GITMA MARIMARAN - AN INTRODUCTION
5.6 Shwhi Deshpande
and Githa
Githa Hariban grew up in Bombay and in Manila. She was educated in these two
cities and later in the United States, where she worked in public television. Since
1979, she has worked in Bombay, Madras and New Delhi, first as an editor in a
publcishing house, then as a freelancer. Githa Wa- has published several short
stories in magazines and journals. The Art of Dying and Other Stories (1993) contains
twenty of her short stories. Her two novels are : The Z%ousanH Faces ofNight (1992),
and Where Dream Travel ( 1 999) m e Ghosts of VasuMaster ( 1 994). The thousand
Faces of Night her maiden novel, won her the prestigious Cornmenwealth Writers
Award for 1993. She has also edited A Southern Wanlest a collection of short stories
translated into English from four south Indian languages. She lives in New Delhi with
her husband and two sons.
5.7 GAJAR H A WA - A DISCUSSION
This story is a moving account of y ~ u n gPerurnagree's life in Salem and out of it.
Life for her was extremely k d in Salem, The parent5 didn't get along. Mother was
always screaming. So the father left,.It didn't seem to bother his wife one bit. 'We're
well rid of him, he's a lazy drunken bastard, she sad. She went to work everyday,
even on days when she was sick or when her stomach vras empty, to the highway they
were building near their village. She would leave at six in the morning after drinking
the strong, sweet tea Perumayee made for her. She coiled a rag on her head, &y for
the baskets of gravel she would carry all day. On her hip she held the youngest child
who was still breast-feeding. We don't need much imagination ta 'mow the extent of
her drudgery to fend for her four children.
And Penunayeel Young Perumayee would get her brother Selvan i n y for school,
feed him his gruel, oil and comb his hair, and wave at him fPom the door of their hut.
Then, along with Thayee, her baby sister, she would begin her chores for the day.
Chores which included collecting the firewod, the water queue that got longer and
longer (that's where she learnt ta fight and push and shove), scrubbing the clothes
hitting them again and again on the, rocks near the river. Her reward! 'That
Perumayee is like a little mother, everyone said, the irony is too obvious. At an age
when she should have gone to school, she was taking care of her siblings. And we
cannot blame her mother either. She is doing whatever she possibly can, whatever the
Tire Short Story circumstances allow her to do, to keep herself and her children alive - so that they can
have some rice or gruel or once in a while a handful of dal in lots of tarnarind water.
No one could think things would get worse. They did. The highway was built after
eighteen months of backbreaking work. N Omore work thereafter. The rains failed for
the second year, making life still harder, provisions costlier.
Around that time their neighbour's cousin Chellamma was talking five of the village
girls to Delhi with her. It was decided that Perumayee should go too so that she could
earn something and send it home. That perhaps was the only way out.
Perumayee stuck to Chellamma like a leech on the train and didn" look at anyone's
face, Then they reached her home, a small room in M~lnirka(a locality in Delhi) that
smelt of urine. The room was actually a scooter garage but even this small, dark hole
with no tap for water and no toilet, Chellamma has got after years of working for the
same memsahib in the colony.
Chellamma has no difficulty finding a job for Perumayee for two hundred rupees a
month. Cooking, cleaning, washing, looking after the baba. Perumayee has to give
Chellamma, her mother now, fifty rupees from her salary every xwnt!. The rest she
can send home.
At the milkbooth, which reminds her of the fights at the water-tap in the village,
Perumayee makes friends with girls who work in the flats in the same colony. Their
memsahibs are a lot like hers. They themselves are not very different from her. One
can imagine the kind of childhood they have had and the family circumstances that
have compelled them to take to this drudgery.
Githa Hariharan has very effectively portrayed the plight of the poor in rural India
forcing them to reach Delhi in search of a better life, in quest of a dream. The hard
realities of life take away their childhood, their innocence.
Necessity is the mother of invention, they say. Necessity makes us invent lies,
falsehoods. It makes us conceal the truth. Necessity to find a job for Perumayee
makes Chellarnma tell the memsahib that the girl can cook, sweep and swab and look
after children even though she knows full wzll that Perumayee has never cooked
anything more than rice or gruel or perhaps a handfu! of dal once in a while. Telling
the truth would mean getting fifty rupees le:s. It might also mean not getting a job and
consequently taking the first train back to Salem.
Necessity not only forces Perumayee to learn enough Hindi in a few weeks but also
forces her to learn how to shirk work, how to swab quickly, skipping corners and
under the beds when the mistress is not around or to just squeeze out the baby's
stinking clothes with the yellow stains drying in crust on the diapers whereas back at
home in Salem she used to scrub and scrub the clothes, hitting them again and again
on the rocks near the river. Or she would steal a quick look behind her and pop bits of
something or the other into her mouth. The chores she i$ supposed to do included
peeling and grating mounds of carrots, or so it seems like to this young girl, fr-r halwa.
Scraping so many carrots leaves her arms stiff. Her fingers feel as if they will never
straighten out again. And then stirring the pan of milk (with all these grated carrots)
on the fire, round and round, scraping the sides of the pan again and again her arm
becomes numb with pain. This is an indication of the life ahead of her.
Githa Hariharan has also managed to bring out the north-south contrast. The language
problem, to begin with. It suits Perumayee in the beginning because she does not have
to reply to memsahib's questions. She can pretend not to understand he: instructions
or queries and just say yes or no, hoping it is the right answer. Even though she
quickly picks up enough pf Hindi, she cannot pronounce gajar correctly. She must call
it kaachar. And she is justifiably hurt when the *nistresslaughs at it. Her memsahib
calls her Prema. Despite her education and ability to drive the car, she can't say
Perumayee, the girl argues. Perhaps Perumayee doesn't realize that it is not her Hariharan
memsahib's inability to correctly pronounce her name, it is some kind of a social
convention, social custom to shorten the name of your retainer. The change in weather .
has also been indicated. The sun doesn't shine properly for days in Delhi. The water
freezes Perumayee's fingers. In Salem, they obviously didn't have this problem with
lots and lot of sun for most part of the year. The situation demands adjustment on
various levels - physical, economic, emotional.
5.8 CHARACTERSIATION
The story is mainly about Perumayee - the young girl from Salem - and what all she
goes through, in Salem and then in Delhi. It's also about her evolution and initiation
into the city life and its ways. When Peru~nayeecomes to Delhi, she feels she should
speak the truth, tell her prospective mistress that she cannot cook anything more than
rice or gruel and maybe dal. Quickly she learns the Delhi ways, learns to swab
quickly, skipping comers and under the beds when the mistress is not looking, leams
to just squeeze out the baby's stinky clothes without properly washing them. She
learns not to slave for her memsahib, leams to shut the kitchen door, turn the gas knob
to high and hold her hands over the onions sizzling in oil to feel warm and safe.
Learns also that in six months, once she has picked up the basics of city
housekeeping, she can get a job for double the money in a richer colony. In a few
years' time she may be no different from our wise, fawning Chellamma, bringing
young girls from the village and supplying maids to the city folks making, in the
process, a quick buck or two herself. Chellamma, we are told, had brought five village
girls with her to Delhi. We can safely surmise that the other four girls would be as
quick at adapting themselves to the Delhi ways as our protagonist. We can also safely
gue-s what Chellamma would have been like the first time she herself came to Delhi.
The process goes on - as long as the circumstances don't change, Delhi will continue
to enticc the poor villagers. And the young village girls will continue to become part
of the metropolitan system sacrificing their simplicity and innocence.
Chellamma knows how to bargain what, to say and when, how not to give in. She
knows the exact words that would please or soften the memsahib. She knows the
mistress is rieedy but she also knows that she should not stretch things too far. She is
no good Samaritan - Perumayee has to pay her fifty rupees a month for her services
and liason work.
Then we have the mistress. We are not told her name. That's not important. What's
important is that she badly needs a domestic help to do the chores and look after her
baby. Perumayee is just a servant girl, No more or no less. The relationship between
the two is very formal, matter-of-fact. She asks Chellamma her age - perhaps to
gauge how much she knows, what all she can manage. She does not ask her name,
does not ask her anything personal, Docs not want to know why she has come all the
way to Delhi at such a young age. Does not want to know if she misses her mother.
Being a mother herself, she could have shown some emotion, some concern for the
girl. But she does not do so. Perumayee is coming to her as a maid -she should prove
herself to be a good maid, and that's that. She is a typical mistress and the mistresses
in other flats in the colony are a lot like her, Other maids are not very different from
Perumayee either. So we can conclude that they too would be having more or less
similar relationship with their employers. Education and affluence do not necessarily
bring in understanding and compassion.
Perumayee's mother has been portrayed in detail. An unhappy woman. A hard-
working woman. She went to work every day, even on days when she was sick or
when her stomach was hungry, to the highway being built near the village. She would
lea.ve at six in the morning after taking just a cup of strong tea. On her hip she held the
The Short Story
YO' ~ngestchild she was still breast-feeding. And she would carry on her head baskets
of 1gravel all day long. Her husband of gravel all day long. Her husband was lazy and
a drunkard. Obviously not bothered about his responsibility as the head of the family.
Not bothered about his wife and four children. No wonder Perumayee's mother was
alvlays screaming. She couldn't possibly see the children starve to death. She couldn't
po:;sibly watch the husband squander money on drinks - whatever little money there
wa,s. And so he left. A very familiar scenario! And she is left to fend for her four
chiIdren. Again these characten are not given any names. This could be any couple in
rura1 India. What is important is the situation, the compillsions of the situations. She is
a-brave woman who faces the situation with courage - accepts this backbreaking work
anc1 when even this tunnel is blocked, takes the boid decision to send Perumayee with
Ch'ellamma in search of a job.
In a way all these are stereotypical characters but together they create a very vivid,
moving picture of our society, of our times.
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5.9 NARRATIVE TECHNIQUES -
Gajar Ijalwa - a common home made sweet-dish in winter in alnlost the whole of
north India. A fdvourite dish. Githa Hariharan uses it as a very effective imagery.
Making it requires a lot of hard work. Hours of peeling and grating and stirring. The
young maid does it all - it gives her stiff fingers and arm numb with pain. Ofcourse,
the great red gold warmth of thz grainy, syrupy thickness, once it's ready, spreads all
over her and she becomes part of it, It symirolises the city life, rhe new life for
Perumayee. Hard yet tempting. Like ?he carots absorbing, sucking in and swallowing
the sugar, the ghee and the milk, the city sucks in and absorbs numerous Chellarnmas
and Perumayees who become part of its thickening red sweetness.
The device of contrast is also used to highlight the rural migration to the city. Back at
home a11 that Pemmayee has seen is rice or gruel or maybe a handful of dal and
tamarind in the good days. She has never seen such a pile of carrots before. Nor so
much of milk and sugar rind ghee. There is a gas stove and fridge, and they have meat
thrice a week. Almost a dreamland. And then the water queues getting longer and
longer in the village contrasted with the cold, fresh waxer gushing out of the city
kitchen pipe, never ending, as if the entire river lies inside it. Scarcity and abundance!
Her mother carrying the baskets of gravel on her head all day long and the memsahib
driving a car and ordering her around. The backbreaking work her mother did to
provide two (?) square meals for her children and the smooth, pink skin of her
memsahib who has been to school just like her brother Selvan. To a much better
school. Who wouldn't want to come over?
The city has other &tractions too! Before sending any money home, Perumayee
would like to buy a sweater, a blue one with shiny, beaded flowers, the kind she saw a
girl wearing at the milk - booth queue, for herself. Then she wouldn't have to sleep
with the thin, lumpy mattress on top cf her, pretending it is a blanket. Quite fair and
natural, one would say. Except that her mother and siblings back in the village might
not even have a morsel to eat, given the miserable conditions there. But Perumayee
forgets that. This is what the city does. Saps human emotions, human ties,
and human bonds. Perumayee forgets, if only temporarily, the pressing needs of her
family. Her memsahib forgets that she is a frail, young girl -- too frail and too young
to do this kind of work.
Language has been used to denote moods and stress points. Peel, peel, grate, and
grate. The repetition conveys the size of the pile pf carrots and the hard work
involved. Stir, stir, the memsahib says. And then - stir, stir, she barks. This one word
conveys her anger and authority.
Colours have been used to heighten the over -- all affect. The peeled carrots, freshly Shasbi Desbpande
washed, dazzle Perumayee's eyes. Later, great red-gold warmth spreads all over her and Githa
bones. The gajar halwa sucks in everything, likewise the city sucks in everyone. And Hariharan
the earlier spluttering becomes a faint but steady heave of red, like a heartbeat, then
gentle sighs. And you eventually get used to it, accept it, and become part of it.
In a way both these stories are concerned about how women deal with the sanction of
space in the Indian society and the possibility or absence of choice in the broad
context of our ethos and social mores.
5.10 LET US SUM UP
In this unit we have seen that the womer; writers in India do not confine themselves to
women alone issues - we have read that Shashi Deshpande refuses to be called a
feminist, A s such the two stories have broader concerns. In a way the two stories
show how women make the best out of the limited space they have in Indian society.
Their choice or possibility of choice, as said earlier, remains in the broad context of
Indian ethos and social mores.
5.11 OUESTIONS
1. The Miracle highlights man's cruelty to animals. Have you heard of the
SPCA? Do you love animals? Which character impresses you the most in this
story?
7
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-. What is the essential message of this story?
3, Why does the doctor marry the typist at the end of the story?
4. Are education and faith mutually exclusive?
5. Perumayee feels that her father left them because her mother was always
screaming. Do you agree with her analysis?
6. Do you agree that 'Gajar Malwa' offers a scathing comment on our social
inequalities?
7. How do you view Ghellamma's role in the story? Does she uy to take
advantage of the situation in her own way?
Mukta Atrey and Viney Kirpal. S'izashi Deshpcnde: A Feminist Study of Her Fiction
in Indian Writers series General Ed, A.N. Dwivedi, B.R. Publishing Corporation New
Delhi, 1958.
Sarbjith Sindhu. B e Image of Women in the Novels of Shashi Deshpande New Delhi,
Prestige, 1996.
Anuradha Roy. Pattety of Feminist Consciousness in Indian Women Writers. r\i ew
Delhi, Prestige, 1999.
