Kolkata, Jan 10 (.) Mahasweta Devi refused to be confined in a box as merely an author and reinforced the idea of ‘buffalo woman’ when describing herself, with her works disrupting a literary culture that largely preferred safe and familiar narratives.
Far from a metaphorical flourish, media personality Sudeshna Roy explained, the phrase “buffalo woman” encapsulated Mahasweta Devi’s lived politics. She likened herself to a buffalo wallowing in mud and water, burdened by labour, yet sustaining life, choosing to draw her strength from the everyday struggles of the marginalised.
Her major works include “Hajar Churashir Maa”, “Rudali” and “Aranyer Adhikar”. She worked on the ground with tribal communities such as the Lodha and Shabar across eastern and central India, fighting for their rights and recognition. Her contributions were recognised with honours including the Sahitya Akademi Award (Bengali), the Jnanpith Award, the Ramon Magsaysay Award, as well as the Padma Shri and Padma Vibhushan.
At the 17th Apeejay Kolkata Literary Festival, a session titled Mahasweta Devi, Living Legacy: A Centennial Tribute remembered the writer not only for her books, but for the way she stood with people pushed to the margins.
According to clinical psychologist Ratnaboli Ray, the word “trauma” has entered everyday speech with surprising ease, often stripped of its depth. In contrast, for Mahasweta Devi, trauma was not a buzzword but a profound act of bearing witness. Ray noted that her writing sought to construct an “emotional register”, a way to acknowledge suffering without reducing it to individual pathology or medical terms.
Roy noted that Mahasweta Devi constantly interrogated society’s response to suffering. When someone is in distress, she asked, should we try to “fix” the individual, diagnose a medical condition, or hold the state accountable for creating such conditions? Rejecting the notion of the mind as a private domain, she contended that suffering is embedded within social and political contexts, and that genuine healing is inseparable from justice.
Mahasweta Devi explored this idea most starkly in Stanadayini (The Breast-Giver), the story of Jashoda, a wet nurse whose body is worked until it has nothing left to give. Her eventual illness compels readers to consider whether cancer is merely a biological fate or the price of prolonged exploitation.
Writer Anita Agnihotri recalled encountering Mahasweta Devi’s work in the 1970s, noting that it disrupted a literary culture that largely preferred safe and familiar narratives.
In discussing Aranyer Adhikar, Agnihotri highlighted how Mahasweta Devi transformed history into a living narrative. By integrating folklore, oral tradition, and imaginative reconstruction, the text asserts that history is continuous, extending beyond past events into contemporary consciousness.
Agnihotri noted that Mahasweta Devi wrote for the people, not the elite, publishing in magazines and serials to ensure her stories reached a wide audience.
Mahasweta Devi’s quiet feminism shone in Choli Ke Peeche, where she questioned why the lives of poor women could be exploited for profit while they themselves were left uncompensated, the panel highlighted.
. . . SAS PRP