![]() Thus there are women writers like Rajni Pannikar, Krishna Sobti etc who address the issue of the subjugation of women in society. Krishna Sobti also opposes the traditional moral values imposed on women. In most of her novels, Shivani opens up numerous windows on the lives of women. She asserts that the tradition-bound, male-dominated system leaves no space for women's individuality. Shivani contends that a woman may be treated as a goddess or as a 'Sati,' but actually her position is no more than that of a servant. Her novels reveal that even in the contemporary milieu, women's situation is no different from the repressive conditions of the nineteenth century that had urged the need for social reforms. In Chaudah Phere, Shivani, through the colonel, his wife, and their daughter Ahilya, exposes the social system. She puts forward the view that in the male-dominated Indian society, a man assumes the rights to behave with a woman in whichever way he likes. Despite Ahilya's protests, her father the colonel forces her to marry the man he chooses as her husband. The colonel himself has an affair with Malika Sarkar, depriving his wife of all her rights in the house. In Rativilap, Shivani portrays the difficulties of a widow. In spite of being educated, Mayapuri's Shobha, finds herself caught in a web of difficulties. Helpless and trapped, she silently suffers when her poverty, class, and caste prevent her from marrying her lover, Satish, who brings the governor's daughter home as his bride. Like Mayapuri's Shobha, the protagonist in Usha Priyamvada's Pachpan Khambe Lal Diwaren is prevented from marrying the man she loves because it is socially unacceptable. Burdened by poverty and her family's financial crisis, she takes up a job as the warden of a hostel and becomes a prisoner in the building with red walls and 55 pillars. ![]() The problems of arranged marriage is manifested in Shivani's Kainja, whose heroine, Nandi Tiwari, is not allowed to marry the man she chooses, because her father has been told that her horoscope does not predict a happy married future. The problem of dowry compounded by widowhood is considered in Mrinal Pandey's short story "Hum Safar." Through the thoughts of a young widow, Nirmala, traveling in a train compartment, Pandey illuminates the bitter truth about the ways in which her widowhood denies her whatever little she has left to savor. Nirmala recalls that after her husband's death, her colored Saris and blouses, her silver anklets and nose ring, all had slowly found their way into her sister-in-law's boxes. Thus through the story Pandey tries to challenge the existent social structure which affects and moulds a widow's world. To confront the violence committed on women in their daily lives, Pandey introduces a language of violence expressed in Nirmala's outrageous beating of her son. What is expressed in this action is that a quiet and non-violent, passive attitude that society expects from a "virtuous" woman is insufficient to confront the violence inflicted on women through male-dominated structures. Stories written by women largely reveal women's desires to have the choice to shape their lives, especially marriage, something that existing social institutions do not grant. Although Mannu Bhandari sees marriage as a necessity, she recommends the choice of divorce in an unsuccessful marriage. At the same time, however, she highlights the social problems attached to the status of being a divorced woman in Ap Ka Band (1971). Most of the stories of Pannikar, Shivani, Mannu Bhandari, and Mrinal Pandey strongly convey the necessity for women's education for achieving social and economic equality. For this reason, their protagonists are often educated women. The heroine of Do Ladkiyan is professionally sound because of her education. Similarly, Kainja's Nandi Tiwari fights the system by obtaining a medical degree, which enables her to become a successful doctor. Her education provides her a self-confidence and economic stability that enable her to face the repressive society. Thus women writers in Hindi Literature have proved extremely progressive in their questioning of the social structures which confined. The stories written by these women introduce old issues, but with new emphases and new orientations. |