BOOK TALK
As we see ourselves
R. KRITHIKA
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In an e-mail interview, journalist and author Pinki Virani talks about the various issues that her first foray into fiction, Deaf Heaven, throws up.
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I need the solid comfort of bound pages and neatly laid-out matter within covers in bed.
Into fictional territory: Pinki Virani
Her first book Aruna’s Story — about Aruna Shanbag, a nurse who was raped and left in a coma — hit the headlines in 1998. Two years later Bitter Chocolate focused national attention on child sex
ual abuse in India. In 2004, Once Was Bombay traced the life of the city. Now author and journalist Pinki Virani moves full-scale into fictional territory with her first novel, Deaf Heaven, a comment on India of today, its socio-cultural setup and the struggle between religious extremism and moderate forces. Excerpts:
After Bitter Chocolate and Aruna’s Story, which focused on one issue, what was it like to move to such a broad base in Deaf Heaven?
None of my earlier books focussed on one issue unless you consider rape being the commonality. Deaf Heaven is broad-based, true; that’s because it’s about the contemporary history of India.
Considering that the book examines the current social set-up, why did you choose to do it through fiction?
Two reasons, actually. The second reason. It hasn’t been done in such a wide-ranging way before in Indian-English — or any other English — fiction. And the first: I thought I could try and do it as an Oral History, so to speak. Which accounts for so many pan-Indian voices.
Given your treatment of Kajoli’s homosexuality, what is your view of the Delhi High Court’s ruling on Sec 377?
Kajoli is a woman looking for true love. That she is a lesbian compounds the issue only until she realises that love may be found, even if you have to wait, without sleeping around. May I add here that there are too many disturbing reports about heterosexual college-going girls self-pressured into thinking that the affection and attention of boys can be got only after sex.
As for the Delhi High Court’s ruling on 377, it’s now gone to the Supreme Court. I do hope the Supreme Court will spell out what exactly qualifies as “consensual sex” among adult males. Or will a heterosexual man who has been raped by a bisexual face the same trauma as a raped woman to prove non-consent? And what about homosexual prostitution? How is this consensual and how can it be legal when female-prostitution is illegal?
Much of the book details what’s going wrong in the country. What is the way out?
Saraswati, the sutradhar, provides some of the answers on how to be part of the solution. She talks of the power of one. She goes into some detail on the higher — and nobler — part of the brain which can rise above the amygdala, which functions only on fright or flight.
Towards the end, you refer to the “authentic Indian”. How do we ensure that this tribe increases and not just gives up?
You can’t change it in one shot, but you can be an authentic Indian by being part of the solution. Or, at the very least, by actively ensuring that you are not part of the problem. I would also draw attention to the point Saraswati makes of zor, especially the force exerted on everyday decent Indians by politician. They need to be cut down to size in both, numbers and in power, to make them accountable to every Indian who is a tax-payer.
Your sutradhar expresses a preference for paper over pixels; is that your preference too? If so, how do you feel about Deaf Heaven being the first Literary Cell-Novel and an Adult Audio-Mobile Book in India?
Yes, I’m a bit like Saraswati. I need the solid comfort of bound pages and neatly laid-out matter within covers in bed. I cannot imagine reading an e-book in bed, though my husband tells me I might prefer that as I get older because of the digital reader’s adjustable font-size and enhanced backlighting. None of this needs to stop me from being sort of amazed at the techno-facility of today’s generation, the almost throwaway ease with which they manage e-matter. Therefore — and as much for them as for those who want to read differently — it becomes important to use modern technology to take Indian literature across various platforms.
The male characters in this book are particularly unlikeable… Why?
Evil does magnify itself, doesn’t it? It serves its own purpose too well by also ensuring that the good gets shadowed. Like Czaerandhari’s husband, the maharaja who supports his wife when she chooses not to follow the family’s clear-cut policy on non-interference among the “subjects”. Or the simple, shop-employee Mumbaite who, much before dying in the local train’s superdense-crushload, ensures that his wife Qudsia Begum is financially and emotionally empowered to take all her own decisions as a widow.
Your concern about child sexual abuse is reflected in this book as well. Do you think the Indian media is sufficiently sensitive in dealing with this issue?
Yes. It appears, though, that the Indian government is not.
Has the Indian public moved beyond the “such-things-don’t happen-in-India” stage?
There is a lot more acceptability now. Real acceptability — and through this the solutions for the protection of child — will come when Indians realise that it happens in their homes and neighbourhoods. Right now it’s still too knee-jerk.
And will age-appropriate sex education in schools help deal with this issue?
Definitely. I do believe that parents should not give away their point of power to a politician or a special department set up to fight AIDS in Delhi. This is about our children, not someone else’s agenda.Curriculum for age-appropriate sex education would best be decided in individual, or a group of, schools by the Parent-Teacher Association.
Given your stand against extreme right-wing forces — what you term bharatibaan — how will you deal with a hate campaign against you or the book?
I like what Bhagyalakshmi’s mother says in Deaf Heaven. “Each of us does not like something. The important thing is to not act on that dislike. Or you will have given in to evil. And evil can only be meaningless.”
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