Giving Voice to Voiceless: A Study of Dalit Literature

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One section of our society that has attracted the great attention of various scholars and activists during the last decade are the abased people who call themselves ‘Dalits’. The word ‘Dalit’ hails from Sanskrit language, meaning, suppressed, crushed, ground or broken to pieces. Gandhi Ji coined the word Harijans meaning ‘Children of God’ as a way of reverentially identifying the untouchables. The term ‘Scheduled Castes’ and Scheduled Tribes’ are the official terms used by Indian government documents to identify the untouchables and tribes. Earlier, a renowned Marathi social reformer Mahatma Jyotirao Phule used the term ‘Dalit’ to describe outcastes and untouchables as the oppressed and crushed victims of the Indian cast-ridden society. It is also believed that this usage was first devised by Dr. B. R. Ambedkar. But the term got its prevalence in 1970’s when the supporters of Dalit Panther Movement of Maharashtra used this term ‘Dalit’ as a continuous reminder of their age-old suppression, representing both their state of social deprivation and people who are exploited. But, at present time, the term ‘Dalit’ stands for those people who, have been considered ‘outcaste’, because they are not deserving enough to be included in the fourfold classification of class structure. In the religious scripture ‘Manu Smriti’; the ‘Varna system’ of the society is provided. It is a four graded Varna system incorporating four kinds of people of the society borne out of the body of Lord Brahma, the supreme God. According to this mythology, Brahmin was born out of head, Kshatriya was born out of arms, Vaishya was born out of abdomen and Shudra was born out of feet. It focused on Shudra to live a life of servitude; because he was born out of feet. Th...

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...ill to go a long way towards becoming a part of democratic society to be evolved so that their unique identity of Dalits or Scheduled Class gets dissolved in that civil society; which is supposed to be still in the process of making. Today, Dalit writers have their literary foundation with ideology and have political support also. Thus, the output of Dalit literature is growing day by day. And, we can hope, one day, it will establish itself as a most significant port of world literature.

Works Cited

Bagul.Baburao. “Dalit Literature Is But Human Literature” Poisoned Bread. Ed. Arjun Dangle.
Bombay: Orient Longman, 1992.
Clarke. Sathianathan.Dalits and Christianity: Subaltern Religion and Liberation Thelogy in India. New Delhi: OUP, 1998.
Dangle. Arjun. “ Dalit Literature: Past, Present and Future”. Poisoned Bread. Ed. Arjun
Dangle. Bombay: Orient Longman, 1992.

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