Volume II Special Issue IV April 2022

Name of Author : Dr. Mahesh Naik S

Title of the paper : Sangati: Anecdotes of Dalit Womens Sorrows and Tears

Abstract: Sangati is an appalling analysis of the lives of Dalit women. In Tamil, sangati means news, events, or happenings. The text shows how these women face the double disadvantage of caste and gender discrimination. The book contains many narratives woven together to unfold the social inequities, economic hardships, suffered by Dalit women. Women with different age group several generations and different kinds of experience of life appear in the novel one after the other to exhibit the life of exploitation, oppression, humiliation, injustice, cruelty, trauma and disparity they undergo. The book provides an insight into the lives of women who have been trapped not only by patriarchy but also by caste-hatred. The book also presents many of these women as strong women “who have the courage to break the shackles of authority, to propel themselves upwards, to roar their defiance changed their difficult, problem filled lives and quickly stanched their tears” Sangati i. It has a series of powerful episodes involving memorable characters. Individual episodes, anecdotes and memories of personal experience are narrated in first person. There is a multiplicity of voices in ‘a voice.’ Here instead of a single narrator, many Dalit women speak to the reader. Bama examines the different issues that oppress different women but at the same time has an admiration for those Dalit women who could cope with the caste and gender discrimination. She explains why men vent all their anger at home, the reason for the street quarrels, the use of abusive language and submission to the police and upper caste men. Lack of education and lack of self awareness make them submissive and exploitive.

Keywords : sangati, social inequities, self awareness

DOI :

Page Number : 9-13