Work in Progress
DEHATI DUNIYA
By Shivapujan Sahay
[Dehati Duniya by
Shivapujan Sahay was first published in 1926: a century ago, when Hindi fiction was still in
its infancy. Premchand had published only a few early novels by then, though
none of them was located entirely in a rural setting. Dehati Duniya was
the first novel in Hindi telling the story of a ‘village world’, its backward
social life, in a language spoken and understood by the rural people. It was
the story of the rural people, of their social life, told in their own
language. In later Hindi criticism, Dehati Duniya came to be
seen as the prototype of the ‘regional’ (or ‘anchalik’) novel generally having
a rural setting as its locale. The novel depicted the life of people living in
the interior rural areas in all its rich cultural texture and variety. It
brought to light in Hindi fiction the dark and complex realities of social life
in the interior villages in India. The genre came to its full fruition in
Phanishwarnath Renu’s Maila Anchal published in 1953.
The following is an extract
from the beginning of the novel Dehati Duniya rendered into
English by Dr Mangal Murty. The novel contains a wealth of sayings, proverbs
and words from the local (Bhojpuri) dialect that are very difficult – nearly
impossible – to translate into English. The story begins in the form of a
fictionalized autobiography, narrated by a small boy ‘Bholanath’. The full
English version of the novel is under translation by Dr Murty and shall be
published in this year. Here we get a fascinating picture of his childhood
days in this starting episode from the first chapter of the novel – ‘In
Mother’s Lap’.]
DEHATI DUNIYA
In Mother’s Lap
Jahan ladkon ka sang tahan baje
mridang
Jahan buddhon ka sang tahan kharche
ka tang1
My father rose early and after
his morning ablutions sat down for his daily worship. I never left his side
since my early childhood. With mother I stayed only for my milk. Even at
night, I’d sleep in the outer room with father. He’d waken me as he himself
awoke, do my ablutions, and make me sit with him for worship. I’d keep nagging
him to put the ‘ash mark’ on my forehead. With laughter, mixed with
annoyance and a little chiding, he’d put the tripund mark
there and my broad forehead would seem to glow with it. I had long locks
of hair on my head, and the ‘ash mark’ on my forehead made me look a
perfect bumbhola
Father
would lovingly call me ‘Bholanath’, though my real name was ‘Tarkeshwarnath’,
and I’d also call him ‘Babuji’ and my mother – ‘Maiyan’.
As Babuji would chant
from Ramayan, I’d sit by his side and keep looking at my
face in a mirror. When he’d glance at me, I’d put down the mirror with a shy
smile, making him smile, too.
After his prayers, he would
write down the name of Rama in his ‘Ramnama’ copybook, one
thousand times every day, and then after tying it up with his Ramayan, put
it away. Next, he’d write the name of Rama on five hundred
tiny bits of paper, roll them into small dough balls, and walk with them
towards the Ganga river.
I’d be comfortably ensconced
on his shoulders, not getting down from my throne, and would keep laughing, as
he threw each ‘Rama’ ball into the river to feed the fishes. On way back home,
after the ritual of fish-feeding, he would put me on the low outflung branches
of trees and swing me for some time.
Often he would practise
wrestling with me and would feign fatigue to spur me on, as I would then easily
pin him down. He would fall on his back, and I’d ride astride his chest. Then
as I would start pulling at his long moustaches, he would laughingly free them
from my hands and kiss my little palms with his lips. Then he would ask
for sour and sweet kisses on my cheeks, and I would alternately turn my left
and right cheeks to his pouted lips. After taking the sour kiss on the left
cheek, when he’d take the sweet one on the right cheek, he’d tickle it tenderly
with his bristly beard or moustache. But feeling nettled, I’d again start
pulling at his moustache, and when he would feign crying, I’d stand away
and giggle to my heart’s delight.
After all
this fun and frolic, when we’d be back home, I’d sit with him on the kitchen
floor for our meal together. He’d feed me with his own hands, cooked rice mixed
in milk, from a bronze bowl. When I’d have no more, Maiyan would insist on
feeding me a few morsels more. She would chide Babuji – You feed him with tiny
morsels of a few grains each time, and even while he’s still hungry, you make
him feel, he’s had enough. You hardly know how to feed a child. You must feed
him big mouthfuls of morsels. -
Jab khayega bade-bade kaur, tab payega duniya me thaur2.
How will he go about boldly
into the world, unless he eats large morsels? Look, how I feed him; menfolk
- how’d they know how to feed a child? Only a mother can fill
a child’s belly full!
Then she would mash the cooked
rice in curd and make it into large balls, giving each a name – the parrot, the
myna, the pigeon, the swan, the peacock – and put them one by one in my mouth,
saying that I must swallow them up quickly before they could fly off, and I’d
hurry with them so that they could never fly away.
When I had gobbled up all the
‘food-birds’, Babuji would say – Go play now, you’re now a King! And I would
get up to go and play, all naked, into the alley outside, pulling my wooden
horse by the string tied to its neck.
But whenever Maiyan
suddenly caught hold of me, she would put a palmful of mustard oil into my wild
locks, however much I resisted. I’d start crying, and Babuji would chide Maiyan
for it. But she would put more oil into my locks and let go only after
she had massaged my whole body with it. She would then put kohl marks on my
navel and my forehead, and weave my locks into tight braids, tying flowery
cotton balls in them, and dress me up in a coloured tunic and cap. I would now
be looking quite a cute ‘Kanhaiya’, and go out in Babuji’s lap,
whimpering and sobbing.
As soon as I came out, I found
a whole pack of boisterous boys eagerly waiting for me. I’d at once
slither down Babuji’s lap, forgetting all my sobs, and join them avidly
in their various games and ‘tamashas’.
The ‘tamashas’ consisted of
different kinds of dramatic events. In one corner of the front terrace, we
would set up a stage. The large square bathing stool of Babuji would be the
actual stage. Willow sticks on the four corners covered with paper, to form the
roof, would make the sweetmeat shop. Broken firepots of the hubble-bubble would
form the dishes holding the brick-bits as laddoos, and green
leaves would be fried purees, with jalebis made
from wet dirt,and broken pitcher pieces would serve as batashas –
to make the sweetmeat shop complete. Pebbles would be used for weighing and
small bits of zinc would be the coins, with some of us being both buyers and
sellers. Babuji would also often turn up as a customer.
Soon, winding up our shop, we
would try and build tenements with dirt and clay. Walls made of dust, with a
roof laid with twigs. Broken twigs as pillars and empty matchboxes for doors.
Neck pieces of broken pitchers would serve as cooking stove or grindstone,
and earthen lamps as makeshift frying pan. Babuji’s pooja spoon
would be the ladle, with water as ghee, dust as dough, and sand as sugar
crystals, we would cook a grand feast, with some of us being cooks as well as
the feasting guests. When we would all sit in a row, Babuji would also
stealthily join us at one end of the row. And then, hastily undoing our
make-believe tenements, we would all flee laughing, amidst Bauji’s burst of
laughter. “When do we have the next feast, Bholanath?”, he would ask in
his chuckles.
Sometimes we would also form a
marriage procession. An empty canister would be the drum, a rubbed mango rind
would be the clarinet, the broken micetrap-box would serve as
the palki; the groom’s father astride a he-goat, and the
marriage party would travel from one corner of the front platform of our
house to another, supposed to be the bride’s door. There in a small, cow-dung
plastered courtyard, decorated with festoons and buntings made of mango and
plantain leaves, and narrow broken wooden planks, would be the earthen kalash. The
procession would reach and return from there soon, with the bride carried on a
small cot covered with a red cloth. Babuji would again be there to raise the
cover to have a look at the bride, which would drive us scampering and laughing
off.
But soon we would return and
decide to play ‘farming’. At one end of the platform, we would fix a pulley to
draw water from the street below which would now be the well. A small earthen
pot tied to a string, rolled from grass, would be lowered down the pulley into
the street, and two of us would do for oxen to draw the improvised moat for
irrigation. The large platform would become the field to be tilled, gravel
would serve as seeds and a long wooden piece as the plough. The tilling, sowing
and watering would all be done with great care; and the crop, too, would ripen
in no time. We would start harvesting the crop, singing –
Oonch
neech me bayee kiyaree, jo upaji so bhayee hamaree.2
The harvested
crop would be threshed by our feet, and the grains would be winnowed in the
wind with the help of another earthen pot. Then it would be ready to be weighed
on a scale made of an earthen lamp. And once again Babuji would appear from
nowhere and ask – How was the crop this year, Bholanath?
And that would again make us
scamper off laughing from our farming drama. How delightful it all was!
All those dramas of childhood! Even strangers would stop awhile to watch our
childhood revelry.
Whenever we would find groups
of people - men and women - going to the Dadaree fair,, we
would leap and jump, and shout out our refrain –
Chalo bhaiyon dadaree, satu
pisan ki motaree.3
Once in a while on the road we
would come across a bridegroom walking behind a covered palki we would shout
out loud another refrain in our sing-song way –
Raharee men raharee puran raharee,
doli men ke kaniyan hamar mehree4.
One day as we sang this
refrain to one owl-faced bridegroom, he chased us pelting brickbats at us. We
have still not forgotten that ugly owl-face and wonder how anyone could have
chosen such an owl-faced groom for his daughter. Indeed, we had never seen such
a mule-faced bogey ever in our life!....
[To be continued]
This extract is published to mark the 63rd Death Anniversary today: 21 Jan. 2026] ======
Notes
1.Where boys play together,
drum-sounds abound./ Where old men sit together, miserliness is right there.
2. Up and down the rows are
sown, and ours is all the corn that is grown.
3. Let’s go bretheren to
Dadaree fair, quick fill your bags with wheat and gram flour.
4. The lentil bush may be old
and grey, but the bride in the palki is all ours.
Tripund (a sandal paste triad
mark on the forehead). Bambhola (simpleton), Tamasha (here.
children’s games), Poori, Jalebi, Batasha, Laddoo (food items,
sweets), Kalash (vessel) Moat (large bucket).
[The work of translation of the full novel is continuing & it is likely to be published later this year. Translation rights are fully reserved by the A. Shivpoojan Sahay Memorial Trust.]
Photos: Shivpujan Sahay c. 1926 / The Shivalaya & Pond in the village/ The river Cochan flowing in the east close to the village Unwans (15 kms south of Buxar) where Sahayji was born on 9 Aug, 1893.
(C) All photos & Text: Dr
BSM Murty
