Mahashweta Devi-The Mouthpiece of Indigenous Crave for Identity and Existence

Abstract

Mahasweta Devi has explored the unexplored world of subjugated Adivasis. She was a legend in the regional Adivasis literature, explaining the causes of tribal displacement, resistance and marginality. In a true sense, she had taken the responsibility to give the voices to the marginalized Adivasis who were suppressed for centuries by the imperialist mentalities. Devi’s translated novels Chotti Munda and His Arrow and Arenyer Adhikar were path-breaking novels in the Indian English Novel Writing. For the first time Birsa Munda, the legendary martyr and icon of whole Adivasis in India was known through her magnificent novel to all. The present research paper peeps into mainstream literary writing and representation of the realism of the Adivasis struggle and survival issues including the demeaning of tribal life. The research paper tries to examine the issues of displacement, acculturation and disparity of Adivasi life came out from the writings of Mahashweta Devi and regrets that hundreds of Adivasi revolts took place in colonial India but hardly those revolts could not become the subjects of literary, social and political discourses in India.