The margins of the wilderness: a critical reading of mahasweta devi’s chotti munda and his arrow

The present paper critically examines the challenging idea of India’s ‘Subaltern tradition and culture keeping into consideration the well acclaimed novel of Devi: Chotti Munda and His Arrow. This paper has been prepared in order to explore the correlation between narrative style, language, and the Subaltern studies. Most of her celebrated fiction deals with the tribal, and the Dalits, and their contribution in the Socio-Cultural Indian History. The major concerns of the present research are to tackle the issues of exploitation, the concern with gender-bias as well as the use of language as a tool to subvert the stereotypical narrative style of the so-called ‘Main-stream’ authors. The power that lies in the narrative fiction of Mahasweta Devi has been consistently analyzed and critically studied in order to shape the present research. The central focus of the paper remains to be the narrative organization which may include the Tribal Dialogic Exchange, along with the Indian Context. This analysis has been followed by the visible context of ‘Resistance’, and ‘Post-Colonial Studies’ in the present works of Mahasweta Devi. These texts also incorporate within them the various issues of class, race, and gender. The major subaltern groups in Mahasweta Devi’s fiction dwell in the states such as, Bihar, Bengal, and Orissa. As a whole the paper acts as a complete Discourse of the themes which have been already mentioned above.