A LITTLE BLACK CHALK

A little white chalk

Can write whatever it wants

On a big black board,

Why?

You,

A little black chalk,

Don’t sit with fear,

Stand,

And write whatever you want

On the big white board.

                                                                             

Market mantra

Buy buy buy buy

Coal coal coal coal

Charcoal charcoal

Cream roll cream roll

Hari Bol Hari Bol

Buy buy buy buy

Soul  soul soul soul

Dipped in dipped in

Black coal black coal

Buy this but that

Me tit me tat

Drink drink drink drink

Drink blood drink blood

Eat flesh drink blood

Blood blood blood blood

I love people hanging up there

I love them eating pesticides

I love those people who kill themselves

I love them anyway if they die

Buy buy buy buy

Buy this buy that

Me tit me tat

Buy buy buy buy

As much I get franklin

On that sheet of paper

I am happy happy happy

I’m lucky lucky lucky

I’m above that sky scraper

Buy buy buy buy

Buy me buy him buy them buy all

buy buy buy buy

I’ve bought everything

I’ve sold my soul

I can do anything

To eat cream roll

Roll roll roll roll

Cream roll cream roll

Coal coal coal coal

Charcoal charcoal

Cream roll charcoal

No soul no soul

BUY buy buy buy

Buy this buy that

Me tit me tat

Buy buy buy buy

They die they kill

They eat death pill

They vanish in numbers

To let me chill

Chill chill chill chill

No bill no bill

Kill kill kill kill

Let them kill kill

Chill chill death chill

Cold heal cold heal

Buy buy buy buy

Buy buy buy buy

Buy buy buy buy buy

Buy buy

Buy buy

I WONDER

Barren, hollow sun rising,

Slow, stealing, suffocating?

I wonder?

Breathless nose, Itchy skin,

Under the carpet,

 Over the moon?

I wonder?

Hopeless with a tangle,

Brown skinned hope?

I wonder?

Seventeen people, seven administrators,

One ruler?

I wonder?

Casino, coffins, broken

Under the skin?

I wonder?

Warning, first and last,

Put your hands up

And die?

I wonder?

Crippled, blind, skin disease,

Who? Me?

I wonder?

Gross domestic,

Mass killing,

Who? He?

I wonder?

Black soil,

White cotton,

Industrial revolution,

Sudden death?

I wonder?

Cash, credit,

Car loans,

People mourn,

It’s a wonderful life?

I wonder?

Lights, camera, action,

Smile please,

What the hell?

I wonder?

Country burglar,

City smuggler,

No vacancy?

I wonder?

I wonder about my wonder,

You wonder why I wonder,

I know you don’t wonder,

I wonder why don’t you wonder?

20th century

Woolf. Eliot, Joyce,

Had a disillusioned voice,

Pinter, Brecht, Beckett,

 Structure anew maketh,

 Ginsberg, Burroughs, Kerouac,

Were destined to break the block,

Rushdie, Ghose, Roy,

Breaketh the Indian coy,

Well if this is the way,

The 20^th century went away,

We can expect a lot

In a 21^st century plot.

ABOUT THE BOOK

                         ‘BALCHANMA: PRISHTABHUMI AA PRASTHAN”

The book is a social, economical and cultural study of ’BALCHANMA’, a Maithili novel written by Baidyanath Mishra ‘Yatri’ by Mohan Bhardwaj. This novel was first published in Hindi before it could be published in Maithili.

This book has seven chapters:

1.Maithili society,

2.Maithili Culture,

3.Economic distress,

4.Political consciousness,

5 Peasant struggle

6.Remainder

7.Conclusion

The writer has analysed the novel in these chapters by giving illustrations from the novel. 

According to him the understanding of these elements in the context of the historical background to which the novel belongs to is compulsory for a broader understanding of the text in question. Yet there will be many things which will be left to be known.

I am trying to sum up what he said in these chapters very briefly.

MAITHILI SOCIETY:  ‘Balchanma’ is the history of MIthila. It is not a historical novel, but a novelistic history.  As we know history is written by those who are in power, thus these novels become a part of parallel or marginalized history which are not taken as the official version of the truth, Mohan Bharadwaj believes that the history is incomplete if it only commemorates the tales of the powerful, it is equally important to look into the untold, unheard version of historical truth, that is the history of the downtrodden. We should know the accounts of their day-to-day life, hopes and faiths, and life-style. ‘Balchanma’ emerges from the need of this knowledge.

The story of the novel proceeds in three layers- ‘Balchanma’, his area, and his country.

This chapter consists of the individual story of ‘Balchanma’, the causes and the results of the illiteracy amongst the lower caste, immorality of the higher caste Zamindars, and the broadening of the gap between the status of Zamindars and the peasants and its consequences. 

MAITHILI CULTURE:   MIthila is an agricultural state.  The lifestyle of a farmer is its cultural specialty. The novel comprises the food customs and farming life of the farmers. Working culture is the core nature of this farming culture. For a farmer his farm, cattle are everything. In the Zamindar family this working culture was absent. Balchanma also enjoys farming.

Yatri defines this working culture as the culture of the Mithila on the whole. The main food for farmers is bread of Madua and fish. There were differences in the customs of upper and lower caste. The novelist captures the point of view of a peasant on the food of MIthila for the first time. According to the novelist Maithili culture is above the discrimination of caste and religion.

ECONOMIC DISTRESS: Here, there is a reference of the novel to an incident where Balchanma’s father was brutally beaten up and his death later because of the trivial incident of eating mangoes.

According to Mohan Bhardwaj, Mithila’s socio-economic background reveals two facts: (a) Maithili society was divided into two parts, masters and tenants; (b) the master exploited the tenant.

The novel explains in depth Mithila’s economic arrangements and the inter-clash between land owners and peasants and labourers.  There are examples of the farm-slavery, exploitation of the tenant by the master in the novel.

When Yatri talks about the exploited, there is no difference on the basis of caste in his mind. Agriculture was the center of economy in the whole country and not only Mithila. In order to know about the socio-economic side of Mithila we have to know about this agricultural economy. Even after the earthquakes the peasants had to pay the taxes. These things affected Balchanma also.

POLITICAL AWARENESS: Gandhiji started ‘Savinay Awagya Andolan’ British started the cultivation of indigo. Tinkathia tradition was hugely protested by the farmers. The Britishers used to take three katthas of land out of every twenty katthas for Indigo farming. After two three years when those three katthas became barren they used to take another three katthas of their land. This tradition was hugely protested by the farmers, finally they won and the law was abolished. Gandhi Jee came to Champaran and Swami Vidyananad started the people’s movement. There were two major influences of Gandhi. First, farmers now came to know about their rights; secondly social reform movement took one step forward.  People of Mithila started taking active part in the independence movement. Balchanma was very upset with the corruption in congress during the earthquake relief and he became a socialist.

PEASANT REVOLT: There are references to arm revolts in the novel. There are three important points in the peasant revolt- the reason, structure and result. There were two reasons, immediate and long term. The three immediate reasons stated in the novel are- problem of land owning, interest on the money lent and land-revenue complains. The main reason of peasant revolt is social.

Balchanma was shaken by his father’s death, but the attempt to rape of his sister made him to fight with his master. This event influenced him for rest of his life.

It is clear in the novel that if the reason for peasant revolt is moral economy then Mithila is the best place for the purpose.

The groups of revolts were made on the basis of economic condition and not on the basis of caste or religion. Due to this unity the Zamindars couldn’t fight this battle directly. Although, they tried to break their unity.  

REMEINDER: The writer says, Yatri never wanted Balchanma to die, thus Balchanma was never killed by the men of the Zamindar. Yatri was an active participant in the peasant revolt so he had studied and gained experience about that.   But the basis of the novel is not only his experience but also his vision.

The novel ‘Balchanma’ is the maturity of realistic subject matter and advance vision. There is coherence between the events in the novel and the contemporary life of the peasants. Balchanma is not only a novel about peasant-revolt but also about their life. It is a hand-book of the progress of peasants.

The novel is a realistic take of the life of the village and not just a description of village life. Mithila’s villages are not static but changeable.

CONCLUSION:  Balchanma is basically a novel of change in system in three ways- economically, socially, and culturally. The novel is basically both realistic and artistic. The story is narrated by Balchanma so the language is of a layman of Mithila. Yatri had effectively used this lingo as he was closely connected to the peasants. Yatri not only wanted to establish his characters but also to lighten the social, cultural, economic and political causes that led to the birth of peasant revolt.

One of the major attempts by the writer of the book is to make this novelistic history stand parallel and equal to the history written on Mithila till date. To state a fact, that the history of Mithila, which Yatri brings into front is no less important than the non-fictional history. Though the character of Balchanma is a fictional one but the situations and events surrounding him are things which actually happened but not given importance to. Apart from that the customs and way of living have never being fore fronted in a Maithili novel before this work. But this is not just a collection of facts, but an amalgamation of art and history, Yatri uses a novelistic framework to tell his version of truth about the years in question, combining in that what he believes what should have happened. Ending on a hopeful note, he is optimistic about the rapid social change which he believes that will occur in the future, with people like Balchanma in the center of the proceedings.