Indian writing in English - Assignment

Name: Anaaya Sharma

Roll No.: 504

The lines in question are taken from the short story ‘The Free Radio’ by Salman
Rushdie, a controversial writer due to his bold depictions of post- colonial
reality. The story is set in the post-independence era, about the sterilisation
campaign launched by Indian government during the emergency period [1975-
77].

The quoted lines are spoken by the narrator who is a retired school teacher and
seems to have a plausible reputation in the society, due to which he is reluctant
in talking to the thief’s widow, contemplating whether it would taint the image
of himself within the society but eventually he gives up and expresses his
concerns.

The way narrator begins with voicing out his concerns clearly portrays the urge
to dominate and manipulate the listener that is the thief’s widow. The addition
of the phrase “I told her with dignity”, shows the importance he holds of his
reputation that he fears would be tainted if so much as utters a word to the
thief’s widow but nevertheless he gives up his fears after much contemplation
and begins spewing out the hate he had for the woman under the false pretence
of care and concerns for his pupil Ramani.
As we proceed through the story, we notice that the narrator often switches
between ‘I’ and ‘we’, which could mean that he assumes the role of the
community’s spokesperson, a leader perhaps voicing out a collective concern.
For instance, when he says, “we had always believed that ‘our’ Ramani was a
little soft in the head…”.
Something else we notice through the course of the story is that narrator is
unreliable and bias, his knowledge is limited to gossip and what he can witness,
which is proven when he is reprimanded by the thief’s widow for voicing out
his ‘concerns’ or as he thought of them. ‘He proceeds to ‘close his eyes’ to
Ramani and widow’s affair because he had done all he could and there were
other things that would interest him like a health officer bringing a white
caravan and doing things to men.’ Other than depicting the unreliability of the
narrator this quotation also shows the urge to interfere in other’s life, perhaps
this could have been a way to entertain themselves because it has been a major
issue and still is in the rural life.
The narrator not only sticks his nose where it doesn’t belong but also never fails
to give his unwarranted and unfiltered hateful comments.

The narrator is particularly prejudiced against the thief’s widow and the fact that
he had never addressed her with her name just through the identity of her dead
husband says a lot about his misogynist tendencies.
“The widow was certainly attractive, no point denying, in a sort of hard vicious
way she was all right, but it is her mentality that was rotten. Ten years older
than Ramani she must have been, five children alive and two dead, what that
thief did besides robbing and making babies God only knows, but he left her not
one new paisa, so of course she would be interested in Ramani.”

The above statement given by the narrator reveals his true sexist self when he
can’t even fathom a woman whose ten years older than a man being in love with
him, when he does see them together or even hears complimenting each other in
the streets, he labels it as selfish gains. Apparently, he pretends to safeguard
morality when he mentions Ramani’s mother, he says, “I was glad his mother
was dead because if she had lived to see this her face would have fallen off from
shame.” It shows an attempt made to protect the morality and emphasising the
correctness of opinions of the elders even if it meant lack of free will.

Towards the end we see the mentions of widow burning which points towards
the clear animosity he holds against the thief’s widow. He says, “Go to the
widows ashrams in Beneras and spend the rest of your life there in holy prayer,
thanking god that widow burning is illegal.” This portrays the lack of empathy
or sympathy he had for widows of any kind since he isn’t thankful that ‘Sati-
Pratha’ is illegal. The same statement also shows that there are set rules for all
women be it widows, married women or even the unmarried little girls, all of
them has a role to play in the narrator’s eyes that would be ‘right’. Thus, tying
them to the misogyny of the society.