Mahasweta Devi Draupadi Summary| Gayatri Chakraborty Spivak Translation|
Mahesweta Devi is an Indian Writer born in 1926. She has written most of her short stories in Bengali. Many of the critics call her the mother of ‘Bengali Dalit Literature’.
“Draupadi” is a work of Mahesweta Devi where she tells the readers a story of a tribal woman named Draupadi.
The title ‘Draupadi’ is named in the name of the lead woman character Draupadi whom everyone uses to call Dopdi. There is a significance of Draupadi and Dopdi.
Draupadi| Portrayal of Resistance
Mahasweta Devi Draupadi Summary
Dopdi is looking perfect for a tribal, uneducated woman who even does not know of the world. The plot is being written in the Naxalbari movement where the tribals were being destructed by army officers. Dopdi is the wife of Dulna Majhi whom an army officer encountered and he cries, “Maho”
Therefore, Dopdi becomes alone and she keeps on her fighting. She hides in the forest and there she never replies if someone calls her in the name Dopdi.
She knows well that other villagers will help the army officers to catch her. But a tragic incident happened to her. A group of army officers catches her. She knows well that they will encounter her for no reason as they killed her husband.
She knows well that if they force her to tell the truth she will cut her tongue and they will encounter her. Dopdi is ready to face the incident but there happens something else.
When she is being apprehended, Captain Arjan Singh tells the others,
“”Made her. Do the needful”
Dopdi never knows what is going to happen with her. She knew that is going to die but she could not realize, the army officer has come to make her. They raped Dopdi Mejhen.
There are so many armies that get up and down and crushed her nipple. She looks up at her sari and probably compares herself with the mythological Draupadi whom lord Krishna saved from her shame.
But in the reality, there is no existence of Lord Krishna who will save the uneducated tribal woman, Draupadi. When she wakes up she finds clots of blood in her thighs.
Her breasts are crushed and she is perfectly made up. After waking up the army group tells her to wear the sari but she did not put up.
She goes confidently to the captain and stands in front of him without having any arm. The captain is astonished but he never takes up his rifle to encounter.
“Arjan Singh’s power also explodes out of the male organ of a gun. Without
a gun even the “five Ks” come to nothing in this day and age.”
The speech proofs the fact that of the fear of the captain where the story ends. This is ending here with a tragic ending.
A tribal woman does not have a say but when she is being tortured by the higher authority, she tells the truth. The English translation is being done by Gayatri Chakraborty Spivak and she adds some words for the story.
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