Name: Robin Singh Arya

Professor: Sakshi Dogra Ma’am

Paper: Indian Writing in English
Class and Roll Number: B.A. English (Hons.) 1st Year (786)

"Despite the natural hardships of language and expression, the (Indian English) short story
has made some headway and has become truly Indian". Do you agree with A.N. Dwivedi's
statement? Elaborate and elucidate with reference to any one short story in your syllabus.

‘Years ago, a slender sapling from a foreign field was crafted by ‘pale hands’ on the mighty and
many branched Indian Banyan tree. It has kept growing vigorously, and now an organic part of the
tree, it has spread its own probing roots into the brown soil below. Its young leaves rustle
energetically in the strong winds that blow from the Western horizon, but the sunshine that warms it
and the rain that cools it are from the Indian skies; and it continues to draw its vital sap from this
earth, this realm, this India.’

Capturing the enthralling struggle and subsequent acceptance and success of the Indian Writing in
English (of which the short story forms an essential part), Hans Harder employs the metaphor of ‘a
sapling from foreign land’ and how the sapling now has ‘its own probing root into the Indian soil’
to trace its trajectory. Inspite of all the problems, struggles and apprehensions about an alien
language being employed to delineate the raw ethos of India, Indian short story in English has
indeed come a long way in claiming its Indian-ness in absolute terms. Written in the twentieth
century, ‘The Two Lady Rams’ by Mulk Raj Anand; one of the pioneers of Indian writing in
English, accentuates the arresting of Indian vitality in true Indian terms. This essay will reflect over
the trajectory of the Indian short story from a marginalised creative art form to a widely accepted
one; with exclusive focus on ‘The Two Lady Rams’ by Anand and the process of capturing the
authentic Indian experience in English through crafted thematisation, characterisation, critique of
entrenched stereotypes in society and linguistic aesthetics.

The basic hurdle that the initial Indian writers who chose the English language as a mode of
expression encountered was the challenge to capture a rustic and authentic Indian experience in a
language that was not one’s own. The peculiarities of English in the Indian context were manifold;
it was a foreign language of course, but more importantly, the language of the former colonial
master, which manifested itself in the Indian English literature being branded as ‘westernised’ or
non-authentic. On the other hand, English was the language which tied a linguistically diversified
nation such as India through a common thread and played a vital role in India’s national struggle for
independence, hence making the situation of the Indian English literature quite gruelling to
comprehend. The duality manifested itself in peculiar and absurd ways, pushing the Indian English
Literature (and the short story) to the margins, making it secondary to the Indian regional
languages.

The first generation of Indian English Writing emerged in the nineteenth century, in alignment with
the Bengal Renaissance. The intellect that inhabited Kolkata at the time boasted of Derozio, Raja
Ram Mohan Roy and the likes, many of them drew inspiration from the Romantic movement; they
painted vulnerable pictures of the down trodden; brimming with strong humanist ideas of equality.
However, it was with the ‘Three Musketeers’ of the Indian English writing; Mulk Raj Anand, Raja
Rao and R.K. Narayan, that the cultural ethos of India was actually reflected into the creative works
of the era. It was a characteristic of the 1930s wherein the dynamics of the national struggle for
independence interplayed in the reflection of the same. Critics such as Anand Prakash have argued
that the themes of their stories were, in one way or the other, linked to the same core idea of the
vulnerable Indian; Emancipation from foreign rule (Mulk Raj Anand), need of new passion and
fervour across towns (Raja Rao) and persistence of critical attitudes towards the entrenched
stereotypes within the masses (Narayan).

The struggle to capture an experience in an alien language, however, remained constant. In the
forward to Kanthapura, Raja Rao remarks, ‘One has to convey in a language that is not one’s own;
the spirit that is one’s own. One has to convey the various shades and omissions of a certain
thought-movement that looks maltreated in an alien language.’ He further adds how ‘the tempo of
the Indian life must be infused in English’, seemingly such a huge task, but adding in the same
breath, the simultaneous need to capture the Indian rhythms and thought process in English too. In
order to capture the ‘rustic’ Indian experience, the ‘Indian-ness’ had to be defined first. Mulk Raj
Anand, especially, explored the ‘Indian-ness’ by underlining themes of the colonial masters and
colonial subject; capturing the hypocrisy of the Raj, demarcating the Indian domestic household
structures and perhaps, more importantly, by amalgamating Punjabi words and phrases with the
English, hence marking it by the earthly touch of the honest Indian experience.

‘The Two Lady Rams’ by Anand, boasts of a peculiar title to begin with, the name of a known
mythological figure preceded by ‘Lady’, hence marking it with absurdity. The story narrates the
‘awful domestic predicaments’ of Lalla Jhinda Ram and his two wives, furiously competing over
the title of ‘Lady Ram’ which derives itself from the conferring of the knighthood to Lalla Jhinda
Ram in exchange of his favours to the Raj. Anand narrates the story with a typical mock heroic
style; as if dealing with larger than life figures, hence marking it with ‘grandiloquence’ as Anand
Prakash puts it. Mulk Raj Anand underlines the ethos of the era by pressing over the theme of the
relations between the privileged Indian class and the British. The character of Sir Lalla Jhinda Ram
doesn’t seem to fit in the categories of either the colonial master or the subject, rather he seems to
be the link between the two. Critics such as Anand Prakash perceive him to be a hybrid of ‘Sir
Jhinda’ and ‘Lalla Jhinda Ram’. The protagonist seems to be the face of all the privileged classes
within the hierarchical system in India, whom Anand criticises of engaging in a mutually beneficial
dealing, leaving the vulnerable Indian, essentially down trodden. Anand fills his narrative with
humour, wit and a striking critique for the imperialist agenda, calling them ‘singularly inept’. Hans
Harder comments in his essay about the ‘Indian Literature in English and the Problems of
Naturalisation’ that the Indian Writing, and hence the short story, developed out of ‘the contact
zone’ of the British and the privileged Indians, it’s the same ‘contact zone’ that Mulk Raj Anand
seems to be vehemently criticising.

Mulk Raj Anand introduces an undercurrent of intense critique of the colonial British government;
remarking that there was ‘no way in which His Majesty, the King Emperor, sitting seven thousand
miles away from India, can ever get to know anything about the private lives of his subjects.’ Add
to this, them being ‘singularly inept’ and ‘formal about the human details of their (subjects’) life.’
The critique could well be a reflection of the hypocrisy and blatant oppression that the colonial
regime lay down upon the Indian subjects. Anand employs sarcasm, wit and humour to get his
perspective across. On a higher level, Mulk Raj Anand seems to be vehemently critiquing the
dealings of the privileged Indians; criticising their ‘sundry services’ to the colonial government.
Various remarks such as Captain Forbes receiving ‘generous commissions’ from Sir Jhinda Ram;
the Captain having made his ‘pile’ and not wanting to be involved in the shady negotiations
anymore; and how Sir Jhinda Ram had already altered many intricate documents before; all these
instances underline that the British regime couldn’t function without the support from the privileged
Indians. On a similar level, the British government followed a hypocritical approach; distributing
titles; extortion of bribes and the consequent raise in one’s status; Anand talks about them all. Even
after being declared a ‘knight’, Lalla Jhinda Ram cannot access his ‘king’ who is the governor. The
reflection can be read as a possiblity that even after climbing the social ladder, the higher officials
still remained unavailable. In other words, the spaces of the British officials discriminated against
Indians, irrespective of their class to a much extent. It’s interesting to note that these subtle yet
sarcastic critique of the British would have manifested itself in a duality; one, adding to the
National Struggle for Independence and two, these characters such as Sir Jhinda Ram would have
been stock characters in a common Indian’s daily life; the narrative satirises the same; marking it
with an acquaintance of the day to day Indian sociological dynamics. Towards the close of the
story, Anand remarks that ‘the youth of today, in Government house and outside, is notorious for its
disregard of manners, codes, conventions, rules and regulations.’- a symbolic metaphor for the
agitation amongst the youth of India to break out of the shackles of the Raj and their endeavours to
undo the hierarchy within the Indian community itself. The theme of oppression and certain
privileged sections of the society yet choosing to ignore it; and carrying forward with their lives in
normalcy, was an essentially relatable Indian concept; Mulk Raj Anand underlines the same
argument.

Mulk Raj Anand’s characterisation speaks volumes about the earthly Indian life experience he aims
to capture. The characters of the two wives; Sukhi and Shakuntala, could as well be read as a
reflection of the dynamics they carry. The older wife; Sukhi, literally pertaining to ‘happiness’
brought dowry and wealth to Lalla Jhinda Ram; which resulted in his reversal of fortunes, and made
him into the rich and established contractor that he was. The younger wife; Shakuntala, reminds of
the historical folklore of the Dushyantha-Shakuntala story, but more importantly, she fulfilled the
romantic void in her husband’s life, the analogy to the Sanskrit story is pretty obvious to
comprehend. Even the character of Sir Lalla Jhinda Ram isn’t aloof, Anand employs the double
repetition of the alphabet ‘l’ in ‘Lalla’ unlike the normal spelling - ‘Lala’. Critics have read this
seemingly minuscule technicality to be a judgement of his character. The emphasis on ‘Lalla’
roughly translates to an idle; immature person who is of no use in the ‘Punjabi-Multani’ dialects of
Anand’s home state. It’s interesting to note that even the nomenclature of Mulk Raj Anand’s
characters links back to literal meanings of words, traditional Sanskrit folklore as well as the typical
Punjabi dialect set in the spirit of the story. On another level, the themes of lack of solidarity
amongst wives to the same man and the subsequent disheartening of one are recurrent motifs in
Indian folklore, Anand employs them all to create a sense of relatable manner for the Indian
audience.

The involvement of the Hindi and Punjabi words and/or their literal translations is particularly
integral to the linguistic aesthetics of the story. Anand employs multiple such instances, the smooth
entry of words such as ‘Sarkar’, ‘Angrezi’, ‘Maharaj’, ‘Bibis’ and expressions like ‘Acha!’ and
‘Ohe!’ mark the story with a particular rhythm and relatable nuances; seemingly appealing to many
Indian readers. Mulk Raj Anand pioneered the amalgamation of words, transcending language
boundaries; which was revolutionised by Salman Rushdie proudly coining the term
‘chutneyfication’. Anand makes a conscious decision to allow entry only to the literal translation of
Punjabi phrases in his story narration. In the process, ‘kopbhavan’ becomes sulking place, ‘bhali
loke’ becomes gentle woman, ‘rajmata’ becomes mater familias and ‘khasma nun khani’ becomes
the ‘eater of her masters’. Anand has commented over the same, ‘I found, while writing
spontaneously, that I was translating dialogue from original Punjabi to English. The way in which
my mother said something in the dialect of Central Punjab could not have been expressed in any
other way than an almost literal translation which might carry the sound and the sense of the
original speech.’ In this way, the inclusion of the regional phrases/words seeping into the Indian
short story marked it with a rustic Indian flavour.

Through the course of the story, Anand also seems to be subtly criticising the patriarchal set up, the
dogma and the entrenched stereotypes thriving in the Indian society at that time. Lalla Jhinda Ram
devises to marry again; just because his first wife was ‘barren’ and his ‘race’ had to be continued in
any scenario. Moreover, value of his second wife, Shakuntala, seems to be reduced to just her ‘fair
cheeks’ and ‘snubbed nose’. The relations within the household paint a typical patriarchal scenario
where the man showers all his love on the younger wife, enchanted by her beauty and charms,
Anand Prakash argues. His ‘true sense of chivalry to his young love’ when he drags Sukhi by her
hair to her part of the house; reeks of conservative patriarchy. The vivid descriptions about them
inhabiting different parts of the house; the ‘purdah’ and them communicating just through servants
makes them look like highly priced commodities rather than humans. Anand captures the domestic
feuds with great military vocabulary; ‘trenches dug’ and ‘barricades raised’; the complexities, the
stereotypes and the conservative ideologies that govern the Indian domestic household are
underlined with great subtlety. The class aspect is evident too, as they’re supposed to be residing in
a common row away from the main house; the hierarchy within the spaces and how they mark your
status in a social ladder is quite evident throughout. Anand captures the patriarchal set ups
commanding the Indian domestic structures with great detail, blowing the feuds within out of
proportion, marking it with classical humour and wit and hence making the story rich with yet
another amalgamation of aspects which are necessarily ‘Indian’ in every sense of the word.

The essay has attempted to reflect over the initial struggles of the Indian writers who chose to write
in English; followed by the three pioneers of Indian English Writing, of which Mulk Raj Anand was
an indispensable component. On a much more focused light, the essay has attempted to trace the
various components of ‘Indian-ness’ in ‘The Two Lady Rams’, reflecting over the underlying
themes of colonial expression, the characterisation, the linguistic aesthetics marked with regional
expressions and the vehement critique of the entrenched stereotypes of the Indian society at that
time. Having attempted to elucidate the complex challenges that the study of Indian writing in
English poses, one can trace the trajectory of the Indian short story and its final success in
eloquently conveying an authentic Indian experience in a language that is, though not historically
but in contemporary terms, one’s own in spirit.

Bibliography:
1. Prakash, Anand, Interventions, Worldview Editions, 2016.
2. Harder, Hans, Literature and Nationalist Ideology: Writing Histories if Modern Indian
Languages, Social Science Press, 2010.
3. Rao, Raja, Kanthapura,
http://books.google.com/books/about/Kanthapura.html?id=naJbPgAACAAJ.

Note: As Mulk Raj Anand (writer) and Anand Prakash (critic) have seemingly resembling
names, the essay has referred to the critic by his full name at all times; ‘Anand’ being used as
the last name of Mulk Raj Anand, the writer.