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Hareesh cautions against reading Meesha as a Dalit novel: “Much of Meesha’s social space is the world of upper castes. The Dalit community - the hero of the novel, Vavachan, is a pulaya, a Dalit caste - backed him throughout, despite the odd murmur about savarna writers’ obsession with the oppressive past of the community. A lesson he learnt was - “I didn’t know there were so many savarna communal fellows around us.” At least one neighbour stopped talking to him. There was tension initially, but that was mostly because people were only talking about the controversy. The JCB Prize, hopefully, will trigger a fresh look at the book.ĭid the experience of threats to life change the writer in him? Not really, he says. There have been very few discussions on the aesthetics of the book, though it has sold nearly 50,000 copies. The controversy, he believes, prevented a close and intimate reading of the work. With a dozen or so short stories, he had already carved out a niche in the crowded world of Malayalam fiction. Hareesh, 45, had hoped that his novel, ambitious in its historical and ecological canvas and innovative in narration, would be read and reread in quiet. Meesha is a complex, multilayered work that, in poet K Satchidanandan’s words, seeks to resurrect a language within a language. The controversy helped sales, but it coloured the reception of the novel. A month later, a three-judge bench of the Supreme Court dismissed a plea to ban the book on the ground that it had references derogatory to Hindu women. In August, DC Books, a major Malayalam publisher, announced the publication of Meesha. Fortunately, a counter mobilisation was on, with readers, politicians and the state administration backing him. When the abuse extended to his family, Hareesh withdrew the novel. The mob was largely upper-caste Hindus and the Hindu right-wing.
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Thereafter, it was “a relentless shower of abuse for days,” says the writer. “Pani varunnundu (there’s trouble coming),” he had warned Hareesh. It was a friend who first alerted Hareesh to the tension brewing over Meesha, which the Mathrubhumi Illustrated Weekly had just started serialising. The fine Print: S Hareesh won the JCB Prize for Literature this year and Jallikattu, a film based on one of his short stories, is India’s entry to the Oscars this year
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The ban-the-book campaigns in both cases had positive outcomes, with the judiciary expressing unambiguous support for the writers while reaffirming India’s constitutional commitment to free speech. That episode in December 2014 turned Perumal Murugan from being a provincial writer, largely known to serious readers of Tamil literature, to an internationally recognised novelist. BJP held the Jhuggi Samman Yatra to reach out to slum dwellers in Delhi as part of the party's campaign in the run up to the civic polls in the capital.Hareesh’s story, of course, recalls the unexpected trajectory another writer’s career took after a right-wing mob in another language and cultural setting forced him to apologise over hurt sentiments. Perumal Murugan is a native of Namakkal district and resides in the town. The poster, however, did not name him and had his image as a collage with a group of people belonging to various age groups purportedly portraying them as people living in slums. Apparently, they were not aware of my identity," Murugan told TOI. "I guess they had taken my photo from the internet. Perumal Murugan, who had faced threats in the past from right wing groups for his novel 'Mathorubagan (One Part Woman)' based on the struggle of a couple to beget a child in a society troubled by caste divide, was surprised when he came to know that he has been featured in the BJP's banner. None of those involved in the process BJP functionaries, people who designed the banner or the printer was aware of the witer's identity. Tamil writer Perumal Murugan's image used on a promotional banner for BJP's Jhuggi Samman Yatra in New Delhi has raised eyebrows.