Love knows no caste

Author: N Vinoth Kumar | ENS

Published Date: May 30, 2013 9:22 AM

Writer Imayam’s book Pethavan throws light on the ruthless ‘honour killings’ carried out by khap panchayats to oppose inter-caste marriages in Tamil Nadu

Of late, the word ‘love’ is turning out to be an unpleasant one with a section of society and is being perceived as the root cause of all pain. Worse, those falling in love are treated as ‘criminals’.

Members of a politicial party who have been persistent in their demand to have an anti-Cupid crusade in society are to take a part of the blame. While the intellectual community is taking efforts to end the ‘castecentred anti-cupid crusade’ at the ground level, there are some contributions being made in the literary arena too. A short story has now succeeded in creating tough opposing waves against this crusade.

Writer Imayam, a well-noted litterateur in the Tamil literary circle, has penned a short story titled Pethavan last year, which got published in a well-known literary magazine Uyirmai in its September 2012 issue. Widening its reach with each passing day, this 26-page short-story (also called Nedunkathai in Tamil) collection, which has been compiled into a single book, has sold over 18,000 copies till date. At a marriage function in Thiruvarur, around 1,200 copies of Imayam’s book were distributed free of cost to the invitees. It is now being translated in Malayalam and Kannada.

In his story, Pethavan narrates the collapse of a poor Hindu family after a girl in the family gets involved in a love affair with a lower caste boy. The girl, Bakkiyam, also the lead character in the story, falls in love with Periyasamy, a Dalit boy, while at college. When their relationship comes to light, the upper caste families in the village oppose the relationship.

The couple attempt to elope from the village twice and both times, the villagers manage to stop them and brutally punish them by beating them up in public view. When the girl gets caught the third time while trying to elope with the guy, the villagers pass orders for a ‘honour killing’. The panchayat assigns this task to the girl’s father Palani himself. They also warn that if the girl is not killed, she will be raped and murdered by the villagers. To avoid such a horror, Palani, who was also ashamed by her act, agrees to kill his daughter.

However, paying heed to the fervent appeal from Bakkiyam’s grandmother, mother and differently-abled sister, Palani decides to go against the panchayat’s decision and plans to save her daughter instead. The night when the killing is scheduled, Bakkiyam’s father helps her to escape from the village with Periyasamy. With their successful escape and with Palani ending his own life after making sure of his daughter’s safety, the story comes to an end.

Throughout the story, Imayam brings out precedencies of honour killings, quoting examples of the Kannagi Murugesan pair, who were killed a decade ago for the same ‘ inter-caste marriage’.

The unnamed political party plays a vital role in this story and instigates the villagers to engage in honour killing. Interestingly, the story was published after a political party leader’s alleged instigating speech on inter-caste marriage in April at Mamallapuram.

Interestingly, it was after this story was published that there was caste violence in Dharmapuri over a love affair.

“It is a pure co-incidence” said Imayam, relating the story to the party’s anti-cupid crusade. “We say that ours is an educated culture. But with such opposition to love, we have to think twice before terming it an educated one.”

“Tamil culture has always praised love affairs. But, our society today is caste-centric and not Tamil culture-centric. It is to be kept in mind that your daughter has every right to choose her partner. When you, as a parent, become a hindrance, it means you are violating her basic fundamental right. The demeanour activities of some parties are not just aimed at opposing love, but has also been used as a tool to build up a casteist society” he added. “It has been said that they oppose love affairs happening between high caste and low caste people.

But, will they be ready to accept a poor boy if he loves a rich girl from the same caste? Moreover, in general, it is seen that society accepts a relationship between an upper caste boy and a lower caste girl, opposes the relationship when it is between a lower caste boy and an upper caste girl,” Imayam said.

“When one reads this story and gets a bitter feel about the whole caste structure in society, only then I think the story can be said to have attained success,” he concluded.

Courtesy: The New Indian Express