Oppression and Society in Dalit Literature as Strife for New Social Structure

Pages:41-42
Ashish Sangwan (Independent Research Scholar in English, 621, Sector-14, Rohtak, Haryana)

Dalit literature is not simply literature. It is associated with a movement to bring about change. Dalit literature as a nomenclature may be traced to the first Dalit Literary Conference in 1958. After centuries of darkness and suffering, the Dalits have begun voicing their claims for a just heritage and space in society. Having found their cultural awakening their own spiritual universe, literature and their own aesthetics, the Dalits have started to question and challenge all the values and declared their writing as ‘Resistant Literature’. My purpose is to study the oppression and society of that time in the works Om Prakash Balmiki, Praveen Gadhvi and Bema. They can be seen standing up against subjugation, humiliation and atrocities and singing of the drawn of a new life. The possibility of their social-cultural and political emancipation led to a host of publications dealing mainly with the Dalit situation in India as well as a parallel body of literature called Dalit Consciousness which has come to occupy a niche in the body of Indian Literary expression. Dalit literature is gaining space as a literary genre because of its aesthetic quality, deepest life experiences and the unforgettable historic notions.