GENDER, CLASS, AND CASTE CONSCIOUSNESS WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE TO INDIAN LITERATURE

The aim of my paper is to deal with the literary as well as cultural representations of Indian women – almost from the very old age – that of the great epics the Mahabharat and the Ramayana and up to the modern day India. I also want to show up the trends attitudes and practices related to Feministic Criticism and Women Empowerment. At the same time it is also to expose the sentimental notions, angry oppositions and confrontations of the so called feminists apart from revealing stereotype and celluloid representations. I have used the illustrations from the learned literary figure, Somadatta Mandal, the first, the Documentary by Ananya Chatterjee Daughters of the 73rd Amendment in which the success stories of three different women leaders of different lands are described. The second a Bengali film Paromita and the third the a ward winning feature film Dahan, which proved to be very controversial for the stereotypical representation of man and Ananya‟s confrontation there on to reveal the hypocrisy and aggression of mere feminism. Moreover, I have also tried to show up the interrelatedness of caste, class and gender and the politics and exploitation by the dominant. I have illustrated this interrelatedness and hypocrisy by providing illustrations from Premchand, Sharadbabu and Arundhati Roy. The exploitation of women and patriarchal treatment expressed in some Bengali collections and the stories of modern day Punjabi writer Kartar Singh Duggal. Finally, exposing the aggressive feminism which by mere confrontation may harm the manwoman relationship and consequently the civilization, I have shown up the representations like Sita, Draupadi, Savitri, Mandodari, etc from our great ancient heritage. I have also covered examples from Toru Dutt‟s Ancient Ballads, like Savitri. At the end I have mentioned the lofty and sublime representations in our folklore from Dineshchandra Sen to Padmashree Dula Kag who has created some wonderful Dohas and Poems regarding mother in particular and women in general. His poem Rajpootani is the striking example of the „Shakti‟ or „Jagadamba‟ form of woman, wherein the Rajputani performs almost every role as an ideal, generous and dominating woman, as wife, as mother and as the queen. She doesn‟t hesitate even to drive her husband away, if he follows the corrupt path. I have ended my writing with the beautiful, exquisite,celebrated poem by a Gujarati poet Botadkar, who creates a wonderful and miraculous image of mother – the incarnation of extreme, ever flowing and overflowing affection