The fantastic, authentic world of Rupi Baskey
Hansda Sowvendra Shekhar speaks to Aditya Mani Jha about his experiences as a medical officer in Jharkhand, which helped construct the universe of his recently published novel.
ou’re a medical officer based out of Jharkhand. I couldn’t help but notice the way you have approached the scene( s) where Rupi and Sido visit a doctor. Sido, in particular, is confused, skeptical and probably a little in awe of modern medicine, even though women dying in childbirth are apparently common in the Kadamdihi of the novel. This is the sort of reaction, I imagine, a typical city-slicker would have if/when confronted with witchcraft of the sort Gurubari and co. practise. Tell us a little about your personal experience with Santhals and medicine. A.
It’s right. Sido is, indeed, in awe of modern medicine. I wanted Sido’s reaction to be that way, because you see, Sido is from a village. He’s had an opportunity to gain some education and that he did. That education brought him almost at par with the non-Adivasi communities which have been the haves so far, with their exposure to education and a refined way of life. On the inside, however, Sido is an ordinary Santhal man from a village. The time when he takes Rupi to the doctors must be — in the novel — in the 1980s or the 1990s. I don’t know how many Santhals were welleducated, with well-paying jobs and well-settled in urban centres during that perios. In Ghatsila where I grew up and have set my novel, I don’t remember seeing too many Santhals in enviable positions. They were still growing. Santhal children were going to school, young individuals were getting into good jobs, but not too many. I wanted Sido’s visit to the doctor, to the various doctors, demonstrate the situation of the Santhals during that time. Sido’s skepticism, the sense of awe he feels towards each doctor, it was the typical reaction of a man who has never been exposed to modern medicine and who, all of a sudden, finds himself amidst doctors, amidst modern medicine, amidst all those pathological tests, and he doesn’t know how to react. It’s all too new to him, but he feels that it is the right thing because all educated people do it. He believes that all educated people, when they fall ill, they go to a doctor. So he holds doctors in high regard and is, therefore, quite anxious. He starts losing faith though later on. And this is where his scepticism is justified. During my tenure at the medical college hospital and also from my days at this district town in the Santhal Pargana area where I am working as a medical officer, I have seen Santhals from villages — and not only Santhals, but most people from villages — approach doctors in a hospital with awe and skepticism. They don’t know what to expect from a doctor. They don’t know how to relate their difficulties to a doctor or a nurse or any other health and medical personnel. The Santhals don’t know how to give a proper history of their complaint and it is often the job of a doctor or nurse to draw out the history of their ailments.
Q. A lot of men in the novel are seemingly addicted to their hooch — their productivity is suspect at best. Dulari says late in the novel, “The men are never home when one needs them (…)” Is the prevalence of “dahni- bidya” (witchcraft) in Kadamdihi, then, also a sort of feminist reaction to the lazy, perennially drunk and often philandering men these witches see all around them? A.
Before I answer this question, I would like to make it clear that the women in my novel are not stronger than the men, and the men aren’t weaker than the women. I see them as equals. Just as men and women are equal in the Santhal society. As such, I don’t see any reaction — or any event or occurrence — as being feminist. The strength that the women display — all women, and not only those who are witches — is because they are strong. Their strength is not meant to be some kind of a statement. And the dahnibidya should not at all be seen as a feminist reaction or a statement or anything of this sort because even those women who are apparently clean, who are not witches, even those women are strong. Even in the face of severe adversity, they don’t let their strength leave them. They fight back. Isn’t Rupi strong? She is. And she is not a witch. Wasn’t Dulari, before she turned to witchcraft, strong? She was. Wasn’t Della strong? She was. And she was not a witch. Witchcraft is an important plot element in my novel, but it isn’t some kind of a feminist reaction.
Q. The politics discussed in the novel are like a faraway loudspeaker, bringing only muffled words. Khorda seems to be the exception among the men of Kadamdihi — he educates them about events like the Kharsawan massacre of
The politics discussed in the novel seems like a faraway loudspeaker because it was not in the original draft that I had written and submitted to Aleph. The politics discussed in the novel seems like a faraway loudspeaker because it was not in the original draft that I had written and submitted to Aleph.
1948, “in which more than a thousand Adivasis were killed”. Why do you think there is such widespread ignorance — both outside and within the Santhal community — about horrific events like this? A.
The politics discussed in the novel seems like a faraway loudspeaker because it was not in the original draft that I had written and submitted to Aleph. The political events were put during the editing phase so that the readers could have an idea of the time when this novel is set and the time period over which the story takes place. While I was working with Aleph, we were aware that not many people know about Jharkhand and Santhals and that this book is, perhaps, the first novel in English language to be set entirely among Santhals, the first novel which tells a Santhal story, and published by a mainstream publisher like Aleph Book Company. In order to make the subject more familiar it had to be put within a timeframe. When I was required to do this, I asked myself: Why don’t I put the events in the history of Jharkhand against the events in my story? That would make the story more interesting, that would give the readers — many of whom would be reading about Jharkhand and about Santhals for the first time — an insight into Jharkhand and into the lives of the Santhals, apart from putting the story in a particular place and time. I couldn’t do it entirely, I was sure, and I wasn’t aiming to tell the history of Jharkhand or of the Santhals. I just wanted to tell a story, the story of Rupi Baskey and her mysterious ailment. The politics in the background was just to give a certain form to the story. Hence, the faraway loudspeaker feel. The politics is supposed to support the story; the story is not about politics.
About the widespread ignorance outside the community, this massacre was carried out by the police. The police was of the then government of Bihar. When it was a massacre carried out by a state government in free India, by a government run by non-Adivasis, why would anyone remember it? When General Dyer carried out the massacre at the Jallianwala Bagh, we remember it because it was a foreigner who killed the Sikhs and the Hindus — the Indians. In the case of the Kharsawan massacre of 1948, Indians killed Indians, the non-Adivasi government of Bihar killed the Adivasis—the Santhals, the Hos, the Mundas. So why would anyone remember it? Perhaps Sikhs and Hindus are more important than Adivasis.
Q. Finally, tell me a little about the making of the book — how involved were you with the cover? (Everyone has loved the production quality and the lovely green-and-yellow theme — to me, it brings out Jharkhand’s beauty perfectly) A.
Thank you so much for liking the cover. It is the work of designer and calligraphy artist Nikheel Aphale. He has also designed other covers for Aleph. The calligraphy is Nikheel’s signature. I finished writing the book in about four to five months. I began in May 2011 and finished in October 2011. Anurag Basnet, my editor at Aleph, had a vision for the book. And, of course, we had Ravi Singh guiding us. Anurag did not want the book to be exotic. I had to delete and re-write several parts because of this, so that the book could have a normal, natural feel, as if it is just any other book and not a book set in a Santhal village and among the Santhals. anew in our newborn. In other words, was there a celestial crossover of souls?
Of course not! How can one entertain such thoughts? The first time my mother uttered such notions, I told her to stop. She, obedient, did. But I know the feeling lurks in her. As it does in me.
Late some nights, when the house has fallen asleep, I have stared at my boy’s face. “Baba, give me a sign.” There has been none, at least not ostensibly. Robi-Jo giggled when he was 12 days old. Lying on my chest, he raised his neck slightly and smiled, the most delightful toothless grin that turned into a chuckle. His uncle, Georgie’s brother, captured the moment on camera. I had proof that my boy was doing something out of the ordinary. ut of the ordinary! Could it be? Several nights I lie next to him and urge him to smile hoping that from the widening of his mouth, the crooking of his eyes, I will glean something other worldly.
My father’s smile was infectious. He would come home and taking off his shoes in the verandah, would stand holding both sides of the door, smiling at me. I would run to him and he would scoop me up in his arms. We hugged.
Both my parents told me this story. My father was a travelling salesman working for a medicine company and I was born in a small t own i n North Bengal where he was posted. Each month, he would travel, sometimes for a night or two, sometimes f or weeks. Once, he had been away for a particularly long stretch. It is said that he came home late at night. I was asleep but jumped up at his voice. He held his arms out and I rushed into him. And I cried and cried. All of a few months, I learnt the unfathomable sadness of separation. I still cry. But unlike the first time, there is no one to scoop me up. Instead, now, I do the scooping. And the little one gurgles in delight.
Sometime during my teenage years, just growing out of the protective cocoon of home and encountering Camus and Kafka, Brecht and Genet, I had asked baba what rebirth meant. Did he really believe in such tosh?
I remember his words well. “It is nothing but the passing of tradition, Somu. My ideals, my thoughts and beliefs find place in you. In your son, the same will carry on. That’s rebirth.”
Welcome Robi-Jo Manas Batabyal.
OLate some nights, when the house has fallen asleep, I have stared at my boy’s face. “Baba, give me a sign.” There has been none, at least not ostensibly. Robi-Jo giggled when he was 12 days old. Lying on my chest, he raised his neck slightly and smiled, the most delightful toothless grin that turned into a cuckle. His uncle, Georgie’s brother, captured the moment on camera. I had proof that my boy was doing something out of the ordinary.
Somnath Batabyal is a backpacking social theorist. When not travelling, he teaches at SOAS, University of London.