and their children are used to.

After analyzing her life lucidly, Sarita decides to confront Manu and take control of her life. She realizes that ‘her hell’ is within her and that it is up to her to exorcise the demons that had taken hold of her life. She also realizes that she is “so much more” than a mere daughter, sister or a wife and that she is predominantly a doctor. With this positive outlook she prepares to face the challenges of life.

The novel Roots and Shadows depicts very skillfully the transitional state of the contemporary Indian society and the new Indian woman’s resistance to conform to her orthodox environment. Indu the protagonist of the novel is also like Saru, an educated and an intelligent woman who is brought up in a traditional Brahmin family, which is controlled by a senior member of the family called “Akka”. Indu is stifled by Akka’s suffocating authority and the oppressive ambience at home.

Like Saru’s, Indu’s relatives too prepare her from her childhood to acknowledge the fact that as a female her status in society is subservient to that of a man’s. The women members of her family had reminded her at every stage of her life that she has to conform to the pattern of behavior expected of women in the society in order to survive.

Defying the traditional role she was expected to play, Indu seeks her liberation and fulfillment through education and career. She leaves home at the age of eighteen to pursue her education and later marries Jayant, a man from outside her caste. Marriage deteriorates Indus’s personality drastically. She who considered herself independent, intelligent and was proud of her logical thinking, becomes a typical submissive Indian woman after her marriage. Obsessed by her overwhelming love for her husband in the beginning, she would “think of him” always: “... Always what he wants. What he would like. What would please him.”

But when she finds out that Jayant is just another Indian male who takes his wife’s submission for granted and expects her to be a passive partner in sex without feelings or passion, Indu is disillusioned and hurt. Nevertheless, she tries to please him by suppressing herself.

Indu’s uncle tells her that the world is made up of interdependent parts and that one need not be ashamed of one’s attachments or one’s dependence on others. He makes her realize that freedom and fulfillment are achieved through the right perception of life. As Bhatnagar points out, Indu in the end comes to realize that freedom lies in having the courage to do what one believes is the right thing to do and the determination and tenacity to adhere to it; and that alone brings harmony in life.

In That long silence, the writer focuses her attention on the deafening silence of women who constitute half the human world, and especially on the women in Indian society where they are treated as unacknowledged source of labour, or mere “appendages” of man. The narration of Jaya’s life reveals how Jaya had vegetated for a period of seventeen years before understanding herself and mustering up the courage to speak out her thoughts.

That Long Silence is the story of a woman whose personality is trammeled by the constraints imposed on her by the male dominated Indian society. It gives us an insight into the feelings of women, their aspirations and their perceptions of love, marriage and life in general.

Unlike Saru and Indu who defy their respective families and marry for love, Jaya opts for an arranged marriage. But her marriage with Mohan turns her into a mindless automation whose only goal in life seems to project a veneer of a happy family, like the advertisements that are shown while watching a movie. She tries to conform to the role of a ‘soft, smiling, motherly woman’, whose ‘leit motif’ of life is “What, shall I make for breakfast, lunch, tea and dinner?” She even stifles her creativity in order to protect this perfect family picture she strives to project.

Like Saru and Indu, Jaya also is jolted out of her passivity when she goes to her Dadar flat in Bombay. Her introspection makes her realize that she cannot keep up the ‘masquerading’ any more. She had at times in the past felt that she ‘can’t go on’ and ‘can’t cope’ but did not give expression to these feelings because she feared she might hurt Mohan and jeopardize her marriage. He was her ‘sheltering tree’. She had been watering this tree with deceit and lies and had almost annihilated herself in the process of compromising at every stage of her life.

The factors that are responsible for Jaya’s deterioration are neither her husband, nor her publisher, nor the society. They are the deep-rooted fears that were embedded in her mind as a child. Until and unless Jaya expunges these fears, she cannot come alive as her true self. Jaya, therefore decides to cast away the mask of the meek, submissive, humourless house wife and mother and assert herself as the woman that she really is - a person with an independent and articulate mind. She realizes that she can achieve freedom and fulfillment only after she can erase the silence that is between Mohan and her and build a meaningful relationship based on true communication of minds. The novel ends on a positive note with Jaya looking forward to a meaningful life with her husband and children.

The Dark hold no Terrors, Roots and Shadows and That Long Silence–all the three novels–expose the psyche of a typical middle class Indian woman. The female children belonging to the middle class are taught to perceive themselves as being inferior to males. The discrimination and humiliation they experience in childhood make these children grow up with fears and complexes. They turn into self-effacing women who suffer silently the indignities and atrocities that are meted out to them by the male dominated society.

The protagonists of these three novels belong to the middle class Indian family and have been brought up like all the female children of this class to believe that their status in society is inferior to men. But they are different from their meek submissive counterparts as they are educated, intelligent and are modern in their attitude towards life. They are the new generation women who are seen emerging in the middle class Indian scenario. They have the courage to question meaningless marital relationships, the strength to take decisions concerning their own lives, assert their will to be treated as individuals on par with men and demand respect.

Saru, Indu and Jaya love their husbands passionately. They take extreme care not to hurt their male ego. They even ‘snip off’ parts of their personalities to please their husbands. Each one is ready to sacrifice her career to maintain peace and harmony in her relationship with her husband. In turn they only expect reciprocal love and respect, to be treated as individuals and not as ‘appendages’ by their husbands. Instead they receive indifference, pain and humiliation from them.

Saru’s bitter experience with her husband makes her scorn the word love: “love...how she scorned the word now there is no such thing between a man and a woman...Take away the word, the idea and concept will wither away”.

Indu’s humiliating relationship with her husband makes her feel that marriage is only a means to procreate and nothing more” “Behind the facade of romanticism, sentiments and tradition...two people are brought together to meet, mate and reproduce...so that the generations might continue”.

Jaya on the other hand clings to a loveless marriage, as she finds no other alternative. She sees her husband and herself as a ‘pair of bullocks yoked together’ who have to stay together for life: ‘... it is more comfortable for them to move in the same direction. To go in different directions would be painful and which animal would voluntarily choose pain’?

All the three women, disillusioned in love and marriage conclude after self­-examination that fulfillment in life is achieved only through the freedom of self. This is possible only when they can extricate themselves from the clutches of traditional upbringing and muster courage to live by the dictates of the self and not society.

Shashi Deshpande gives us an authentic picture of the conflict that torments the educated middle class women due to the dichotomy in their psyche. Although the novels are about suppressed women, Shashi Deshpande is not a hard-core feminist. She believes in striking a balance between the traditional expectations of the Indian woman and her modern needs. Explaining what she intends to convey through her novels, she says: “It’s necessary for women to live within relationships. But if the rules are rigidly laid that as a wife or mother, you do this and no further, then one becomes unhappy. This is what I have tried to convey in my writings, what I don’t’ agree with is the idealization of motherhood - the false and sentimental notes that accompany it”.

The three protagonists of Sashi Deshpande reflect the spirit of the times. The influx of western spirit and the need for fulfillment of one’s potential both intellectually and emotionally. These women who are intelligent, resourceful and emotionally mature shatter the image of the middle class Indian woman as a weak and voiceless creature. They suffer much but emerge stronger from their experience. They are very good illustrations of the new Indian women who represent a new ethic and a new mode of life.