HUMANISM IN COOLIE AND UNTOUCHABLE

INTRODUCTION

MULK RAJ Anand: His Life and Work

Mulk Raj Anand was born on 12^th December 1905 in Peshawar. He graduated with honors from Khalsa College, Amritsar in 1924. He went to England and studied at University College London and Cambridge University. He completed his PhD in 1929. Mulk Raj Anand also studied and later lectured at League of Nations School of Intellectual Cooperation in Geneva. Between 1932 and 1945, he lectured intermittently at worker Educational Association in London.

Mulk Raj Anand was initiated into the literary career by a family tragedy, instigated by the rigidity by the caste system. Anand’s first prose essay was a response to the suicide of an aunt, who had been excommunicated by his family for sharing a meal with a Muslim.

In 1930’s and 1940’s Mulk Raj Anand divided his time between London and India. He joined the struggle for independence, but also fought with the Republicans in the Spanish Civil War. After the war, Anand returned permanently to India and settled in Bombay. In 1946, he founded the Fine-Arts Magazine Marg. He also became the director of Kutub publishers. From 1948 to 1966, Anand taught at Indian Universities. Mulk Raj Anand was the fine arts chairman at Lalit Kala Academy (National Academy of Arts) from 1965 to 1970. In 1970, he became President of Lokayuta Trust, for creating a community and cultural centre in the village of Hauz Khas, New Delhi.

Mulk Raj Anand was an Indian novelist, and short story writer. He was among the first writers to incorporate Punjabi and Hindustani idioms into English. His stories depicted a realistic and sympathetic portrait of the poor in India. He was the first Indian novelist to make an untouchable, the hero of a novel.

Untouchable is Anand’s first novel and his most compact and artistically satisfying work. This novel describes one day in the life of 18-year-old Bakha, who is treated like dirt by all Hindus just because his profession is to clean latrines. Artistically, it is the most perfect of anand’s earlier novels. The distinction of anand’s writings lies in capturing Bakha’s work ethics- Bakha tackles his odious job with a conscientiousness that invests his movements with beauty.

The next novel coolie has a wider canvas and is more diffuse in structure. Munoo, a young orphan, works at a variety of odd jobs at Daulatpur, Bombay and Simla till he dies at age 15 of tuberculosis brought on by undernourishment. Munoo is exploited not because of his caste but because he is poor.

While Untouchable and Coolie are epic novels Two leaves and a bud is a dramatic novel about the plight of the laborers in a tea plantation in Assam; the novel fails because Anand’s approach is too simplistic; the English owners are shown as unmitigated villains. Anand’s next work was The Lal Singh Trilogy (group of three novels)-The Village, Across the Black Waters, The Sword and The Sickle.

The Big Heart (1945), one of Anand’s best novels deals with the traditional coppersmith who feel threatened by mechanization.

The Private Life of An Indian Prince (1953), a study of neurotic maharajah is confused and disorganized. It is also considered as his best novel.

The Seven Summers (1951), is a lyrical account of early childhood, primarily from the child’s point of view.

Morning Face (1968), describes the life of the protagonist, Krishna Chander Azad up to the age of 15, and we get a vivid picture of the brutality that once passed for school teaching.

Anand has about seventy short stories to his credit published in six collections from time to time all through his career. These collections are: The Lost Child and Other Stories(1934), The Tractor and The Corn Goddess and Other Stories(1947), Reflections on The Golden Bed and Other Stories(1953), The Power of Darkness and Other Stories(1959), Lajwanti and Other Stories(1966) and Between Tears and Laughter(1973). In addition to these also retold old Indian tales in two collections Indian Fairy Tales (1946) and More Indian Fairy Tales (1961).

In The Lost Child and Other Stories, the author gives the expression to the feelings of the human heart and its indomitable spirit to know and conquer. The Barber’s Trade Union and Other Stories (1944) is the expression of universal feeling of the human heart, expression of the sufferings of Indian during the freedom struggle.

In The Tractor and The Corn Goddess (1947), most stories depicts universal human feelings. In his second book A Lament on the Death of a master of Arts (1939), which is a long story, we see the physical and mental sufferings of an Indian youth in peculiar Indian situation, where people regard physical labor as undignified.

“The Price of Bananas” and “A Promoter of Quarrels” show a coolie, a fruit vendor and a pair of cowherd. Women respectively, under paid and cheated by the haves. In “Boots”, the young widow of a dead soldier is not allowed even to keep his boots as a momento, when the house is auctions. Other stories which reveals Anand’s typical concern with lower ranks of the society are “Birth”, “The Prodigal Son”,” The Tractor” and “The Corn Goddess”.

A dominant feature of Anand’s novels is that he frequently refers to the concepts of life as journey. Every one of his protagonists takes some sort of journey and the heroes symbolize the different stages in the spiritual journey of a pilgrim. In his novels, we can see the realistic presentation of life and he also presents the ugly and seamy side of life.

Anand is a humanist; a proletarian or Marxist humanist who does not believe in the theory of Arts for arts sake but writes for the sake of life. He is a born storyteller and he can narrate a tale grippingly and convincingly.

HUMANISM

The word “Humanism” has a number of meanings and because authors and speakers do not clarify which meaning, they intend. There are different types of Humanism -- Literary Humanism, Renaissance Humanism, Cultural Humanism, Philosophical Humanism, Christian Humanism, Modern Humanism, Secular Humanism, Religious Humanism etc.

Humanism is one of those philosophies for people who think for themselves. There is no area of thought that a humanist is afraid to challenge and explore. It’s a philosophy focused upon human means for comprehending reality. It’s a philosophy of reason and science in pursuit of knowledge. Therefore when it comes to the question of the most valid means for acquiring knowledge of the world. Humanists reject arbitrary faith, authority, revelation and altered state of consciousness. It is regarded as a philosophy of imagination, compassion etc.

Humanism is a realistic philosophy. Humanism is the philosophy for those in love with life. Humanists take responsibility for their own lives and relish the adventure of being part of new discoveries seeking new knowledge and exploring new options.

Humanism is a way of looking at the world by emphasizing the importance of human beings- their nature and place in the universe. Humanism means love of man with all his weaknesses, instincts and impulses. It may be defined as system of thought in which human interest, values and dignity are held dominant.

Humanism implies devotion to the concerns of humankind it is an attitude that concentrates on the activities of man more than the super natural world, the world of nature or so called animal kingdom. There have been many varieties of humanism, both religious and non-religious. But all the humanists agree that people are the centers of their study.

Humanism teaches that every person has dignity and worth and therefore should command the respect of every other person. Finally, in its most general application humanism may mean any philosophical or ethical system centered on the concept of dignity and freedom of man.

The ideals of the study humanitatis were developed by antiquity, first in the great age of Greece, and subsequently in the adaptation of Greek thought to Roman education especially in the work of Cicero and Quintilian. This classical tradition was newer wholly and in Western thought and continued to exert a pervasive influence during the middle ages.

Although humanism had its roots in the life and thought of ancient Greece and Rome, it flourished as a historical movement in Europe from the 1300’s to the 1500’s. It approach to the study of humanity formed the intellectual core of the cultural reawakening called Renaissance. The humanistic attitude towards life has continued to the present day.

The humanistic movement in the early Renaissance began with the exciting rediscovery of the writings of the classical Greeks and Roman. These writings had either been unknown in the Europe since the decline of Roman Empire. The humanists were interested in the ancient classics not only because they were models of literary style, but also because they were the guidelines to the understanding of life. This understanding was in contrast to the emphasis of many medieval scholars, who taught that life on earth should be devoted to earn a place in heaven.

Humanists rejected their view of sinful nature of humanity. This fresh way of looking at life during the revival of learning began in Italy in the 1300’s and spread to France, Germany, Netherlands and England. At its height in the 1500’s, Humanism was an international fellowship of scholars.

Much of modern western culture comes from humanistic achievements. The spirit and goals of humanism still influence the arts, education and governments. Most early humanists were religious. But the main drift of their work led away from the ascetic of their world and its pleasures. Instead, the humanists urged a more robust recognition of the realities of human nature.

Humanistic literature is realistic, critical and often humorous. The Italian humanist poet Petrarch portrayed the Laura of his sonnets as a real women, not medieval, religious symbol. The brilliant Dutch humanist Erasmus was a priest who tried to find common elements in Greek philosophy and Christian thought. However, his great work “The price of folly” was a witty and satiric criticism of kings and churchmen as well as recognition of general human error.

Anand’s humanism may be defined as, “A system of thought in which human interest, values and dignity are held dominant. Humanism implies devotion to the concerns of mankind, it is an attitude that concentrates on the activities of man rather than on the super natural world, the world of nature or so called animal kingdom”. Historically humanism is a Renaissance doctrine, which stresses the essential worth, dignity and the greatness of man as contrasted with an older view that man is wicked, worthless and doomed to destruction both in his life and in that come. Anand’s humanism makes him use his arts for the service of humanity.

Anand has often expressed himself in favour of humanism. The nature of Anand’s humanism, it must be admitted, derives its strength from both eastern and western thought. Prof.Kantak opines that the most common form of the new morality might take is the kind of Western type humanism, which is seen at its best in Anand. But Anand time and again has stated that he rejected all kinds of system and categories of philosophy that are the basis of Western humanism.

Instead, he arrived at philosophy of human person, a philosophy of concrete living and suffering which is likely to augur a new awareness. As student philosophy and more, significantly a perspective critic of life and reality, Anand gives an individual stance to his vision of man trapped in a milieu, which is burdened with a part full of stratifications and contradictions.

Anand is a great humanist. His insistence on the dignity of man irrespective caste, creed and wealth, his plea for the practice of compassion as a living value, his conception of the whole man, the profound importance the attaches to art and poetry as instrument for developing whole men, his crusade against superstition, feudalism and imperialism are some of the chief characteristic of Anand’s humanism. Like true humanist, he rejects God, fate, religion, past and future. He believes in the supremacy of man.

And like most other humanists starts with a declaration of his immense faith in Protagorean dictum, ‘Man is the measure of all things’. Anand admires man and believes that man is the maker and breaker of worlds. However, this admiration does not bind him to man’s weakness. He does take cognizance of man’s greed, lust, selfishness, cruelty and uncertainty. He has a genuine respect for man, love for him and faith in his ability to live a life full of dignity.

According to Anand, man can solve his many problems with the help of imagination, reason and advancements of science. The theme of his work is the whole man and the whole gamut of human relationship. To him highest reality in the world is ‘the whole man’ and not God and the supernatural.

Since he believes that man is the master of his destiny, he refuses to believe in fatalism, a malady that has plagued the Indian masses for centuries. Fatalism weakens man’s faith in self and insidiously persuades him to become a passive dependent on unseen and non-existent forces. So naturally, fatalism is an essentially non-humanistic concept. According to him, casteism is heinous crime and a severe blow to the concept of the dignity of man. So casteism must be rejected.

Anand’s humanism recognized the fact that the pain and cruelty are two other serious maladies of the universe. Nevertheless, it is not unavoidable. However, with aid of advancing science and technology, and with practice of love and compassion for the weak and low, it is possible to reduce and even remove misery and unhappiness.

To him, education is a powerful instrument for social reconstruction. In his opinion, the conquest of pain should be the supreme goal of all individuals and all nations. He believes that belief in the brotherhood of men is a great virtue, which needs to be sincerely practiced by all.

Anand’s philosophy of humanism is a deep rooted enemy of Fascism, Feudalism, Imperialism and all other similar tendencies, which come in the way of man’s efforts to achieve freedom. In his opinion, these are the forces, which divide men into faction and classes, so it must be eschewed. His philosophy believes in democracy, socialism, and the peaceful co-existence of all nations etc. he further says that all people must have freedom- social, economic, political, intellectual and emotional- without any encroachment up on each other’s freedom.

Bigoted and parochial nationalism means only more war and no one who has had knowledge of the vast destructive capacities of super scientific weapons can desire war. According to Anand, art and science are complementary faculties. They should together endeavor to make man happier and nobler.

Salient aspects of Anand’s humanism are as follows:

• The highest reality in the world is man, ‘the whole man’ and not God and the supernatural. There is no life hereafter and man has only here and now.
• Institutionalized religion, therefore, is a matter best left to individual preference.
• Man’s highest duty is to realize his full potential for a complete life. This can be achieved by the acceptance of the principles of perfect equality between man and woman the brotherhood of all man, and the right of every person to enjoy social, economic, political, intellectual and economic freedom.
• The forces that come in the way of achieving this ideal are the various kinds of barriers that separate men- differences in nationality, culture, religion, creed and caste; the numerous forms of exploitation of man by man, such as Capitalism, Colonialism, Fascism, Feudalism, Communalism etc. these forces must be effectively destroyed.
• The forces through which man can achieve his ideal of a full and happy life in an international community.

The characteristics of Anand’s humanism tell that the highest potential of man is his own sanction, not God. Man is the master of his destiny; so fatalism is rejected. All people must have liberty and equality. War is a deadly evil. It must be avoided if mankind is to survive at all. There is no god and there is no supernatural. Religion is a matter, which needs to be left to the private conscience of the individual and should not be classified into empty rituals and meaningless customs.

CHAPTER 2

HUMANISM IN UNTOUCHABLE

Untouchable, brings to light the sufferings and sorrows that the Hindu caste system inflict on the untouchables and outcastes through a poor sweeper boy, Bakha. To comment on Bakha, who is the pariah protagonist of the novel, namely “They think we are mere dirt because we clean their dirt” (39) sums up Anand’s understanding of the grim realities of India’s social life.

Anand portrays Bakha as a sensitive outsider introducing him as the most conspicuous man in the out caste colony. He has a sort of dignity, wonderful wholeness of body and nobility which does quite fit in with his filthy profession. The animal imagery in his description is a device to hint that Bakha is an amoral victim of the society, which treats him just as a butcher might treat a dog sniffing round his shop.

He is a tiger at bay, an enmeshed lion and a wild horse. He is extremely sensitive and his aspiration includes a decent life with a good education. He wants to be treated as a human being.

In spite of his good merits he is insulted and put beyond the possibility of proper recognition. Several incidents in the novel explains this fact. The high caste priest’s vulgarity, the inhumanity of the crowd delighting in his humiliation and finally the rebuff for his purely selfless act of saving the injured boy, have all made it clear to him that though he is in the society, he is not of it.

When in the midst of the crowd, “his first impulse was to run [….], but then he realized that he was surrounded by a barrier not a physical barrier but a moral one” (56). He realizes that it was not possible to “overstep the barriers which the conventions of his superiors had built up to protect their weakness against him” (75). He experiences the profound sense of alienation when he ids in the sea of humanity waiting for Gandhi.

There was an inseparable barrier between himself and the crowd, the barrier of caste. Her was a part of consciousness, which he could share and yet not understand. He had been lifted from the gutter, through the barriers of space, to partake of life which was his and yet not his. He was in the midst of a humanity, which included him in its folds and gets debarred him from entering into a sentient living, quivering contact with it (155).

The living contact is impossible with in his narrow circle. He cannot even share his views with his stupid, slavish father who “was as good as dead, a putrefying corpse like that of a stray dog or cat on the rubbish heap” (96). He finds that he has no way out. He wished himself dead.

This novel Untouchable expresses his belief in the dictum ‘man is the measure of all things’. To him man is able to remove the misery and unhappiness in the society with the aid of advancing science and technology and with the practice of love and compassion for the weak and low. But in the case of Bakha, man is the root cause of his problems and sufferings.

According to Anand, casteism is a heinous crime and it is realistically portrayed in this novel. It is a sociological novel, and it is concerned with the injustices and exploitation to which one large section of the Hindu society is subjected by the other section enjoying a higher status in the social hierarchy. The novel is about the life of the untouchables, who have been the victims of the social injustices of oppression and exploitation. It deals not merely with the life and suffering of one individual, Bakha, but through Bakha, it presents before a gigantic problem of Hindu society.

This untouchable Bakha is almost always a dispossessed man, deprived even of the basic right to live like a human being in freedom, honor and dignity, in utter poverty and isolation, though. The innate creative impulse in him chocked his sensitiveness to beauty strangled and his tenderness or love crushed. Yet, the resilience of his spirit cannot be broken; it has remained in fact, despite centuries of oppression, holding out a promise for the future of humanity.

Anand as true humanist, rejected fate or God. In his belief, the root cause for the sufferings for Bakha is not fate, but the cruelties of mankind. They considered him as an inferior to their caste. Instead of creating a brotherhood affection to him, they treat him only as untouchable. The following quote taken from Untouchable where in we read about the lady, at whose doorstep Bakha was at rest, treats the so-called Sadhu passing through the alley and Baksha who has to plead for his bread after sweeping the alley, is a telling illustration of two contrasting and attitudes:

‘Bham, bham, bhole Nath’ cried the Sadhu in the particular lingo of Sadhuhood, shaking the bangles of his arms, which brought two women rushing to the terraces of their housetops.

‘I am bringing the food’, Sadhuji shouted the lady at whose doorstep Baksha was at rest. But she stopped short when she saw the sweeper’s body knotted upon the wooden platform outside her house.

‘Vay, eater of your masters’, she shouted, ‘may you perish and die. You have defiled my house! Go! Get up! Eater of your master! Why didn’t shout if you wanted food! Is this your father’s house that you come and rest here?’ (80)

The series of humiliation Bakha endures within a span of a day in his life denote and connote Bakha’s life as one of blighted hopes and despair. As insults reach the peak with the shouts of “polluted”- polluted by the high caste Hindu devotees within the precincts of the temple, Bakha’s rage- the rage of a lion in a cage not only reflects his pathetic state of helplessness but also the ogriesh nature of jati-system that decimates human worth.

Anand later enhances Bakha’s religious stature by placing Bakha in confrontation with Colonel Hutchinson, the chief of the Salvation Army, whose portrait is a masterpiece of satire on Christian missionary activity. He behaves like a clown and his main job was to proselytize the natives into Christianity. We are given a chance to have a glimpse of his sensation- loving wife shouting at the husband and making fun of his missionary work. Bakha showed himself too strong in will foe the missionary’s manoeuvres. He thought he was happy with the religion of his father who similarly had occasion to resist the missionary in his time thinking that the religion and his fervour of devotion that are placed in contrast to the barbaric treatment he received from the caste Hindu.

As a humanist, he believes that man can solve the problem by universal brotherhood love and compassion. Even though the high caste Hindus considered him only as an untouchable, there are also good fellows life Havildar Chart Singh, who gives much love and consideration to him. The Tommies also treated him like a human being, while to the caste Hindu, he is untouchable. Prof. S.Laxmana Murthy quotes the words of Anand that, “the tragedy of my hero (Bakha) lay in the fact that he was never allowed to attain anything near the potential of his qualities of manhood” (167).

Bakha’s world is much too narrow for his aspirations. So he longs for a new world. Anand in the conclusion of Untouchable subtly examines the various possible solutions religious conversion, rapid industrialization and the Gandhian way. The emphasis on the Hutchinson’s religion is on sin, love and equality of birth where as it is on cleanliness, morality and dignity of work in Gandhi’s approach to the problem of the emancipation of the untouchables. Of these, Bakha likes only the idea of cleanliness and equality but he feels flattered by Gandhi’s sympathy.

It is only the third solution offered by the poet, Iqbal Nath Sarshar that engages Bakha’s attention- the flush system, Anand appears to believe that the rapid industrialization alone would pave a way for secular situation and introduces flush system as a desire image of the change. He is unhappy with Hutchinson’s religious program of equality by conversion. He is equally skeptical of the slow regeneration of the traditional Hindu society in the Gandhian way. Bakha’s hopes lie in machines. “Perhaps I can find the poet on the way and ask him about the machine” (178).

In Untouchable, Anand creates a character who is seeking identity for himself in a world which has for ages suppressed his kind- a degrading social ill against which philosophers, poets and reformers have fought over a thousand years.

Anand’s heroes are always living and adjusting with the present and struggling for the future. They do not defy the codes set for them immediately; rather they want the codes to be changed by the oppressors.

CHAPTER 3

HUMANISM IN COOLIE

The best fictional treatment of Anand’s humanism can be seen in his first novel Untouchable and in the second novel Coolie. Coolie is a proletarian novel depicting the tragic plight of the millions of coolies who are landless and run away from hunger and starvation of villages. Thus driven by poverty, they become coolies and laborers only to be victimized by the social forces of exploitation, Capitalism and Industrialism and then die somewhere in a corner, unknown and unwept.

Coolie is the narrative of life and death of a coolie, Munoo, over a period of two years. In Coolie as in other novels, Anand is not only a realist but a social reformer also. Naturally, he preaches for the betterment of the lot of persons like Munoo. His tragedy is Anand’s passionate plea for reform. Humanism is his answer to this problem. This is expressed through typical situations and characters.

Coolie expresses his belief in the essential dignity of man whether he belongs to the rich or the poor class. In this novel, he selects a poor boy, Munoo, as the hero, and he dominates this novel from the beginning to the end. To Anand the pain and suffering from universal brotherhood, love and compassion. His life is full of sufferings and in the beginning of the novel itself; we can see how his aunt Gujri ill-treats him.

‘Munoo Ohe Munooa!’, she called again, exasperated and raising her voice, this time, to the highest pitch to which, in her anger and hate, she could carry it: ‘where have you died? Where have you gone, you ominous orphan? Come back and begone!’ the piercing soprano resounded through the valley and fell on Munoo’s ears with the dreadening effect of all its bitter content (1).

If his aunt Gujri and his Bibi Uttam Kaur treated him with love and compassion, his tragedy would have been avoided. In his adventure, Munoo meets not only cruel and bad people but also kind and good fellows like Prabha Dayal and his wife in Daulatpur, Chota Babu in Sham Nagar and Ratan in Bombay. For example, when he first met Prabha Dayal, by neglecting the advice of his partner, Ganesh, he patted the boy on his back and said, “Come, come now, be a brave lad. Wipe your eyes. We will take care of you. Look we are almost nearing Daulatpur” (64).

Anand’s philosophy of humanism rejected fatalism and it gives importance to man and his ability. According to Anand, Munoo suffers not because of fate but because of society. It is the society, which leads him to his tragic end. Unlike Bakha in “Untouchable”, Munoo was of the high caste; because of the poverty, the society did not consider him as a human being. Early in the novel he realized the truth that;

Whether there were mere rich or more poor people, there seemed to be only two kinds of people in the world. Caste did not matter. ‘I am a Kshatriya and I am poor. No, caste does not matter. The Babus are like the sahib-dogs, and all servants look alike. There must only be two kinds of people in the world: the rich and the poor’ (55-56).

Anand clearly shows that he had met more persons like Dr.Prem Chand, Seth Prabha, Ratan and they considered him as a human being, an object of pity and love. But social forces of capitalism and industrialism are stronger than the stray individuals. They victimize Munoo, as he has no economic freedom or prosperity. He allows himself to be exploited because of his hunger and poverty.

In Coolie Anand rejects the concept of Karma which is a mask for other evils in Indian society. According to Indian belief one gets rebirth on the basis of his previous Karma. The privileged people are superior and the underdogs are inferior because of this. Munoo has a traditional sense of inferiority. Anand shows his humanistic faith that man is the master of his destiny. Munoo has great ambitions about life. However, he is treated only as a beast of burden. To Anand the only solution to this problem is humanism- a creed of love.

As a consequence of the growing rural indebtedness and unemployment, Munoo is forced to migrate to the town in search of employment. When Munoo first enters to the market in Daulatpur, he is baffled by the maddening competition in the labor market. He is amazed to see so wild “a rush for the jobs by the fall and hefty and coolies” (138). It is this insecurity and uncertainty of employment that forces Munoo to come to Bombay. Even here, they are exploited by the indigenous as well as foreign capitalists.

Humanism as a philosophy runs as red thread throughout Coolie. Compassion for the poor is the major strain in his treatment of his themes. This is his message to the suffering humanity. Munoo’s tragedy is universalized and the human element in men of low class is brought out by showing their essential dignity and innocence. Coolie is a novel of social protest. The anger with which he has portrayed Munoo’s sufferings and exploitation is a direct expression of love of man, a basic tenet of his humanism.

Although all his novels present him as a humanist, his earlier novels including Coolie revealed what may be called proletarian humanism. As he observed, “it is true that my humanism seems to be biased in favor of the poor and the oppressed, but, then is there not the example of the man who turned towards the woman taken adultery away from those who sought to condemn her”.

CHAPTER 4

CONCLUSION

Anand, who is the champion of the underdog, has always written to emphasize the essential dignity of man and to arouse compassion and love to the oppressed and downtrodden in the hearts of the readers. His belief in the humanism makes him a novelist with a mission, his mission being to write for the betterment and uplifting of the underdog of the society. To him a truly humanist art is commensurate with needs of our time.

His philosophy of humanism is the result of his conscious need to help the peasants, coolies and the suppressed members of the society by developing in them human dignity and self-awareness. He writes for the sake of man, for refining and ennobling him and for inspiring him into action calculated to achieve the well-being of mankind as a whole.

Anand’s humanism is the focal point of his fiction. He is a novelist of the under dogs, a champion of the poor, almost as great as Dickens. The bottom dogs of the Indian society are heroes of his novels- a sweeper, a coolie, a laborer, a villager but all them are human. He had become aware of the religious hypocrisy and bigotry in Indian society and of his injustices thriving on anachronistic practices such as untouchability, on feudalism and exploitation of the have-nots by the haves. He wants to eradicate these social problems by criticizing it through his novels. It makes him essentially a novelist of the lower class, a lyricist of their sorrows and joy. To him novel is an instrument of his humanism, the enlightenment of man and the betterment of his a lot.

Through his works, he also expresses his love, sympathy and compassion for the socially inferior classes. All the novels and short stories that he has written show his chief aim is to highlight the various social problems of Indian society. His chief motive is to use the art for the amelioration of Indian underdog.

From Untouchable to Morning Face Anand consistently adheres to his aim of projecting the life of the underdog and making Indians aware of these traditional view that hamper them from becoming a progressive and modern India. Both Untouchable and Coolie deal with the social injustices of his own time and through this he wants to eradicate these problems.

Through his novels, Anand portrays the outcastes’ intense struggle with the oppressive forces. Of these, only Bakha strikes a positive note, for the rebel in him succeeds to a small yet significant extent. Munoo mostly runs away from the oppressive environment, because in his case, the area and intensity of oppression are of longer dimensions. But, that he is too capable of coming to grip with reality so that he might transcend it, is indicated by the fact that when he dies he clutches at Mohan’s hand. Thus, Bakha and Munoo represent the two faces of the archetypal figure of the dispossessed but undefeated outcaste or the untouchables that could be found in all the novels of Anand.

Anand’s humanism and his concern for the underdog are realistically portrayed in Untouchable and Coolie. The misery and wretchedness of the poor and their struggle for better life is described in both these novels. Untouchable is socially conscious novel where as Coolie is a politically conscious novel. The descriptions of the pathetic conditions of Munoo and Bakha served the useful purpose of arousing conscience of the educated Indians to the problems of untouchability and economic and social injustices in India.

Anand was well familiar with the life of the untouchables and the untouchable boy, Baksha has been modelled on one of his playmates. Through his novels Anand has exposed and satirized the hypocrisy, bigotry and callousness of the high caste Hindus whose can be polluted by the mere touch of an untouchable, like Bakha, but whose like Pandit Kali Nath, do not hesitate to molest an outcaste girl Sohini.

In these novels, we can see his desire for scientific and technological progress. Anand welcomes the scientific and technological progress because he sees it in the immense potentialities for solving India’s socio-economic problems. Munoo considers railways to be a blessing. To him railway is a wonderful thing. In “Untouchable”, the solution to the problem of untouchability is sought in machines as it gives rise to new division of laborer and destroys the traditional caste system based on caste.

The titles Coolie and Untouchable shows the motive of propaganda and the novels are certainly with purpose. Both of them are the tale human concern, a vehicle of humanism. The sociological concern of poverty, exploitation and corruption are presented in Coolie and Untouchable with humanism as its focal credo. His wonderful realism, his concern for humanity, his insights into the lives of the Indian masses reveals his sensitive and perceptive mind his imagination and his essential humanity.

Though most of his heroes are poor suffering people, characters belonging to the middle class; upper class also appears but they are the butt of his social satire. It is the underdogs- a Bakha and a Munoo- who have his sympathy on their side. The sweeper, the peasant, the plantation laborer, the city drudge, the sepoy all emerge alive from his novels anguished and hungry, yet human, superstitions and self-divided, vividly realized inspite of their thwarted purposing. With these characters, Anand started the literature of downtrodden.

Anand is a committed novelist. He concentrated his efforts to present tragic condition of taming millions, the class conflict and the championing of the propaganda against him. The philosophy to which he is committed as a novelist is that of humanism. His commitment is seen in his handling of his theme of hunger, poverty, humiliation and social injustice. He wrote his first novel Untouchable on the unusual theme of untouchability and his Coolie, presenting the plight of coolies.

Anand’s humanist convictions and his humanitarian compassion have fired his imagination and have given an unforgettable scene such as Bakha touching the caste Hindu and paying the penalty. Munoo’s traumatic realization that he is born to be exploited etc. in both this novels we can see a realistic display of his deep understanding of pathos and tragedy in the life of the social underdogs.

BIBILIOGRAPHY

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Anand, Mulk Raj. Untouchable. London: Bodley Head, 1970.

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