CHAMAAR TAB AUR AB

Abhiram Ghadyalpatil Poet and Dalit activist Pradnya Daya Pawar on the historical and contemporary Dalit concerns, victimization of Dalit women, literature as the weapon of Dalit activism, and the contemporary social, cultural and political climate Mumbai: When poetry is a conscious act of rebellion, words become weapons of mass uprising. For Pradnya Daya Pawar, the idea of revolt comes from her middle name. Baluta, her father Daya Pawar’s autobiography in Marathi published in 1978, was one of the first personal accounts of a Dalit that soon became a genre in Dalit literature. In 2015, Mumbai-based writer Jerry Pinto translated Baluta into English. Between 1978 and 2018, the literary grammar of Dalit expression, anger and protest went from being a novelty to becoming the norm. Pradnya Pawar, who to her credit has five anthologies packed full of searing Dalit anger and feminist overtones, is the representative of this transition that still maintains its connect with its poignant past. “...