I finished reading Joseph Macwan's "Angaliyat" yesterday. Tiha's death in the end fills our eyes with tears. It is considered the best book in Dalit literature in Gujarati. I want to talk something about Dalit literature before I write about the book. Being a city-guy, I always felt that there was no need of Dalit literature in this 21st century. But later I came across the some Dalit writers who have experienced the injust pracitice of untouchability and insults. As long as Dalit continues to experience this, Dalit literature will exist. Even now Dalit writers think it necessary to write about the ill-treatment that they have to face in their day-to-day life. In cities this ill-treatment may be obscure, but in villages where real India is said to exist, condition of Dalit is not that happy. They are not allowed to live in particular areas, they are not allowed to enter the temples, people keep them at respectable distance. This distance is physical as well as mental. Those who are illiterate and used to this kind of malpractice keep mum, but those Dalits who are educated and rational in thier thinking do not succumb to the insults. They revolt against this and many who can write, put their anger into words so that the world can know what they are suffering from.
"Anglaliyat" is a story of two friends-Tiha and Valji- from the wankar community in South of Gujarat. They weave the sheets and sell them in a nearby village-markets. On one such occasion they go to a village where one boy from the groups throws stone at the earthen pot which Methi, the heroine of the novel- was carrying. Those boys belonged to Patidar community. When Tiha sees this, he challenges the boys and it creates a lot of problem for him later in the novel. Tiha falls in love with the girl, but now it was not possible for him to go to the village. The vengeful Patidars in that village come to know that Tiha has soft corner for Methi, so they try to get her married to the man of her own community to whom she was married in childhood.
Tiha's friend Valji prepares a plan so that these lovers can meet and get married, but unfortunately gets killed. His wife Kanku laments the death, but still doesn't hate Tiha. Tiha feels he is responsible for ruining the happy married life of Valji and Kankubhabhi so he vows not to marry at all. He thinks he can't enjoy the carnal pleasure with MEthi when Kankubhabhi is leading a lonely life. Later in the novel when he is forced to marry, he talks about the re-marriage of Kankubhbhi to Valji's younger brother. It is irony that when Kanku is ready for the marriage, Methi is married already to her childhood husband! Methi becomes mother of a son, tries to forget Tiha and live with his husband happily but could not do so because her husband used to beat her brutally. One day she beats her husband and thinking that he is dead, she runs away with her son to commit suicide by jumping in the well. When she was about to jump in the well, Tiha clutches her hand and explain her not to do so. She comes to Tiha's house and decides to live alone. Both could not marry because Methi's husband was not dead as she thought that day. Methi forces Tiha to marry a nice girl as there was no meaning leaving a lonely life. Tiha gets married and just after some times Methi's husband dies!
In the last chapters, Tiha is attacked by the those old enemies and this time they beat him with sticks so brutally that he succumbs to death. When the news of his death reaches Methi, She becomes mad with the shock.She keep crying continously. People had never ever seen any woman crying that way, not ever for the husband. Methi without telling anyone, stops having meals and dies withing few days of his beloved Tiha.
"Anglaliyat" is a story of two friends-Tiha and Valji- from the wankar community in South of Gujarat. They weave the sheets and sell them in a nearby village-markets. On one such occasion they go to a village where one boy from the groups throws stone at the earthen pot which Methi, the heroine of the novel- was carrying. Those boys belonged to Patidar community. When Tiha sees this, he challenges the boys and it creates a lot of problem for him later in the novel. Tiha falls in love with the girl, but now it was not possible for him to go to the village. The vengeful Patidars in that village come to know that Tiha has soft corner for Methi, so they try to get her married to the man of her own community to whom she was married in childhood.
Tiha's friend Valji prepares a plan so that these lovers can meet and get married, but unfortunately gets killed. His wife Kanku laments the death, but still doesn't hate Tiha. Tiha feels he is responsible for ruining the happy married life of Valji and Kankubhabhi so he vows not to marry at all. He thinks he can't enjoy the carnal pleasure with MEthi when Kankubhabhi is leading a lonely life. Later in the novel when he is forced to marry, he talks about the re-marriage of Kankubhbhi to Valji's younger brother. It is irony that when Kanku is ready for the marriage, Methi is married already to her childhood husband! Methi becomes mother of a son, tries to forget Tiha and live with his husband happily but could not do so because her husband used to beat her brutally. One day she beats her husband and thinking that he is dead, she runs away with her son to commit suicide by jumping in the well. When she was about to jump in the well, Tiha clutches her hand and explain her not to do so. She comes to Tiha's house and decides to live alone. Both could not marry because Methi's husband was not dead as she thought that day. Methi forces Tiha to marry a nice girl as there was no meaning leaving a lonely life. Tiha gets married and just after some times Methi's husband dies!
In the last chapters, Tiha is attacked by the those old enemies and this time they beat him with sticks so brutally that he succumbs to death. When the news of his death reaches Methi, She becomes mad with the shock.She keep crying continously. People had never ever seen any woman crying that way, not ever for the husband. Methi without telling anyone, stops having meals and dies withing few days of his beloved Tiha.
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