CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

Indian writing in English has been more than hundred and fifty years of age today. All

types of literary writings are available in Indian English literature. Indian English fiction

has acquired new dimensions after globalization and liberalization of Indian Economy.

Indian fiction writers have got national and international awards in recognition of their

achievements in the field. Advent of new information technology in India connected

them with literary forces outside and within India. All this enhanced their awareness,

communication skills and responses to the changes in the field.

There are many men and women writers who handled and depicted contemporary issues.

Traditional themes like Indian poverty, superstitions, culture, child marriage and

illiteracy are now replaced by the themes like crumbling family relations, devastating

effects of globalization, exploitation of employees etc. These writers came from highest

centres of learning in India. The writers like Chetan Bhagat, Amish Tripathi, Shashi

Tharoor, Arvind Adiga have presented variety of untraditional themes with innovative

techniques. Women writers like Kiran Desai, Arundhati Roy got coveted Booker prizes

for effective presentation of realistic social, cultural and political situations in India.

Sudha Murty is one of the prolific Indian writers in English today. She has written four

novels, four books of short stories and two novellas. Though a female writer, she does not

deal with the issues related to women only. Main thrust of her writing is the deep

psychological upheavals in the minds of Indian youth in the age of globalization. The

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Indian economy changed drastically in the last decade of the twentieth century and the

first decade of twenty first century. Sudha Murty encountered the ill impact of

globalization on today‟s generation from the social and psychological point of view.

Sudha Murty‟s writing is a wonderful combination of old Indian and the new twentieth

century Indian culture. She is a psycho-analyst as well as an entrepreneur. Her works

reflect a rare combination of philanthropic attitude and logical thoughts. Her writings

take us deep into the human mind with all its complexities. The delineation of characters

depicted by her represents new reality which is revolutionary feature in modern literature.

She is not a feminist in traditional sense who fights for women‟s cause. She writes about

men and women both struggling for their own existence in globalizing India. It will be an

interesting and innovative attempt to find out about her writing in detail through this

study. The present study interpretes and analyzes Sudha Murty‟s literary works critically.

The term critical study has a broad implication. It involves analysis of themes, characters,

narrative devices, setting, language and style. The limitation of time and space has

restricted the researcher to narrow the topic. The study focuses on critical analysis of

themes, characters, narrative devices and setting employed by Sudha Murty in her literary

works.

THEME

Term theme refers to a central idea around which the action of the novel is woven. It is

the subject matter of a novel. Novelist writes with some purpose. He/she intends to give

some message, attack some undesirable attitudes in person or society, propagate some

ethics among the readers, present a social problem, narrate historically important events

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with new perspective etc. In short, a novelist writes with some intentions. He does not

write in vacuum. There is generally one prominent theme and other less prominent ones

to support it in every novel. The supportive themes may emerge through parallel themes

or contradictory themes to highlight the basic theme.

Indian fiction writers in English have been writing on the themes related to castes, classes,

social discrimination, exploitation, alienation, segregation, unemployment, rural and

urban divide etc. A novelist may deal with a one or more of the above themes

simultaneously. Arundhati Roy in her The God of Small Things deals with the

exploitation of women in India, wretched condition of an untouchable boy in the society,

faces that wear masks etc. In fact the greatness of a novel depends on the effective

handling of various themes in the same work.

It is interesting to note at the outset that though a woman, Sudha Murty‟s themes are not

restricted to women‟s issues only. Her writing shows a remarkable shift in overall

perspective to feminine writing. It is a general practice in feminine writing to blame men

for the sufferings of women as if men and women were born enemies and marriage was a

license to carry out an agenda of exploitation of women by men. Sudha Murty is perhaps

the first Indian writer in English to reason out the issue by blaming one woman for the

miseries of other woman along with the man in the family. All her four novels

demonstrate the strained relations between two women in the same family.

Another theme that Sudha Murty deals with is the eroding effects of emerging capitalism

in Indian society on the close human relations. Liberalization in Indian economic system

brought scores of opportunities for the Indians to acquire riches. Young boys and girls

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got a chance to go to the first world countries and avail of modern amenities easily. On

the one hand, it changed their social and financial status. On the other hand, it created

tension in the traditionally close domestic relations. Sudha Murty artistically dealt with

crumbling domestic relations in all her works.

There are some minor themes in her works. Indians overall are superstitious. They

believe in the caste system, particularly while fixing marriages. Horoscopes, auspicious-

ominous moments, customs, traditions, conventions, religious faiths play their roles in

everyday life of Indians. Contradictions in the life of Indians are immaculately put

forward by Sudha Murty in all her works.

CHARACTERIZATION

Character normally is a being with human or human like qualities in a work of art. It is an

entity that is capable of performing actions. It is constructed by the interaction between

the readers and textual representation of character. Margolin describes it as “Character

designates any entity, individual or collective—normally human or human like—

introduced in a work of narrative fiction. Characters thus exist within story worlds and

play a role, no matter how minor, in one or more of the states of affairs or events told

about in the narrative. Character can be succinctly defined as story world participant”1

Characterization is a process in which writer transforms a person into personality, a mere

name into an identity. The skill with which writer achieves this change decides the

greatness or otherwise of a writer. Writer employs different methods like descriptions,

discussions, dialogues, interior monologues to give it a touch of verisimilitude.

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Traditionally characters were divided into hero, villain and minor characters according to

their roles in the novel. Sometimes they were called major and minor characters

depending upon the slice of action they performed. Traditional division of characters into

flat and round characters is also done away with in the recent times. Use of the terms like

protagonist and central characters for hero show a shift in our concept of hero, who in the

past was expected to be virtuous, brave and dynamic. Today we have characters from

subaltern section of the society. Bakha in Untoucahble, Munoo in Coolie, Balaram in The

White Tiger, Velutha in The God of Small Things, Rukhamani in Nectar in a Sieve, and

likes have occupied central stage in the novels today.

Art of characterization has acquired new dimensions with the recent discoveries in the

field of psychology and anthropology. There are descriptions of upheavals in the minds

of the characters along with the descriptions of their physical properties. Readers are

expected to read the minds in order to find out the reality behind characters‟ actions.

Characterization becomes deep and authentic by writer‟s efforts to place his characters in

different situations with different characters. Characterization depends on writer‟s skill

with which he develops his characters in relation to each other.

One of the peculiar features of Sudha Murty‟s characters is that they come from middle

class milieu. They are either from teaching field or from service sector. Sudha Murty

links them with the traditional Indian society and ultramodern western society

simultaneously. Most of the young characters engage themselves in their personal and

professional developments. The old characters are attracted towards riches but are

unwilling to change themselves in other respects. Old traditions, customs and

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conventions possess them even in the modern world of technology, which results into

confrontation between the old and new.

If we compare Murty‟s female characters with the female characters of other Indian

women novelists, one notices that Murty‟s women have positive attitude to life. They

believe in hard work. They are exceptionally optimistic in their approach to life. Kamala

Markandaya‟s Rukhmini resigns to fate. She is a helpless being at the hands of cruel

destiny. Tanner evacuates her from her traditional house. Her children ditch her. society

ill treats her. She bears it all passively, without grumble. Powerful forces outside rule her.

Murty‟s women shape their own destiny with planning and purpose. Mahashweta and

Mridula do not go down to circumstances. They rather work to bring about a change in

external situation.

Sudha Murty‟s characterization lacks depth. She fails to delve deep into the

psychological upheavals of her characters. Young boys and girls fall in love and get

married. There are no romantic outings of the two. This seems rather odd. Modern boys

and girls with high educational qualifications and awareness cannot be expected to get

into marital ties without roaming and dating.

Sudha Murty has placed confrontation between two women at the centre of action in all

her novels. Even a modern boy hands over his wife to his mother immediately after

marriage. As a result, characters do not contain any other dimension to them. She could

have shown her characters with reference to other characters in order to provide other

aspects of their personalities.

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In spite of these flaws her art of characterization is simple and straightforward in keeping

with the tradition of story telling in India. As a result, Murty‟s novels, novella and short

stories appeal to the cross section of Indian readers today. Great Indian story writers like

R. K. Narayan, Mulka Raj Anand and Ravindranath Tagore before them were Murty‟s

models for story writing. She stood out as an exceptional story teller because or her

allegiance to the Indian tradition and not because of blind copying of the westerners. It

goes on to demonstrate that India has changed but Indians have not changed.

NARRATIVE TECHNIQUE

The way in which the story and action is unfolded is called narrative technique. Writer

can use first person narration in which character itself narrates the incidents and episodes

in its life. First person narration generally uses flashback technique to recount its life. R.

K. Narayan‟s The Guide, Kamala Markanday‟s Nectar in a Sieve, Shashi Deshpande‟s

That long Silence used this technique. Some times writer creates a narrator who unfolds

the action through its eye. Raja Rao‟s Achchakka in Kanthapura and Emily Bronte‟s

Nelly and Lockwood in Wuthering Heights are the best examples of the use of this

technique. The writer employs this technique in order to keep his distance from the

characters. Third type of narrative technique is the writer itself takes the reigns of action

of the work in his hands. Most writers follow this technique. Chaman Nahal‟s Azadi,

Anand‟s Coolie, Adiga‟s The White Tiger are some of the notable examples of the use of

this technique.

One of the innovative techniques in the twentieth century was stream of consciousness

technique. This technique was based on the presentation of the thoughts, emotions and

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feelings of the characters as they occurred to them. M. H. Abrams describes Stream of

Consciousness as “Stream of Consciousness is the name for a special mode of narration

that undertakes to reproduce, without a narrator‟s intervention the full spectrum and the

continuous flow of a character‟s mental process, in which sense perceptions mingle with

conscious and half conscious thoughts, memories, expectations, feelings and random

associations.2 Virginia Wolf‟s Mrs. Dalloway and James Joyes‟s Ulysses are some of the

notable examples of the use of this technique. Unfortunately this technique did not take

firm roots in British literature. We do not find any novel in Indian English using this

technique.

One story can be narrated in different ways by different writers. Nectar in a Sieve, That

Long Silence, Inside the Haveli deal with women‟s issues. Rukhmani in Nectar in a Sieve

narrates the story of her life. Geeta‟s story in Inside the Haveli is narrated by the writer.

Meaning of a work of art partially depends upon the narrator‟s view point. Shashi

Deshapande‟s That Long Silence has dragged negative criticism simply because the

protagonist herself is a narrator. Readers feel that she has been unjust to her husband.

First person narration becomes one sided story of a narrator in which he/she might try to

explain his/her position. It becomes a fictional version of an autobiography. Writer‟s

narration has more authenticity as it has a touch of impartiality. It provides bird‟s eye

view of characters and actions in the work.

One of the salient features of good writing is its potential to force readers‟ participation in

the process of writing. It is not the writer alone who writes. The readers are equal stake

holders in the formation of the text. Metaphoric death of an author signifies the birth of

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readers in the creative act. Real author creates co-authors who guide and monitor his/her

writing. This process of collective writing is extremely meaningful in the appreciation of

a work of art. Sudha Murty unfortunately fails to create co-authors and co-readers. She

presents, explains and interprets her characters leaving very little for his readers to do.

This may suit traditional Indian method of story telling. Though it makes her works

unilateral, she remains a centre of attraction for the neo readers of India. This must be

considered a great service to the Indian literature.

SETTING

Setting of a work of art is a background against which the action takes place. Novel is

generally set in imaginary or real geographical area. It also has the element of time in it.

R. K. Narayan‟s novels are set in the imaginary locale of Malgudi. Mulk Raj Anand‟s

Coolie is set in the rural and urban areas of India. Kiran Desai‟s The Inheritance of Loss

is set in the north-eastern parts of India. Appropriate setting adds to the cohesiveness of

the work. It helps to enhance the thematic significance of the novel. If the novel deals

with the disastrous effects of caste system, India is the best place for its documentation.

South Africa is a good place for a writer writing on racism. It is difficult to find British

writer writing on the theme of discrimination based on the caste and race with the British

setting.

Pramod Narayan wrote that “Setting in a novel has two main components; as place and as

time. Place is where the action unfolds; house, cities, planets, nations etc. place as setting

could also be social spaces; families, ethnic groups, diaspora and immigrant

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communities. Time is the time within which action unfolds; historical periods, seasons,

time of the day etc.” 3

Time is an important factor in the description of setting, which plays significant role in

shaping the character of a person. We cannot have references to railways and airways in a

novel written in or about seventeenth century. In the same way, reference to internet,

mobile phones, supersonic aeroplanes are unavoidable in a novel that is set in a twenty

first century. Novel on Indian freedom struggle may not attract Indian readers today.

Sudha Murty sets her novels by weaving the threads of traditions and modernity in all her

works. Indians of the old generation even today boast of their social and cultural heritage.

Many Indians are proud of it. Sudha Murty sets the action of her novels in the villages

and rural tendencies that exist in big cities. Juxtaposition of rural life with cosmopolitan

life of the cities makes her work representative of overall Indian life. It also helps her to

bring out the confrontation between two generations

Sudha Murty today comes from Bangrulu in Karnataka. Though Maharastrian by birth,

she has settled her business empire and philanthropic work basically in Karnataka.

Naturally she is well acquainted with the people and their life styles in that area. Her

characters possess Kannada names like Akka, Appa, Avva etc. This does not however

mean that her novels are regional in scope and appeal. We find people with such

characteristics elsewhere in India. Her skill to enlarge the canvas of her novels is

noteworthy.

Two novels Dollar Bahu and Mahashweta are set partly in the USA and partly in

England. Gouramma in Dollar Bahu goes to her son and daughter in law in the USA for a

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year. The writer places her squarely with American atmosphere expecting some change

in her attitude to others. There is no change. Dr. Anand in Mahashweta goes to England

for further training in medical field. Though Sudha Murty transports her characters to the

first world countries, they do not have much interaction with the people in those

countries. Chandru is almost nonexistent in the USA. We rarely come across him in the

family or society. The same can be said about Anand in England. He seems to have gone

into oblivion there.

Sudha Murty‟s novels are set in post-independence India, particularly the period of

economic liberalization of the last decade of the twentieth century and the first decade of

the new millennium. India was going through a new phase of economic reforms. Indian

boys and girls acquired new skills in Information Technology sector which opened the

gates to America for better opportunities. Sudha Murty dealt with the new generation of

Indians and their interaction with the old generation.

Contemporary Indian English Literature

Indian writing in English has been more than hundred and fifty years of age today.

Almost all major and minor forms of literature have been handled by hundreds of men

and women writers from India during this period. It will not be an exaggeration to say

that with the exception of epic, all types of literary writings are available in Indian

English Literature today. Very fact that Indian writing in English is recognized as a

separate entity like British, American or South African literatures today, testifies its

vigour and potentials. Writers have written on different themes like Indian poverty,

superstitions, culture, child marriages, illiteracy, blind belief etc. Though major chunk of

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this writing have been fiction and poetry, Indian English writers have not been lagging

behind in the writing of short stories, plays and biographies.

Basic Indian ethos demands long narratives and recitation of poems. If we look at our

own literary traditions in Indian languages, we find Puranas, Vedas and Epics like

Ramayana and Mahabharata filled with stories. Poetry originated and flourished in the

vicinity of temples through Bhajan and Kirtan.

India has been a fertile soil for literary activities for centuries. Indians have produced

voluminous literature in Sanskrit, Urdu, Bengali, Marathi, Telugu languages. This shows

that Indians had never been new to literary activities. When British rulers brought English

language along with them for various political, administrative and cultural reasons,

ground was already prepared for Indian English writing. Initially there was a problem of

its nomenclature. Some people called it Indo-Anglian Literature. Some others called it

Anglo-Indian Literature. K. R. Srinivasa Iyenger called it Indian Writing in English. But

“The Sahitya Akademi has recently accepted „Indian English Literature‟ as the most

suitable appellation for this body of writing. The term emphasizes two significant ideas;

first that this literature constitutes one of the many streams that join the great ocean called

Indian literature, which though written in different languages, has an unmistakable unity;

and secondly, that it is an inevitable product of the nativization of the English language to

express the Indian sensibility.”4

Indian English literature can roughly be divided in three phases for the sake of

convenience- literature during Gandhian era, literature in post-independence era before

globalization and literature during the period of globalization. Famous trio R. K.

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Narayan, Mulk Raj Anand and Raja Rao wrote voluminously on poverty, illiteracy, child

marriages, superstitions, condition of women and outcastes in Indian society. Narayan

depicted the life of villagers and illiterate simpletons in his The Guide, Financial Expert,

Swami and the Friends, The Bachelor of Arts. Anand voiced his concern for the lower

caste and lower class people in India in his Untouchable, Two Leaves and a Bud and

Coolie. Narayan combined message and humour whereas Anand‟s novels had a

seriousness of purpose in them. Narayan was ticklish and Anand was angry in his tone.

Raja Rao‟s novels The Serpent and the Rope and The Cat and Shakespeare were

philosophical in nature. His Kanthapura demonstrated sociopolitical philosophy of

nonviolence that worked behind Indian freedom struggle. These three novelists adopted a

simple narrative technique from Indian tradition of writing in Indian languages. All these

writers believed in social reforms through writing. Hence their novels were termed as the

novels of social realism.

Kamala Markandaya, Attia Hosain, Anita Deasai and Ruth Prawar Zabawala are some of

the notable women novelists in this era. Markandaya wrote on the sufferings of the Indian

women. She selected poor, illiterate women characters and depicted their miseries in

novels like Nectar in a Sieve and Coffer Dam. Anita Desai has presented the condition of

alienated boys and girls in the big city like Culcutta in Voices in the City. Writers of this

phase wrote without experiments and innovations.

We have dozens of men and women writers in the post independence phase as well. The

list is so long that it is better to avoid naming them all here. Khushawant Singh, Manohar

Malgonkar, Chaman Nahal, Arun Joshi, Amitav Ghosh, Babhani Bhattachaya are some

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of the notable figures in this period. Women writers like Shashi Deshpande, Jai Nimbkar,

Rama Mehta, Nayantara Sahgal wrote during this time.

Male writers of the time shifted their attention from traditional themes to the the themes

based on national issues like Indian freedom struggle, partition riots, Hindu-Muslim

divide and East West encounter. Though Khushawant Singh‟s Train to Pakistan is

considered to be a novel on partition, I believe it is meant to send a message of Hindu

Muslim unity through love and sacrifice. Manohar Malgoonkar‟s Bend in the Ganges

passes the similar message of the importance of unity and fraternity for the Indians.

Chaman Nahal‟s Azadi makes us aware of the serious consequences of religious

fanaticism on the innocent people from both the communities. Babhani Bhattacharya‟s So

Many Hungers deals with the theme of social, political and economic exploitation of the

disadvantaged Indians during the famine of Bengal in early forties of the last century.

Women writers of this period changed their focus from presenting their women

characters as scapegoats to the presentation of their claims as living human beings. Anita

Desai in her Cry the Peacock presented a woman who asserted her rights as an individual.

Jaya did not want to face the pangs of infertility alone. She wanted her husband to share

her life just as she shared his life. Shashi Deshpande was more vocal in her novel That

Long Silence. Her Maya was not prepared to keep quiet any more in front of the

traditions. If we compared the themes handled by the women writers in this era with the

women writers in the previous era, one clearly noticed that passivity of women characters

of the past was replaced by their active response to the situation in this era.

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There are traditional women writers like Rama Mehta and Jai Nimbkar who believed in

the traditional roles assigned to them. Rama Mehta‟s Geeta in Inside the Haveli was a

good example of a woman who combined the old and new in her development. Though

an educated girl from cosmopolitan city of Bombay, she did not revolt against the feudal

atmosphere in the haveli. Though she lived within the four walls of the haveli, she did not

refrain from taking steps to open the gates of haveli to other children and women.

Nimbkar‟s Vineeta in Temporary Answers chose her own way of life by taking up

voluntary social services. She did not abstain from taking conjugal pleasures in the

company of other man after her husband‟s immature death.

Third phase in Indian English Literature is marked by men and women writers writing on

untraditional themes with innovative techniques. Globalization had provided them with

ample opportunities to interact continuously with the writers from various first world

countries. Some of these writers visited universities abroad which gave them exposure to

experiment with their writing.

Indian English fiction has acquired new dimensions after liberalization and globalization

of Indian economy and subsequently Indian society. New themes, new narrative

techniques, innovative art of characterization and untraditional settings have entered

novel writing. Indian fiction writers have got national and international awards in

recognition of their achievement in the field. Advent of new information technology in

India connected them with literary forces outside and within India. All this enhanced their

awareness, communication skills and responses to the changes in the field.

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Arundhati Roy got a coveted Booker Prize for her novel The God of Small Things in

1997. This was the first international award for Indian writer. Naturally Indian writers‟

spirit got a special boost. This novel dealt with the exploitation of women and outcaste

boy in patriarchal Indian society. Ammu Ipe and Velutha suffered due to the

discriminatory attitudes of the people in authority. Pappachi and Mammachi family had

two separate yardsticks for Ammu and other members of the family. Ammu was tortured

because she had a sexual affair with Velutha. But the same offence of her brother Chacko

was overlooked by the parents. Even the secular communist party of India was not free

from caste bias. Party ditched Velutha at the time when he needed their help the most.

Roy attacked the religious fundamentalism and political forces in India for their

calculated dereliction to the women, labourers and outcaste people.

Kiran Desai was the second to get the Booker Prize for her novel The Inheritance of Loss

in 2006. Dehumanizing effects of globalization and separatist politics are the two major

issues dealt with in this novel by the novelist. Biju went to America on a forged passport

with a hope to achieve riches there. But he had to come back to his home in ragged

clothes. Gyan and Sai fell in love but had to tear apart due to the turbulent political

movements in the area. The judge Jemubhai Patel had to lead a lonely life of imposed

segregation in the hilly areas of Kalimpong after his return from England. Each major

character inherited losses.

Arvind Adiga was the next writer to get the Booker Prize for his novel The White Tiger in

2008. The entire story is woven around its narrator Balram Halwai. It is a story of an

illiterate village urchin who acquired riches through fowl means. The boy first became a

car driver of a businessman Ashok which helped him to visit centers of business,

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administration and politics in Delhi. He learned his lessons and became a millionaire by

adopting unscrupulous ways. The novel in a way justified Balram‟s act of making money

in modern India.

Besides the three Booker Prize winning novelists in this era, there are novelists like

Upamanyu Chatterjee, Shashi Tharoor, Chetan Bhagat, Amish Tripathi, Shobha De,

whose works stand out as worthy of mentioning in the contemporary Indian English

Literature.

Upamanyu Chaterjee came into limelight with the publication of his novel English

August; An Indian Story in 1992. His other novels are Last Burden (1993) and The

Mammaries of Welfare State. His novels dealt with the theme of poverty and sexual

discrimination in Indian society. Shashi Tharoor‟s The Great Indian Novel artistically

linked today‟s India with the land of past three thousand years. Characters and events in

Mahabharata and characters and events in modern Indian political life sarcastically

commented on Indians today.

Chetan Bhagat and Amish Tripathi are the most popular Indian English novelists in the

Indian youth today. Bhagat‟s novels have broken all the past records of sales in English

fiction. Problems of youth and their attitude to life are fascinatingly drawn by Bhagat in

all his novels. His heroes questioned the traditional Indian value system like reverence to

elders, fidelity with spouse, abstinence from alcohol and faith in religious practices. His

characters drank alcohol and had premarital and extramarital sexual adventures. But this

does not mean that they are bad. Though iconoclast, they loved life. They were secular,

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adventurous, energetic and independent. His novels like Five Point Someone and Three

Mistakes of My Life have been adapted to films as 3idiots and Kai Poche respectively.

Amish Tripathi‟s The Immortals of Meluha, The Secret of Nagas and The Oath of

Vayuputras impressed the millions of young Indian readers by their narrative technique

and detail descriptions. He is considered to be the first pop star in fiction. Amish

presented Indian myths, legends, folklore and linked them to modern India with an eye on

future. This changed readers‟ views about Gods, demons, cultures and history. Bhagat

and Amish are new voices in Indian English Fiction.

Shobha De stands out as a prominent woman writer of the globalization period of Indian

English literary history. Women novelists of the past wrote about the life of Indian

women with restrain. Their compromising protagonists combined the old cultural values

and their demand for self identity. They came out of their limited world of children and

hearth but did not revolt against their families. Shobha De is different. She presented a

totally new woman in her Starry Nights (1992), Strange Obsession (1992), Snapshots

(1995), Small Betrayals (1998). Her protagonists came from higher social class and

indulged in the pleasures of midnight parties.

One of the notable features of these writers is that they come from highest centers of

learning in India. Chetan Bhagat comes from Indian Institute of Technology, Amish from

Indian Institute of management and Tharoor from Indian Foreign Services. Their

educational strength gave them extra advantage in procuring knowledge, information,

skill and technology in comparison to their predecessors.

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Writings like Bharati Mukherjee‟s Jasmine, Jhumpa Lahiri‟s The Namesake, Manju

Kapoor‟s A Married Woman, Chitra Banerjee‟s Food Travelogue and Anita Nair‟s Ladies

Coupe are considered diasporic. Their protagonists are torn between the riches of the first

world and memories of the home land.

FEMINISM IN SUDHA MURTY’S WORKS

Sudha Murty is one of the well known female writers in India writing in English today,

writing on the dominant issues related to women in modern India in the age of

globalization. Murty‟s writing is marked by her impartial way of looking at man‟s

relations with women and women‟s relations with other women. Her four novels deal

with the ideas and aspirations of educated girls and their struggle for space in traditional

Indian society. Girls stand out as individual human beings in her works.

Though the history of literary criticism dates back to Aristotle (383 to 322 B. C.),

feminism is a recent branch in criticism. Friederich Angels and John Stuart Mill in their

books, The Origin of Family, Private Property and the State (1869) and The Subjugation

of Women (1884) respectively were the first writers to articulate the problems of women

and probable solutions to them. The two books were the social and political documents

on the condition of women in the west particularly. They were not literary commentaries

on the women characters or women writers.

Current forms of feminism grew out of the „Women‟s Movements‟ and „Consciousness

Raising Groups‟ of the 1960s in the first world countries. Spade work done by the socio-

political thinkers like Martin Luther King, Mahatma Gandhi, Abraham Lincoln, Mahatma

Phule and the like brought out to the front the miserable reality that women all over the

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world needed to be treated as respectable individuals. Women themselves realized that

they were as good as men in all walks of life. Naturally women and some chivalrous men

clamored for their rights in social, political and administrative fields. The social and

political movements thus became interdisciplinary with the passing of time. Elaine

Showalter widened the scope of feminism to gynaecentric criticism by asking to study

not only women characters in the novels of men but also in the novels written by women.

Simone de Beauvoir‟s The Second Sex is considered to be the first book on feminism. She

wrote about the portrayal of women in D. H. Lawrence‟s novels in this book. She found

that women were assigned stereotype roles and stereotype language in his works. She

objected to that and expected to present women in all variables. This followed by

recurring debates on the representation of women in literatures in the universities. The

feminist criticism found that women were considered weak, dependent and subordinate in

comparison with men characters. She was „Eve‟ who was blamed for the fall of man from

paradise. Her biological and libidinal capabilities were questioned in order to be able to

enslave her. Distinction between social and literary aspects of feminism has been

commented upon in the following way “The feminist movement was literary from the

start. In literary criticism, it began with the realization of the political significance of the

images of women produced and promoted in literary works. As a polemical movement its

primary concern in literary criticism was to explore and combat the stereotype

representation of women in literature. This marks a vital connection between literary

criticism and feminism as social movement”5

Feminism reached India with the spread of English writings in India. But people soon

realized that it can not be applied to Indian English writing as it is. Condition of women

20
in India was different from the condition of women in the west. Indian society is divided

into castes. Women belonging to outcaste sections of the society lived a life of an animal.

Indian Dalit literature showed the cruel treatment meted out to them as child-mothers,

prostitutes and keeps. It is a fact that feminist movement did not reach them for a

considerably long time.

Indian female sex has always been partially treated by the family and society. Girl child

always got secondary treatment in the family. Husband wife relations were always tilted

in favour of husband. Husband took all the decisions not only related to family matters

but also to the matters related to her personal life. She had no say in the selection of her

own husband. She was considered ominous if husband died before her. In short, she had

no personal identity, social status, economic independence and separate voice. Condition

of western women was slightly different. They were educated, independent and protected.

Their problems were different from the problems of Indian women. They wanted to be

recognized as individuals like male members around, whereas Indian women wanted to

be alive.

Domestic and social structure of human relations in India is rigid. The oldest woman in

relations is the one who took decisions on all the matters related to women in the family.

Daughter in laws were always supposed to be living under her fold. The clothes that

daughter in laws wore, places they visited, women that they could accompany and the

men they could talk to were decided by that woman. In a way, she mastered the minds

and bodies of all the women in the family. She was the cause of pleasures and pains of

the women in the family. Hence Indian feminist writers had to attack not only orthodox

mentality of the men but also that of the women.

21
Condition of woman had been terribly awkward in both the families, the family of her

father and also the family of her father in law. She did not have any voice in her in laws‟

house. She was not allowed to make any suggestions, express her opinion or speak out

her mind to her husband. She was the first to get up and last to sleep in the house.

Ironically her own father and mother abstained from „interfering‟ in her affairs after her

marriage. They did not like their own daughter to come back to their house in the feat of

anger or revolt. Thus the condition of Indian girls worsens after marriage.

Another point that must be categorically noticed is that Indian women suffered not only

from domestic, social, cultural and religious sanctions but also from other women in the

family and society. Woman was the enemy of woman in Indian circumstances. In fact, in

a social set up where women, particularly young ones were not allowed to have freedom

of speech with men, elderly women took total charge of newly married girls in family.

One had to take in to consideration this aspect of woman‟s life while commenting on the

novels of Sudha Murty.

Fundamental difference between the girls from the third world countries and those from

developed countries is that the girls from advanced countries are educated, independent

and confident whereas the girls from the third world countries are illiterate, dependent

and diffident. Naturally the cry of the western girls was the cry for identity. Their basic

needs of hunger, clothes and shelter are fulfilled. They looked for something beyond that.

Indian subcontinent girls craved for the fulfillment of their basic needs because their very

existence was endangered. Their first requirement was existence; that of the western girls

was essence in life.

22
Different critics have looked at feminism from different angles. “Mainstream feminists

scholarship attributes the dominance of patriarchal ideology to the activities of men,

while regarding women as innocent victims of patriarchal authority. However a close

reading of texts by some African women writers like Mariamma Ba provides the critique

of this standpoint and examines the direct and indirect roles played by some women in

the sustenance and perpetuation of patriarchal oppression. The focus is on elderly women

who often are so ignorant, selfish and manipulative that they make life hard for younger

women.”6

Indians are caught in two minds after the Government of India accepted the policy of

liberalization and globalization in the last decade of the last century. Indian youth was

attracted towards the riches, glories and pleasures of the new age. They used modern

technological devices to update themselves on the national and international happenings.

They were tempted to possess all those riches. They wanted to wear international clothes,

eat untraditional food items. Man woman relations in the west attracted their attention in

India. They visited various places physically and virtually.

On the other hand, they were also pressurized to follow Indian culture which expected

strict adherence to old value system. Joint family system, respect for parents, restriction

on the movements of women are some of the characteristic features of old Indian culture.

The new age demanded boys and girls to leave their houses. The old age expects them to

stick to old value system in the new environment.

While talking about new Indian woman, Madhumati Adhikari said, “The emerging new

women are rebellious, recalcitrant and self-assertive. Economic independence makes her

23
confident and articulate. The emerging New Woman strives for her identity but still she

has to depend for emotional support on her family. There are characters in literature who,

either live in the conventional old style or are a combination of the old and the new. New

Woman is marked by her struggle for her identity and individual aspirations. She is

neither subjugated nor defied but a human person desirous of living in society as a

responsible member with equal rights and freedom to pursue her own goals.”7 Above

discussion on feminism shows that there are varying opinions on the nature and

characteristic features of feminism in different countries.

SUDHA MURTY AS A WRITER

Feminist movement started with a purpose to liberate woman from man‟s shackles,

particularly from husbands. Feminist thinkers believed that possession of phallus by man

provided him with an authority to exploit woman. Man and patriarchal family system

were held responsible for the abuse of woman in society. This was true in India and

abroad to a large extent. Sudha Murty has deviated from this traditional concept of

feminism by holding woman responsible for the victimization of other woman.

Rama Mehta‟s Geeta in Inside the Haveli, Ann in Jai Nimbkar‟s Come Rain, Jaya in

Shashi Deshpande‟s That Long Silence, Maya in Anita Desai‟s Cry the Peacock showed

the women characters whose personality was eroded by the domination of men in the

family. Simone de Beauvoir observed, “ A husband regards none of his wife‟s good

qualities as particularly meritorious; they are implied by the institution of marriage itself;

he fails to realize that his wife is no character from some pious and conventional treaties,

but a real individual of flesh and blood; he takes for granted her fidelity to the strict

24
regimen she assumes, not taking into account that she has temptations to vanish, that she

may yield to them, that in any case her patience, her chastity, her propriety are difficult to

conquest. He is more profoundly ignorant of her dreams, her fancies, her nostalgic

yearnings of emotional climate in which she spends her days.”8

Murty did not blame „husband‟ for a precarious condition of a woman in the family. She

held one woman in the family responsible for the wretched condition of other woman in

the family. Gouramma in Dollar Bahu and Radhakka in Mahashweta are the main

culprits in Vinuta and Anupama‟s tortures. Chandru and Anand had negligible roles in

the sufferings of their wives. It will not be wrong to say that Murty has put forward the

reasonable account of reality behind women‟s sufferings.

Marriage imposes some restrictions on men and women both. Man is expected to play a

passive role in relation to his wife in family and society. Even if he sees the unjust

treatment given to his wife, he is not allowed to intervene in the domestic affairs.

Marriage is a social institute in India which implies that the newly married girl is

assigned to the parents and relatives. Husband becomes one of the many proprietors of

the girl. Hence condition of women can not be studied without relating them to other

women in the family.

The most significant aspect of Sudha Murty‟s writing is that she has freed the traditional

politicizing issues in feminism. It is true that condition of the women in India hundred

years ago was pitiable. Women did not have any voice in her family or society. Man took

all the decisions on her behalf. She did not have any identity whatsoever. Male generated

25
cultural traditions imposed different sanctions on women. Not only the women from

lower caste but those from upper castes suffered at the hands of men arrogance.

Women world over protested against their exploitation through writing. Even some

chivalrous men raised their voices against the discriminatory treatment meted out to them

in society. Some social workers talked about injustice done to them from time to time. A

platform was created to think of women‟s problems sympathetically. Western feminists

blamed men for women‟s sorrowful existence. They propagated that men chauvinism,

their physical properties and men favourable traditions caused women‟s sufferings.

According to some of them, marriage was a sure source of tortures to wives and therefore

women should not enter matrimony. It must be said to the credit of these feminine writers

and feminist critics that they were right to a large extent. But they were wrong in their

assumption that only men were the enemies of women. They had forgotten to go deep

into the human psyche.

Creative writing is a cultural construct. It invariably reflects on the personal culture or the

collective culture of the populace. Poetry, for instance belongs to a first category; novel

belongs to the second category. Characters that novelist chooses come from some cultural

background. Their movements are guided, governed and groomed by a dominant culture

in them. This is true also about feminist writing. The writer who wants to deal with issues

related to women folk necessarily has to deal with the attitudes of the human beings of

the society.

It is true that women in India were discriminated against, at times ill treated. They were

restricted to their houses. Women were held responsible for the misfortune that befell

26
their men. A widow was prohibited from participating in religious functions of the

family. Life for them was an ordeal. But it is unfair to blame men squarely for their

sorrows. When men were not allowed to take initiative in caring for their women,

responsibility to look after their daily needs fell upon the elderly women, particularly

mother in law of the family. Mother in law provided them with food, clothes and shelter

and medical aids. Mother in law and daughter in law lived together for a major time of a

day.

The hierarchical relations between the „original‟ women of the family like daughter,

mother, grandmother and „other‟ women like daughter in law, mother in law and

grandmother in law surfaced through occasional bickering among the women. Many

times debate did not reach men of the family. Many times men preferred to keep away

from women‟s issues. This means that women were close to each other in times of their

happiness and unhappiness. Therefore it is wrong to accuse only the men for women‟s

sufferings and exempt other women from their roles in the exploitation of the fair sex.

Sudha Murty has fictionalized the encounter between two Indian women and highlighted

the victimization of one at the hands of other woman. Anand left Anupama to his mother

and went to England alone for further studies. Anupama‟s problems started with his

departure. Radhakka made it known to women in the area that Anupama did not bring

any dowry with her, that she had to look after all expenses of the wedding. Remarks hurt

Anupama. She got wild with Anupama when Anupama informed her about Girija‟s

adventurous outings with her boy friends.

27
When Radhakka came to know about white patches, she was elated. It provided an

opportunity to her to snatch her Anand from Anupama. She cooked stories to tarnish her

image in Anand‟s mind. She insulted Anupama‟s father and sent her back with him.

Throughout the novel, Anand acted as a passive spectator and audience to his wife‟s

hardships. It was Radhakka and not Anand who tormented her throughout. The same kind

of strained relations between two women are found in Gently Falls the Bakula, Dollar

Bahu and House of Cards.

INFLUENCES ON SUDHA MURTY

There are three obvious influences on the writings of Sudha Murty. First her narrative

style is influenced by the ancient Indian writings in Epics, Puranas, Vedas and

Upanishadas. Secondly, her subject matter is influenced by socioeconomic and cultural

features of Indian life. Thirdly, her attitude to her writing is influenced by her voluntary

social services through Infosys Foundation.

Stories from our ancient literature had a touch of utter simplicity in their narration. These

stories had a straightforward plot with beginning, middle and end. Most of the events and

episodes were explained by the writer himself. There was nothing complicated or

hairsplitting in these stories. They contained message for the readers to be followed in

their daily life. Not much was left to the imagination of readers.

Sudha Murty‟s novels followed the similar technique. She introduced her major

characters in the initial few pages and never deviated from their basic features. She

concentrated throughout the novel mainly on the happenings related to these characters.

Other characters peeped in and out without adding much to the main action of the work.

28
Her writings therefore attracted those readers who did not want to go into the

psychological and neuro-physiological analysis of the people in the novels.

Sudha Murty believed in the ancient values like love, affection, sacrifice, reverence,

compassion, consideration etc. Naturally, she included all these principles in her writing.

Good fought its battle with the bad and ultimately wins it. Villains had to repent and

sinners were punished in her works. Trouble shooters lost their faces and wrongdoers

rectified their errors. She showed considerable sympathy for the deprived and derelict

sections of the society like poor people, women and senior citizens. She believed in the

good of everybody and gives a message to that effect.

It has been a well known fact by now that Sudha Murty has been a chairperson of Infosys

Foundation that works in the field of education and public health particularly in rural

areas. She admits the impact of J. R. D. Tata‟s advice that “Never start with diffidence.

Always start with confidence. When you are successful, you must give back to society.

Society gives us so much, we must return it.”9 As a chairperson of Infosys Foundation,

she has travelled extensively in rural and urban areas of India and Indian subcontinent.

This has given her authentic first hand information about social, cultural and economic

conditions of Indians. She has made use of all her experience in the writing.

She is a wife of a doyen of Indian IT industry Nararyan Murty. She has seen the changing

phases of workers in the industry. The changing faces of neo millionaires in India and

their negative impact on the family relations constantly appear in her writings. She has

seen the India before and after liberalization very closely. All this is reflected in her

29
writings. Though industrialist, her writing is an outcome of her continuous wanderings

among the farmers, peasants, villagers, children and youth in the rural India.

LIFE AND WORKS OF SUDHA MURTY

Sudha Murty was born in Shiggaon in North Karnataka on in India 19th August 1950. Her

father Dr. R. H. Kulkarni had been a surgeon who along with his in laws looked after her

in her childhood. She completed a Bachelor of Engineering in Electrical Engineering

from the B. V. B. college of Engineering and Technology, Bangalore. Later she

completed Master of Engineering in Computer Science from the Indian Institute of

Science. She was a recipient of Gold Medal at both the degree examinations.

She worked as Development Engineer at Pune, Bombay and Jamshedpur units of Tata

Engineering and Locomotive Company. Later she joined Walchandnagar Group of

Industries at Pune as a Senior Systems Analyst. It is at TELCO that she got an

opportunity to interact personally with JRD Tata, who advised her to look at her wealth

from the trustee point of view and not from owner‟s point of view. His personality had a

significant impact on Sudha Murty.

She met N. R. Narayan Murty at Pune, fell in love with him and ultimately got married

with him. Couple has a daughter, Akshata and a son Rohan. Akshata got married with a

British citizen of Indian origin, Rishi Sunak, The son assists the couple in the various

assignments undertaken by the Infosys Foundation.

Sudha Murty has been helping various sections of the Indian society through Infosys

Foundation. The wide range of her voluntary work covers the sectors like health care,

education, empowerment of women, public hygiene, art, culture and poverty alleviation
30
at the grass root levels. She has so far set up fifty thousand libraries. She has built ten

thousand public toilets in rural area and several hundred toilets in the city of Bangalore.

She constructed two thousand three hundred houses in flood affected areas. She has

helped people affected by natural disasters like tsunami in Tamil Nadu and Andaman,

earthquake in Kutch-Gujarat, hurricane and floods in Orisa and Andhra Pradesh and

drought in Maharastra and Karnataka. She spends her major time, money and energy in

these activities. Two institutes of higher learning, the H. R. Kadim Diwan Building

housing the Computer Science and Engineering department at IIT Kanpur and the

Narayan Rao Melgiri Memorial National Law Library were endowed and inaugurated by

Infosys Foundation.

SUDHA MURTY’S LITERARY WRITINGS

Novels

1) Dollar Bahu (2005)

2) Mahashweta (2005)

3) Gently Falls the Bakula (2008)

4) House of Cards (2013)

Collection of Short Stories

5) How I Taught My Grandmother to Read and Other Stories (2004)

6) The Magic Drum and Other Stories (2006)

7) The Bird With Golden Wings (2009)

8) Grandma‟s Bag of Stories (2012)

Novella

31
 9) The Mother I Never Knew (2014)

Marathi film „Pitruroon‟ is based on her story. Sudha Murty also acted in Pitruroon and

Prarthana. Her novel Dollar Bahu was adapted and televised on Zee TV in 2001.

Awards She has got

1) Gold medals at B. E. and M. E. examinations

2) C. S. Desai Prize for the first rank in the university Exams in Karnataka

3) Youth Services Department Prize from the Government of Karnataka for having

been the outstanding engineering student of Karnataka

4) National Award from Public Relations Society of India for outstanding Social

Service to the society.

5) „Attimabbe‟ award for her book „Computer for School Children‟ in Karnataka

6) „Karnataka Rajyotsava State Award for her achievement in the field of literature

and social work.

7) „Ojaswinni‟ award for excellent social worker for the year 2000

8) „Millennium Mahila Shiromani‟ award

9) Voted as Woman of the Year 2002 by Radio City, Bangalore

10) Raja Lakshami Award from Raj Lakshami Foundation, Chennai

11) Padma Shri

12) R. K. Narayan Award for Literature in 2006

13) Doctor of Laws in 2011

Aims and Objectives of the Study

32
 1) To critically study Sudha Murty‟s writings from social, cultural and literary

point of view.

2) To analyze her four novels in detail in order to be able to place her in the

tradition of Indian English writers.

3) To find out peculiar features of the delineation of man woman relations in

globalizing India in her works.

4) To find out the effects of globalization of Indian economy on the domestic

relations in modern India.

5) To analyze Murty‟s women protagonists and compare them with the past

women protagonists.

6) To study the special features of narrative technique employed by Murty in her

stories and vignettes.

7) To read into her non-fictional prose to find out her commitment to society.

8) To find out the effects of liberalization on the female section of Indian society.

Hypothesis

Sudha Murty has been a voluminous writer in English today. She has written on the

effects of globalization on the close relations in Indian family. She has also written on the

man woman relations in modern India. She is closely linked with the old and new in India

which makes her Indian English writer in real sense. Her narrative technique resembles

the narrative technique in old Indian literature. Her characters come from rural as well as

urban India today. Her writing is a direct reflection of her experiences in philanthropic

works.

33
She has written sufficient number of books in English. These books deal with various

issues. This gives ample choice for the study of her works for Ph. D.

Scope and Limitations of the Study

Sudha Murty is a versatile personality in modern India. She has been playing three crucial

roles in her life. She is a creative writer. Secondly, she is a chairperson of Infosys

Foundation. Thirdly, she is involved in the major administrative decisions of Infosys.

Though the three roles are complementary to one another in her life, study takes into

consideration Sudha Murty as a writer. Her experiences in the field of social service and

administration are reflected in her writing. So they are not studied separately.

Sudha Murty is a talented lady. She writes in Kannada, Marathi and English. She has

translated some of her works in English, Marathi and Kannada. She has also acted in a

Marathi film Pitruroon. She has blog and sends letters to her followers. The study does not

take into account these aspects of her personality in the study.

This is a critical analysis of Sudha Murty‟s literary works. The study comments on the

themes, characters, narrative techniques and setting. Study of these four aspects will throw

sufficient light on Sudha Murty‟s writings.

The Justification of Research

Studies in Indian English Literature have gained ground and momentum in India recently.

Various Indian universities prescribe a special course in this wing of literature because

many options in the selection of texts and writers are available to the syllabi framers.

Books on different forms of literature like fiction, poetry, drama, biography and

autobiography are easily available in the market which facilitates the selection and

34
classroom teaching. Thousands of Indian students have been studying this literature for

their university degrees like M. Phil. and Ph. D.

Sudha Murty is a living writer in this area. She has acquired two important positions in

India. She has taken up social work in the field of education and public health through

Infosys Foundation of which she is a chairperson. Secondly, she has written extensively

on various topics. Her writing has a touch of reality as she travels across India, meets

people of all kind and writes on them in her novels and stories. It will not be wrong to say

that she knows ground realities of Indian life very well. Thus her life and writing are

complementary to each other.

Sudha Murty has written four novels, two short story collections and a vignette. This has

a corpus of about fifteen hundred pages which is sufficient for doctoral study. It is

remarkable that she has combined old and new in her writings. She frequently quotes

from Indian epics and scriptures and provides a new insight to them. Her characters come

from all walks of life across India. She has shown the gloomy side of glamorous capitalist

Indian families.

Though a woman, Sudha Murty does not blame men for the pitiable condition of Indian

women in the modern world. She is exceptionally impartial to her characters. Hence she

blames men and women for the sufferings of women in the family. Other women writers

have written on the sufferings of women with gender bias and politicized the entire issue.

Sudha Murty has sensibly put forward different aspects of women‟s life and left it to the

conscience of readers to judge the situation.

35
Sudha Murty is a writer with a social sense. Thousands of boys and girls have been

migrating to America and England for better financial opportunities. Murty has shown

the temporary nature of this life. Her works therefore became eye openers to the Indians.

Literature entertains but it also instructs. Sudha Murty has taken up the second function

of literature more seriously. Though there are occasional articles and research papers on

Sudha Murty‟s literature, there are few full length studies on her literature. This study

hopes to fill the gap because it has made an indepth study of all her literary writings from

all angles.

Pedagogical Significance of the Study

Indian English Literature has become one of the important components of syllabi at

school, college and university levels in India today. Indian English poetry, fiction, plays

and autobiographies are invariably prescribed in the syllabi. Sudha Murty‟s short stories

and novels are prescribed in school and college curricula. Murty‟s writing shows a

remarkable fusion of ancient Indian culture and modern Indian society. Though she does

not approve of each and every aspect of Indian traditions, she upholds some of them as

valuable even today. She has a reference to the advantages of joint family system in all

her novels. Students can learn about the importance of family in modern times.

One of the most noticeable aspects of her writing is the lucidity of English language

employed by her. It is unfortunate that most Indians believe in high sounding diction and

complicated syntax. Sudha Murty has successfully shown that simple straight English can

also express ideas in literature. Instead of playing the game of hide and seek with English

36
language, she has used Indian words wherever possible. This is a lesson for all the

learners of English language today.

Sudha Murty has quoted extensively from Sanskrit writers like Kalidasa and Bhavabhuti

in her works. She picks characters and incidents from old literature and throws new light

on them in the new context. This clearly shows her Indian roots. Upcoming writers can

learn from this. India has English medium schools not only in urban areas but also in

rural ones. Boys and girls need stories to learn English through entertainment. Sudha

Murty‟s stories can cater to this need. Her stories are the ideal blend of English language

and Indian ways of life.

Methodology

Major part of this study is carried out in library. Researcher procured all the books of

Sudha Murty from the market and went through them carefully before finalizing the

topic. There were many ways to approach Sudha Murty‟s works. The researcher selected

a topic „Literary Works of Sudha Murty; A Critical Study‟ in consultation with the guide.

The researcher went through various research articles on Sudha Murty‟s writings.

Researcher read seminal books like K. R. Srinivas Iyenger‟s Indian Writing in English

and M. K. Naik‟s „History of Indian English Literature‟ in order to gain the idea of this

literature. Researcher studied Ph. D. theses of other students related to present study in

order to get the idea of the art of dissertation writing. Researcher discussed her

knowledge of the topic with the experts in the field.

37
Suggestions for Further Research

The study has critically analyzed themes, characters, narrative techniques and settings in

Sudha Murty‟s novels. Study in stylistic and linguistic analysis of the four novels can be

taken up for further research. Sudha Murty‟s works have been translated into various

Indian languages. Translation studies could be a potential topic for further research. Her

Dollar Bahu was adapted for a television serial on Zee TV in 2001. One of her short story

was transformed into a Marathi film named Pitruroon in which she herself had acted.

Research to compare the story in print media and electronic media can be taken up in

future. Sudha Murty has been active in social services in India and abroad. She has

visited the remotest areas in Maharastra and Karnataka to gain the first hand information

of the conditions there. There is a close connection between her social work and her

writing. One can study the impact of her social work on her writing. Thus there are

number of new avenues for research in Sudha Murty‟s writings.

38
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3) Nayar, Pramod K. Studying Literature. Hyderabad, Orient Black Swan,2013, P. 90.

4) Naik, M. K. History of Indian English Literature. Delhi, Sahitya Akademi. 2006. P.4.

5) Thorat, Ashok and Others. A Spectrum of Literary Criticism. New Delhi, Frank

Brothers, 1994. P. 229.

6) Women Subjugating Women—Reading the novels of Mariamma Ba--- Dr. Jayant S.

Cherekar. Academic Research. October November 2011.P23

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Indira and Nityanandan (Ed,) Explorations: Arundhati Roy‟s The God of Small Things.

New Delhi, Creative Books, 1999. P. 33.

8) De Beauvoir, Simone. The Second Sex Harmondsworth, Penguin, 1981. P. 463.

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Penguin Books India, 2004. P. 67.

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