The Cost of Freedom
Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni’s latest book traces the history of India through the lives of ordinary women
WITH HER LATEST BOOK, Independence, Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni establishes her ease with writing women into history as with writing mythological feminist parables. The novel weighs the cost of independence as a historical question against a narrative of ambition, love and loss through the Ganguly sisters—Priya, Deepa, Jamini. Riven by the tumultuous events leading to Partition, their lives become a microcosm of the nation’s turbulence. Redemption only arrives through painstaking selfactualisation.
The story begins in the quiet village of Ranipur, West Bengal, in 1946. The compassionate but poor Nabakumar Ganguly, a doctor and freedom fighter, runs a clinic with his friend Dr Abdullah. His wife, Bina, supplements their income by stitching exquisite Kantha quilts that are sold in Calcutta. The strain of Nabakumar’s choices tells on their marriage. Bina asks, when men go off to be heroes, do they even realise what it does to the women they leave behind? His friend is the landowner Somnath Chowdhury, whose son Amit is besotted by his youngest daughter, the headstrong, ebullient Priya, who wants to be a doctor. Deepa, the eldest, is a luminous beauty in love with Abdullah’s nephew Raza, a Muslim League activist. The most oppressed of the three girls is Jamini, of crippled foot, jealous heart, and the painful awareness that she did not win life’s lottery.
Their life becomes perilous after Nabakumar is killed in the crossfire between Hindus and Muslims on Direct Action Day. The plot moves swiftly as the sisters’ lives traverse the bloody terrain leading to Partition. Deepa elopes with Raza to Dhaka, where he has become a prominent Muslim League member. She takes on a Muslim name and they pose as husband and wife to avoid scandal. She is promptly disowned by Bina. Priya does not clear the Calcutta Medical College examination due to gender bias and applies to a medical college in Philadelphia with Somnath’s help. When she asks Amit to wait for her return to get married, an enraged Amit breaks off their engagement. Jamini, who has a quiet burning love for Amit, rejoices, but cannot win his love. Amit finally marries her at Bina’s behest to preserve her honour after she is sexually assaulted during a riot. Love is a losing game; tragedy marks their lives.
Divakaruni explores women’s interiority and paints their desires and flaws with bold brushstrokes. In writing Jamini’s unlikability, the prose shines. Divakaruni adeptly builds narrative tension as the sisters’ lives intersect in unexpected ways. The plot culminates in a sensational rescue operation, tying up any loose threads. The novel is not simply a catalogue of loss, but narrates history through the suffering of ordinary women. Even as Divakaruni establishes herself firmly as a master storyteller, there remain minor glitches. An unexplained linguistic choice of avoiding commas seems at odds with the narrative. At times, the immersive, well-crafted plot sits uneasily against the whorl of historical events that sweep through the novel. What she does so effectively is map the centrality of women’s choices that grate against the orthodoxies of a society in transition, enabling an appraisal of how far we have come as an independent nation. ■
Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni explores women’s interiority and paints their desires and flaws with bold brushstrokes