Study on Joothon: Metaphor of Poverty, Pollution and Humiliation

INTRODUCTION

Douglas Bom's remark on Joothan repositions the subject of dominance in Indian culture. In his review of Joothan Boom, argues that by saying "One can somehow get past poverty and deprivation, but it is impossible to get past caste," Valmiki highlights the rigidity of India's caste system, which has resulted in the socio-economic oppression of thousands across India over centuries simply because they belong to a lower caste. This work exposes the anguish and poverty of the author's untouchable Chuhra people in Uttar Pradesh. The treatment meted out to scheduled castes was harsher than that meted out to animals. Bom goes on to say:

A human's life is impossible without society; without it, he is either a God or a beast. He is not only financially reliant on society, but he is also emotionally, mentally, and spiritually dependent on it. Dalits suffer a slew of issues in society, including social, economic, political, and cultural issues. Dalit literature is a ferocious response against the exploitation of the downtrodden. Dalit literature argues for a revolution that functions as a wake-up call to the Dalit community's misbehaviour. The purpose of this chapter is to use chosen texts to investigate the social, economic, political, and cultural exploitation of Dalits.

Caste prejudice continues to exist among the Dalits even after so many years of freedom. Indeed, there is a lengthy history of exploitation and prejudice against them, as well as their crimes, which have been ingrained in the country's culture, particularly among the multi-ethnic Hindu population. Dalits are still humiliated and tormented as a result of caste inequality, including beatings, stripping nude and sluing around the hamlet, setting fire to homes, rapping women, and murdering them.

Caste-based Varna Vyavastha, untouchability, internal casteism, ban of visiting sacred locations and praying, and other forms of discrimination based on social exploitation abound. On the one hand, Dalits are exploited on the basis of mischief, misunderstanding, misbelief, and festivals on the same culture, and they are denied of their political rights on the other hand, Dalits are exploited on the basis of mischief, misconception, misbelief, and festivals on the same culture. Dalits have always been exploited in this manner on a social, economic, cultural, and political level since it has always been the higher castes' norm to deny them their rights. In this sense, Dalit literature is the consequence of centuries of socioeconomic, cultural, and political struggles. Dalit writing has made social equality and political involvement a literary theme, completing the unfinished task of economic equality. Man cannot attain total equality without achieving equality on these three concerns. This perfect equality is fought for in Dalit literature.

"Ground, broken, or reduced to bits in general" is what the term Dalit implies. It is derived from the Sanskrit term 'dal,' which is itself a Hebrew borrowing. 'Dal' has two meanings in Hebrew: 'it may relate either to physical frailty or to a lower unimportant social standing.' They have suffered as a result of the caste system. Disgrace, humiliation, dishonour, repression, and prejudice have all been part of their lives. They have been through harsh and horrific situations for millennia. Their aspirations and dreams were meaningless since they had no right to aspire for a world of happiness and development. They were created to live and serve the upper castes, as well as to die for them. With the passage of time, however, to give voice to their miseries and agony. Autobiographies, novels, short tales, essays, and poetry have all been written on Dalit difficulties. The suffering of Dalits is awful. Only if we come across literature that is full with Dalit agony, misery, and despair will we be able to appreciate their suffering. For the Dalits, literature became a powerful medium for expressing their pain as well as their outrage at the humiliation and ill-treatment they were subjected to. Mulk Raj Anand, Mahasweta Devi, Namdeo Dhasal, Basudev Sunani, Bama, Sharankumar Limbale, Lakshman Gaekwad, Sivakami, Poonami, Om Prakash Valmiki, and others are notable Dalit authors. Dalits have communicated their suffering in their works in a sensitive and straightforward way, and as a result, their literature has become a means of resistance. Their literature sends a message to the Dalit community that they can never achieve a respectable status in society until they fight back against all the injustices that have been done to them.

Om Prakash Valmiki was an Indian Dalit poet and writer who lived from 30 June 1950 to 17 November 2013. He is well known for his autobiography, Joothan, which is regarded as a landmark in Dalit writing. He was born in the Uttar Pradesh hamlet of Barla, in the Muzzafarnagar district. He resided in Dehradun after retiring from the Government Ordinance Factory, where he died on November 17, 2013, of symptoms related to stomach cancer. He was tormented and mistreated wherever he went as a Dalit youngster. He was lucky enough to be born into a family who adored and looked after him. He was able to confront the perils of being a Dalit because of the family's love and encouragement. Valmiki was always a great student since he was aware of the value of academics from the beginning of his existence. He became an enlightened human being as a result of his reading and writing. Despite his father's protests, Valmiki married Chanda and accepted her as his daughter-in-law. In the government colony, he was not given a home. They had to fight a lot at the beginning of their marriage. But he quickly adjusted, and Valmiki and Chanda began a happy married life. Valmiki has published three books of poetry, Sadiyon Ka Santaap (1989), Bas! Bahut Ho Chuka (1997), and Ab Aur Nahin (2009), as well as two collections of short tales, Salaam (2000) and Ghuspethiye (2001) (2004). He also published Dalit Saahity Ka Saundaryshaastr (2001) and Safai Devata (2009), a history of the Valmiki community (Play) Pollution and Humiliation 2. To study on consequence of centuries of socioeconomic, cultural, and political struggles.

Joothan, a work of Dalit literature by Omprakash Valmiki, was initially published in Hindi in 1997 and translated into English by Arun Prabha Mukherjee in 2003. It is a narrative about growing up as a 'untouchable' outside of a normal hamlet in Uttar Pradesh in the 1950s. Joothan is a remarkable record of a rare Indian journey, one that took a boy from extremely wretched socioeconomic conditions to prominence as an author and social critic. Told as a series of piercing vignettes, Joothan is also a remarkable record of a rare Indian journey, one that took a boy from extremely wretched socioeconomic conditions to prominence as an author and social critic. Valmiki highlighted the prejudice they faced at school at several stages in his book 'Joothan.' "We were not allowed to sip water from the glass during the tests," he claims. We had to cup our hands to sip water. The peon would pour water from a great height, so that our hands didn't come into contact with the glass" (J16). In the newly independent India in the 1950s, Om Prakash Valmiki narrates his life as an untouchable, or Dalit. "Joothan" refers to food crumbs left on a plate that are meant for the trash or animals. For decades, India's untouchables have been compelled to accept and consume joothan, a name that symbolises the suffering, humiliation, and poverty of a group condemned to dwell at the bottom of the social pyramid. Despite the repeal of untouchability in 1949, Dalits continued to experience discrimination, economic hardship, violence, and mockery. "Dalit existence is brutally unpleasant, burned by events," Om Prakash Valmiki opens his memoirs. Experiences that were not able to find a place in literary works. We grew up in a society that was really brutal and inhumane. "As well as sympathy for Dalits." (Jvii) Valmiki tells how his whole tribe relies on the higher castes' leftover food in exchange for their hard but unpaid labour. The whole population had to rely on the compassion of the higher castes, who exploited them instead of paying them. 'Joothan,' the title of the book, literally means food left on an eater's plate, which is normally headed for the trash pail in a middle-class, metropolitan household. However, such meal would only be classified as 'joothan' if it was consumed by someone other than the original consumer. Valmiki describes how to gather, preserve, and consume joothan in great detail. He was given the task of keeping crows and hens away from the drying joothan. They used to love joothan that had been dried Valmiki describes his feelings of agony as exclusion as a result of the continuing practise of untouchability throughout the book. "I was kept out of extracurricular activities," he writes. On such times, I sat on the periphery like a bystander. During the school's annual events, while the play was in rehearsal, I hoped for a part as well. However, I was always required to stand outside the door. The so-called gods' descendants are unable to comprehend the agony of standing outside the threshold." (J16) In another incident, he claims that he was kept out of the chemical lab "on some pretence or another." He attempted to speak with the principal and express his dissatisfaction with the situation. However, no action was taken against the instructor, and he was barred from doing any experiments for the remainder of the year. "Not only did I perform badly in the lab tests on the board exam, but I also received low scores in the oral, despite answering the examiner's questions properly," he adds. (J65)

When the guests and bariats, the bridge-party, grooms were eating their meals at a wedding, the chuhrus (the author's caste) would sit outside with large baskets. To keep the Joothan from clinging to them after the baratis had eaten, the filthy pattals or leaf plates were placed in the chuhras baskets, which they brought home. Little pieces of pooris, bits of sweetmeats, and a smidgeon of vegetable were enough to make them happy. The Joothan was enthusiastically devoured. Those who didn't leave enough scrap on their palttals were called gluttons by the bridegroom's guests. They had never been to a wedding feast before. So they'd lapped everything up. During the wedding season, our elder recited stones of the baratis that had leafed for numerous months in Joothan in ecstatic voices. Valmiki goes on to offer a comprehensive deceit and consuming the joothan after reprocessing it through the difficult days of the rainy season via this clip. His childhood memories of Joothan often return to haunt him, causing him further embarrassment and shame. At first glance, the paragraph seems to be describing the extent of poverty and misery caused by hunger in Valmiki's society. However, a deeper examination reveals another facet of this deprivation: the sentence emphasises the Dalits' relationship with the concept of 'pollution.' Consider the following words from Limbale's book Akkarmashi.

The concepts in the two passages are quite similar. The teacher's naturalness in requesting the'height caste' student to gather the remaining food and distribute it to the Mahar pupils is the most remarkable and crucial of these comparisons. The verse, in addition to implying poverty and famine, also implies that the Mahars are filthy. Although the writers' class identities and communities appear in all of these pieces, particularly in Akkarmashi, which may be taken as a witness to rural poverty In the context of accepting leftover food, it is caste identity and the cultural consequences that are foregrounded. When used in regard to anybody other than the stigma and prejudice those results from it, Joothan or leftover food bears the idea of ritual contamination, which distinguishes the Dalits from the other underprivileged categories of 'have-nots' in Indian culture. And it is the Dalits' affiliation with ritual defilement that is used to explain and justify the caste system's inhumane treatment of them. Another facet of the Dalit's connection to pollution is their participation in the so-called 'unclean' occupation. As a result, some jobs are usually associated with persons who are believed to be beyond the pale of humanity. Indeed, the connection between the Dalit as a symbol of pollution and the polluting vocation is cyclical. What is the source of work pollution? Because Dalits are the ones who perform them why are the Dalits damaging the environment? Because they work in polluted environments. It is important to note that the term "pollution" does not relate to a lack of cleanliness. Announcing the news of a death or epidemic, as well as the pounding of wedding, burial, and celebration drums, are all considered polluting since they entail unlucky occurrences such as death and touch with animal skin. Along with Limbale, one encounters this irony in the logic of pollution in the following lines:

These lines include a variety of topics and emotions. One, there is misery in being bound by a set of laws that contradict all logic and reason. Sarcasm comprises a criticism of religion, rituals, and caste on sanitation on another. The following epigraph expresses certain feelings:

And, as Pawde so eloquently observes: "As a consequence, despite my best efforts, I am unable to forget my caste. It's difficult to forget about it. Then I recall a phrase I overheard someplace. Caste is something that is given to you at birth but cannot be taken away by death." (13) What is it about caste that makes it so tough to be expelled? The explanation is that caste is justified by the logic of pollution, and the question of power is disguised inside the ideology of pollution. The way caste is expressed in the public realm is via the use of neutral, benign phrases like "rituals" and "custom." The power dynamics that caste entails are obscured by this sanitised portrayal. And it is here that Dalit life narratives play a crucial role in presenting a counter-narrative. This component is effectively revealed in Valmiki's life storey. The act of offering leftover food to the Dalits, known as Joothan, is an exercise of power by the higher castes. When all of the guests have dined at the wedding of the landlord's daughter.

The novel's chamar protagonists, Omprakash, battle for life in a cruel environment, yet they sometimes find solace in sentiments of connection and unity. The society has harmed these Dalits. The painful and difficult experiences, on the other hand, do not suffocate the humanity in the hearts of the oppressed. Mistry highlights the contrast between two communities: Dalits' human side and upper castes' brutal side. He emphasises that the atrocities and injustices perpetrated on Dalits are unjustified and undeserved. He reveals the terrifying aspects of the Emergency and the ramifications for his characters. Mistry scathingly critiques India's current social pattern—as a country that purports to have reached unprecedented heights. To accomplish meaningful growth for the population, he believes the country must abolish its caste structure. He works tirelessly to expose the Dalits' tragedies, prejudice, persecution, and unending suffering in India after Independence. He also illustrates that political authority, whether at the local or national level, seeks to continue authoritarian systems of authoritarianism at the core of Indian politics.

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Research Scholar, Sunrise University, Alwar, Rajasthan