See discussions, stats, and author profiles for this publication at: https://www.researchgate.

net/publication/364946800

A study on Globalization in Manjula Padmanabhan's Harvest

Article · October 2022

CITATIONS READS
0 1,388

2 authors, including:

Suresh Hemavathi
Vels Institute of Science Technology and Advanced studies(VISTAS)
10 PUBLICATIONS 0 CITATIONS

SEE PROFILE

All content following this page was uploaded by Suresh Hemavathi on 31 October 2022.

The user has requested enhancement of the downloaded file.

Parishodh Journal ISSN NO:2347-6648

A study on Globalization in Manjula Padmanabhan’s Harvest

1*
K.SURESH, 2Dr.D.SHANMUGAM
1*
Research Scholar, Department of English, Annamalai University Chidambaram, Tamilnadu, India
2
Professor, Department of English, Annamalai University Chidambaram, Tamilnadu, India
1*
Assistant Professor, Department of English, Vels Institute of Science, Technology and Advanced
Studies (VISTAS), Chennai

1*
sureshenglish.sl@velsuniv.ac.in, 2shanmugam_ad@yahoo.com

ABSTRACT:

Globalization is an idea that looks to bind together and escalate the socio-social scene of the
world. It is seething to accomplish this accomplishment through Information Communications
Technology (ICT) which has strengthened and contracted all outskirts everywhere throughout
the world. It has brought to the fore lopsided paces of advancement around the globe, and it is
further upgrading the enthusiasm of created countries who are the significant players in
globalization, consequently inspiring various sheds of responses from concerned erudite people.
It has since been twisting the way of life and crafts of monetarily more fragile countries of the
world. Utilizing the explanatory hypothetical system, this paper endeavors an examination
concerning India's Manjula's play Harvest as a genuine impression of the inclinations of this all
around acclaimed wonder, yet exploitative, abusive and underestimating practice that at some
point or another will push these more vulnerable countries to the brink of collapse. This focuses
on the way that 'worldwide awareness' doesn't signify 'worldwide agreement'. One of the impacts
is that the world is in a snapshot of anxiety. African and in fact Nigerian dramatists ought to gain
from what Harvest brings to the table to the obvious condition of disequilibrium in the exchange
between countries right now which the world is in.
Key Words: Globalization, upsetting conditions, social articulations, exploitative, abusive

I. INTRODUCTION

A phantom is frequenting the present reality – that of globalization. It is the popular expression
existing apart from everything else as it is utilized nearly in each field of human undertaking.
Globalization as an idea is breaking into various talks since it has changed the examples and
elements of review other social, financial, political, social and mental happenings around the

Volume IX, Issue II, February/2020 Page No:45

Parishodh Journal ISSN NO:2347-6648

globe. This is on the grounds that it has, through its innovative authority, data correspondence
innovation (ICT), brought people, gatherings and countries closer to one another than at any
other time before. Globalization as a multi-disciplinary wonder has had a lot of understanding in
the theater. India’s persuasive writer, Manjula Padmanabhan has performed what shows up as
the genuine masterful depiction of both uncovered and hid goals of the wonder and she has
likewise caught the undesirable relationship that first world countries have with third world
partners which the previous rely upon for endurance and extension. Globalization must be the
surest alternative for preceded with contact between cutting edge societies and different societies
which has had its results in the personal satisfaction and possibilities of people and countries.
Presently it looks entirely inescapable, yet it isn't. Since the time slave exchange was nullified
and expansionism was disheartened, there must be methods through which the recipients of these
practices would keep their advantages coming to them. The spread of fair beliefs in countries by
America and the proceeded with transformation in mechanical advancement brought forth the
marvel of globalization on the planet which has additionally constrained the creating countries to
a disadvantageous position (Kieh 2008: vii). A nearby take a gander at the play will uncover the
significance of the previously mentioned qualities in the socio-political and social relations
between the characters in the play. The play opens up the upsetting conditions that creating
countries face in today’s globalized world. This can be seen from the dehumanizing
consideration given to the Third World by their exploitative First World that exchange is even
done in human organs.
Globalization is a wonder by which the experience of consistently life, as impacted by the
dispersion of wares and goals, mirrors an institutionalization of social articulations around the
globe. Moved by the effectiveness or intrigue of remote correspondences, electronic business,
mainstream society, and worldwide travel, globalization has been viewed as a pattern toward
homogeneity that will in the long run make human experience wherever basically the equivalent.
The instrumentality of media in supporting the genuine completion of this homogenizing
procedure must be stressed. In fact, numerous researchers have considered the connection among
globalization and media and „most scholars concur that there is for all intents and purposes no
globalization without media and communication‟ (Rantanen 2005:4). Globalization has become
a procedure in which worldwide monetary, political, social and social relations have gotten
progressively interceded across existence. As indicated by Robertson (1992: 8) that globalization

Volume IX, Issue II, February/2020 Page No:46

Parishodh Journal ISSN NO:2347-6648

alludes to „… the pressure of the world and the increase of cognizance of the world as a whole‟.
This shows the wonder has hardened the cognizance of the world toward the equivalent social
articulations and, somewhat, the familiarity with the world. This signifies the de-confinement of
arrangements and projects by legislature of nations consequently giving more space for
worldwide patterns. However, Robertson (1992:5) cautions that „Global cognizance doesn't
suggest worldwide consensus‟. Indeed, even as the world advances toward a procedure of
combination into a typical framework, conservative, social, social or business, there are as yet
obvious indications of absence of understanding in the manner occasions are going on and this is
the reason there has been banter on the marvel of globalization. This view is likened to
Worthen‟s that with the ascent of worldwide interchanges, worldwide economy, and worldwide
political and military interests, social and political upsets promptly become the world’s business.
They reshape the world we live in even as we watch the progressions unfurl on our TV screens.
Luckily, TV has not so much changed the world’s assorted societies into a solitary "worldwide
town", yet neighborhood societies all vibe the effect of occasions far and wide (2004:1341).
There are fluctuating perspectives on the effect of globalization on the planet and beneath are a
couple of them. This paper can't contain all the perspectives on the marvel of globalization as the
field is very expansive. So it is just appropriate to begin with the perspectives on the
hyperglobalists, the cynics and the transformationists on the discussion on globalization.
Hyperglobalists imagined that contemporary globalization characterizes another time where
people groups wherever are progressively dependent upon the order of the worldwide
commercial center (Ohmae 1995). By differentiate the doubters contend that truth of a global
economy progressively sectioned into three significant provincial alliances in which national
governments stay exceptionally incredible. The budgetary and exchanging coalitions are Europe,
Asia-Pacific and North America. That the world is less incorporated as it once seemed to be. At
that point the transformationists battle that contemporary examples of globalization are
considered as generally extraordinary with the end goal that states and social orders over the
globe are encountering a procedure of significant change as they attempt to adjust to a more
interconnection by profoundly dubious world. Additionally the new degree of globalization
banter is as yet an impression of the early discussion where, on one side is the dread that the
world is on an edge of breakdown because of the limited assets it has and the ecological issues,
imbalances and monetary emergency that go up against it. On the opposite side is the view that

Volume IX, Issue II, February/2020 Page No:47

Parishodh Journal ISSN NO:2347-6648

globalization and data innovation are achieving a period of chance and information sharing
inconspicuous in mankind's history. This, unquestionably, isn't the perspective on Padmanabhan
as portrayed drastically in her play Harvest. Globalization is probably the best test of this
contemporary period since it gives exceptionally irresolute sentiments as in on one hand; it looks
as though creating countries are the main ones presented with its impacts, and then again, the
marvel hauls the world to the verge. Anyway worldwide the impacts might be, the full brunt of
globalization is experienced by less fortunate countries. Brief Biography of Manjula
Padmanabhan Manjula Padmanabhan was conceived in 1953, and is notable as a columnist,
artist, sketch artist, fiction essayist and writer and author of children’s books just as composing
for TV and the stage. In the wake of finishing her college examines, Padmanabhan came back to
India and started a profession in reporting. She composed a few plays – including Light Out!
(1996), The Artist’s Model (1995), and Sextet (1996)- and a notable book of short stories, Hot
Death, Cold Soup (1915). Reap won the first Onassis Prize for theater, and debuted in Greece in
1999; it has additionally been created in India. Her latest novel is Getting There (2000).
II .A study of Harvest

Manjula Padmanabhan’s Harvest builds up a silly story of the structure of introduction and force
in the contemporary globalized culture. For Harvest splendidly allegorizes the connection
between the first and third universes, literalizing the essential act of globalization as its focal
circumstance: the third world gives the crude material that the principal world devours for its
own endurance and development. In the play, Om has sold his body – through the relevantly
named InterPlanta administrations organization – to an American "Beneficiary".
As indicated by the term of his agreement, he and his close family (his significant other Jaya,
who is constrained by the agreement to claim to be his sister, his sibling Jeetu, and his mom, Ma)
will appreciate a First World way of life and way of life – they will be perfect, well-nourished,
engaged, and affluent – until such time as his Receiver requests Om’s organs for his own
endurance. As the play grows in any case, the monetary thought processes driving Om‟s penance
are step by step bent by the mediatized relations of worldwide culture. His family is counseled
(on a monster screen Contact Module that drops from the roof) by the Receiver, Virginia – or
"Ginni," whose name reviews the evil djinni, or "genies" of Indian folktales-a "blonde and white
– cleaned exemplification of an American style youth goddess" whose picture skims over the
room, and progressively requests acquiescence from the family. Mama comes almost to venerate

Volume IX, Issue II, February/2020 Page No:48

Parishodh Journal ISSN NO:2347-6648

Ginni, however genuinely adores her new TV, at last deciding to bury herself inside a video
stone coffin – called the Video Paradise – where she will stay for a mind-blowing remainder". At
the point when the InterPlanta specialists come to take Om, notwithstanding, they erroneously
take his wastrel sibling Jeetu, evacuating his eyes and supplanting them with a contraption that
task Ginny’s hot picture, legitimately into his cerebrum. In spite of the fact that Jeetu had been
the most reproachful of the organ - gift plans, presently everything he can see is the Ginny’s
sultry picture; he is tempted, and this virtual relationship drives him at long last to "give "his
whole body. The play’s splendid parody completely takes in First World frames of mind toward
India, its dread of maladies, its nervousness about sanitation, its incomprehension of family and
public activity, its obliviousness of third world reality by and large. Supplanting the family’s
nourishment with "goat - crap" pellets, introducing a can in its one - room condo, dumping the
family’s assets and supplanting them with Western garments and house products, InterPlanta
without a moment's delay seems to improve the family’s way of life which cutting it off from
genuine through and through. However the last scenes appear to propose a methodology of
obstruction. Once Ginni has gathered Jeetu body, she uncovers that "Ginni" had just been a PC
movement all things considered: Jeetu had been lured to surrender his body by the vacant picture
of young, hot America, a picture anticipated to the world to hide that the First World heaven is
maturing and weak, supporting "the less fortunate segments of the world, while increasing new
bodies for ourselves". Virgil - the genuine Ginni - suggests that he (in the collection of Jeetu) and
Jaya have kids to repopulate the First World; he even makes an insemination device shows up
outside the loft while he is attempting to make it all work out. Be that as it may, if the body is, at
last, what the Third World needs to sell; it might in any case be conceivable to retain it, to
demand a genuine instead of a reflected association with First World force. At the play’s close
Jaya seals she inside the loft, with its unending nourishment supply and TV, discloses to Virgil
that in the event that he needs to repopulate the primary world, he should go to her, in the tissue.
Collect and the Evils of Globalization is malicious on the grounds that it doesn't encourage the
humankind of things on the planet. The monetary misfortunes and social separation that are
being caused to many creating nations by fast money related and exchange advancement, the
developing imbalances of riches and openings emerging from globalization; and the observation
that ecological, social and social issues have been aggravated by the functions of the worldwide
free-showcase economy and the taking off level of assault by components of fear based

Volume IX, Issue II, February/2020 Page No:49

Parishodh Journal ISSN NO:2347-6648

oppression are some of what have portrayed globalization today. It implies creating countries
have confronted more issues than any other time in recent memory because of the marvel of
globalization. The play arraigns America which is the best advertiser of globalization and
progression on the grounds that Ginni – the Receiver of the body parts is American. She controls
the family in the play until around the finish of the play.

The play uncovered the genuine degree of mental intimidation that possesses large amounts of
the globalization world. It likewise shows the examples of enchantment and policing the created
world guarantees on the creating scene. Globalization beguiles a great deal that is the reason Om
gets happy: "We’ll have more cash than you and I have named for! "He says to Ma "who‟d
accept there is such a lot of cash on the planet?" (P.219). when Jaya communicates her bookings
for what he has done he gets cautious: "You figure I did it gently. In any case, we will be rich!
Madly rich! Be that as it may, you’d fairly live right now room I assume! Think it, for example, a
fine thing. Like monkeys in a hot case quieted to rest out by our neighbors cadenced fluctuating!
… And starving (P.223). When Jaya blames him for settling on an inappropriate decision he
says: Om: I went in light of the fact that I lost my position at the organization and for what
reason did I lose it? Since I am an assistant and no one needs representatives any longer! There
are no new openings now; there is nothing left for individuals like us! Don’t you realize that?
This is, obviously, what the PC age makes us to accept that there are no employments for less
talented individuals. However, this is the means by which Jaya reacts: Jaya: you are incorrect,
there are decisions, and there must be decisions. Om: Huh! I remained in line and was picked!
What's more, if not this line, there would have been different lines (p.238). Padmanabhan goes to
the outrageous of the unholy relations between the Third World and the First World where the
fundamental items of trade are the body organs. This is based on singular independence. Om‟s
last explanation affirms the astounded state: "How might I have done this to myself? What kind
of dolt am I? (P.238).Om‟s mother, Ma, communicates no such lament, she is hypnotized: "What
sort of occupation pays a man to sit at home?" The "new" mass culture built by globalization
empowers utilization and an existence of "abundance”. The InterPlanta administrations can be
viewed as a portion of the worldwide associations that guide in abusing the creating countries of
the world whether as far as worldwide legislative issues, equity and financial aspects.
Association, for example, the World Bank, IMF, International Court of Justice, and so forth have

Volume IX, Issue II, February/2020 Page No:50

Parishodh Journal ISSN NO:2347-6648

come to mean nothing to the Third World as a result of the „little‟ that is acknowledged from
them as far as advantages and equity. Presently Ginni speaks to the created world and she seems
to control everything that Om and his family do including the time they eat: Om: You know how
Ginni abhors it when we were late to eat" (p.228). Ginni guarantees this control through her
Contact Module which can likewise be viewed as the hello tech media devices utilized by cutting
edge countries to beguile the Third World and further pull in the last on to itself Ginni continues
revealing to Om that he should ensure he grins. This is supposing that he grins, it implies his
body from which organs will be evacuated for the endurance of Ginni is sound. It implies you
ought not gripe when you are being abused. Presently Jaya, the main enduring character of the
play, turns into the look at any expectation of the Third World countries who contradicts Om‟s
choice in the last scene of the play, goes to the snapshot of no give up. Om has deserted Jaya
having tenaciously decided to search out Ginni and surrender his body to her. Mama is connected
to her Video Coach; Jaya faces Virgil, the new voice on the Contact Module. She decides to win
by losing. This predicts a great deal for the creating countries. Globalization through its
indecencies is pushing the creating countries to the edge, maybe, to the minute where, as Jaya, it
must compromise complete annihilation. It would not be right to state that it is unseemly the way
Padmanabhan depicts how the First World tears apart the Third World to satisfy its own wants.
Like Padmanabhan, craftsmen in the creating scene must meet the challenge at hand of rescuing
their customs and stick to what gives them character, and gatekeeper their economies for their
own endurance. The Artist in the Age of Globalization Padmanabhan has composed Harvest to
advise us that the circumstance we are in isn't happy for us all in the age that we are in. Since this
wonder is the characterizing at that point craftsmen must meet people's high expectations to
ensure that individuals don't disregard what has helped mankind directly from time. A peep in to
the predominant financial climate of both the created and the creating countries would uncover
that the entire world is at a snapshot of anxiety. It can't be amazement if somebody ponders
whether we are upbeat or not. It resembles what is said in the principal section to the artful
culmination of the novel by Dickens (1859:1): It was the best of times, it was the most noticeably
awful of times, it was the time of stupidity, it was the age of conviction, it was the age of
skepticism, it was the period of light, it was the period of obscurity, it was the spring of
expectation, it was the winter of depression, we had everything before us, we didn't have
anything before us… . This is an adept portrayal existing apart from everything else of this age.

Volume IX, Issue II, February/2020 Page No:51

Parishodh Journal ISSN NO:2347-6648

Everything works with its inverse. As incomprehensible as it might be, however it is valid. The
craftsman must help mankind to remember where it was, the place it is and where it is going
towards. This is on the grounds that things are terrible and flimsy. Rodney elucidates that:
Development in human culture is a versatile procedure. At the degree of the individual, it
suggests expanded ability and limit, more prominent opportunity, imagination, self-restraint,
duty and material prosperity … At the degree of social gatherings, in this way, improvement
infers an expanding ability to direct both inner and outer connections. (1972:1-2). The dramatist
should manage his/her general public towards the way of genuine impendence underway and use
of what is created. This is on the grounds that each individual have indicated a limit with respect
to freely expanding their capacity to carry on with an increasingly good life through misusing the
assets of nature. Each landmass autonomously took an interest in the early ages of the expansion
of man’s authority over his condition which implies in actuality that each mainland can highlight
a time of financial advancement. So Asia, Africa and Latin America are not special cases to this
principal truth of presence. The playwright’s job in the nation may not be interesting as the
individual in question can conjure a snapshot of disquiet and cause the crowd to feel very
awkward as on account of Padmanabhan who makes a circumstance in the play that is truly not
acceptable for a pursuer or a group of people that is looking for delight. Padmanabhan affirms
this reality in a meeting when says that: I knew at the time I composed it that there would be no
doubt of composing it for its own sake_ I had almost certainly that a play of its sort would
discover no takers in India_ and considerably after the exposure it got, the play has positively not
been well known in any structure. It doesn't astound me at all. It shows an unforgiving
perspective on the real world and has almost no solace to offer the normal peruser (2006). It is
actually a play that evokes the depiction that is fairly unpleasant as in vile foulness. This is on
the grounds that it manages the offer of human parts - ghastly like. She paints the image of the
Third World people trapped in the sections of the exploitative First World who leave no way of
endurance for the previous. This situation is truly not happy to the peruser/crowd.
A great deal of negative legends and generalizations have been made about the Southern pieces
of the globe, however most nations in Asia and South America are getting their improvement
endeavors right, China, India, Malaysia, and Brazil among others are overwhelming the
worldwide economy today. It is additionally said that India has not so much characterized its
position and arrangements in worldwide governmental issues that is if the adulates it gets are not

Volume IX, Issue II, February/2020 Page No:52

Parishodh Journal ISSN NO:2347-6648

unimportant shibboleths. Gasp (2008:1) states that: In its seventh decade after freedom, India
today remains at an intersection in its relations with the remainder of the world. Being one of the
most dominant economies on the planet today gives India clout on the worldwide stage
coordinated distinctly by a couple of different states. Padmanabhan depicts India as an entirely
defenseless and vulnerable nation in the hands of America which is speaking to other propelled
world, while Pant considers India to be fit for „shifting the worldwide parity of power‟. This is
the reason India’s customary perspective on world issues needs to change on account of its
developing stature in worldwide framework. Presently India is required to move to the focal
point of activity in worldwide governmental issues when it had consistently seen such a
framework with doubt and in solidarity with other Third World countries. This can be seen
during its time of "sloganeering" position. India despite everything considers other to be controls
as royal forces who execute only authority in the worldwide markets, expressions and legislative
issues.
III. CONCLUSION

Padmanabhan has modernly uncovered the grim that may almost certainly occur for the creating
scene if basic consideration isn't given to the marvel of globalization. This is what is anticipated
from her very own visionary dramatist class and clout. Different essayists have additionally
uncovered their dread and bookings for this age are exceptionally frustrated. Martin (2007:7),
right now, Meaning of the 21st Century "cautions us that we are living in a "represent the
moment of truth century". We are going at a "very quick" speed into a period of boundaries –
limits in riches and neediness, boundaries in innovation and the analyses that researchers need to
perform, outrageous powers of globalism, weapons of mass demolition and fear mongers acting
for the sake of religion. On the off chance that we should endure, at that point we are relied upon
to deal with this circumstance. It is the blunt situation of the paper that the humankind in us
should keep on being empowered in front of the globalization of the world. This implies
mankind ought to be put first before creations, benefits, governmental issues, and so forth.
Individuals ought to maintain what cultivates the humankind on the planet and not the amount
we interface on the planet. Mankind of things will mean forming another worldwide framework
that will oversee globalization and post-unipolar world. This will mean the requirement for a
certified change of our political and monetary organizations in order to make them fit for another
age. Also, it should likewise imply that purposeful exertion is directed toward taking care of the

Volume IX, Issue II, February/2020 Page No:53

Parishodh Journal ISSN NO:2347-6648

political and ecological issues that will fit into the interconnected and profoundly complex
worldwide age. There ought to be the reconstitution of the participation of United Nations
Security Council to incorporate developing forces like India, Japan, Brazil, Nigeria and so forth
in light of their present degree of improvement. This ought to be confirmed with purposeful
exertion to consistently look for the assent of both major and minor powers as choices are taken
on worldwide issues. There ought to be more show on globalization and its effect and impacts on
societies and public activity of countries. It is in the soul of attempting to change the fortunes of
the creating nations that Padmanabhan kept in touch with her play. This is on the grounds that
creating countries are the ones that are seriously influenced by the wonder.
REFERENCES

Achebe, Chinua, There Was A Country: Penguin. London: 2012.

Dickens, Charles, A Tale of Two Cities, Chapman and Hall, London, 1859.

Khor, Martin, Globalization and the South: Some Critical Issues, Spectrum Books. Ibadan: 2005.

Martin, James, The Meaning of the 21st Century, Riverhead Penguin. New York: 2007.

Padmanabhan, Manjula, Harvest, Penguin, Delhi. 1997

Rajkumar, K. Socio-Political Realities in Harvest: A Brief Study of Manjula a. Padmanabhan’s

Critique, RHI. Mahmul, Purna: 2012.

Volume IX, Issue II, February/2020 Page No:54

View publication stats