Ilavenil Meena Kandasamy is an Indian poet, fiction writer, translator and activist from Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India. Meena published two collections of poetry, Touch and Ms. Militancy (2010). From 2001-2002, she edited The Dalit, a bi-monthly alternative English magazine of the Dalit Media Network.

1. Name:- Dhruvita Dhameliya
Roll no:- 03
Enrollment number:-4069206420210006
Subject: Indian English Literature – Post-Independence
Paper no:- 202
Topic:- One Eyed by Meena Kandasamy
Submitted to:- S. B.Gardi Department of English , MKBU
Meena Kandasamy as angry Dalit voice

2. “
“I am the woman who is willing to display her
scars and put them within exhibition frames. I
am the madwoman of moon days. I am the
breast-beating woman who howls. I am the
woman who wills the skies to weep in my
place.” Meena Kandasmy
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3. Who is Meena Kandasamy?
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Meena Kandasamy is a Chennai-based, contemporary poet,
fiction writer, translator and activist. She articulates the
voices of her own community, her own country to which her
forefathers belonged at a given point of time or history. She
tries to recreate the lives of her community native to her and
makes her voice heard in the dominant discourse. She finds
herself marginalized on the psychological level and suffers
from a split self. She presents herself as a Dalit woman
writer and retells the Tamil myths by feministic and
anti-caste perspectives.(V.P.Rathi)

4. What is Dalit literature?
Dalit literature is based on Dalit consciousness and it represents the harsh lived experiences of
marginalized Dalit people. There is always one or the other real character behind a fictional
name and the depiction of solid reality behind the thin veil of fictionalized incidents in almost
all the genres of Dalit literature. All of its literariness and fictionalization, whether in poetry or
prose, has a realistic stance. Dalit literature is basically a literature of resistance.(Javaid
Ahmad)
Gopal Guru writes,
Dalit male writers do not take serious note of the literary output of dalit women and tend
to be dismissive of it. Dalit women rightly question why they are not considered for the
top positions in Dalit literary conferences and institutions.
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5. Meena Kandasamy as
dalit writer
Meena Kandasamy is one of the Dalit writers who attempted to spread
light on such aspect of Dalit life which found no representation in the
mainstream literature. Untouchables in her poetry are represented
neither as sympathetic beings nor as inferior human beings. Her
approach is on locating the factors which lead to the inferior status of
Dalit people. She has published two collections of poetry titled Touch and
Ms Militancy. Her book Gypsy Goddess is about a caste atrocity
occurred in Kilvenmani. When I Hit You is her auto-fiction that tells the
story of a woman which is relatable to many women in the Indian
society. Her poems speak about the ways in which Brahminical
supremacy was established and discuss the strategies used by the
Brahmins in establishing the caste system and patriarchal ideologies.
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6. Meena Kandasamy’s Work
She writes mainly about love, cast, and society. She is well aware of her past
and her poetry is rooted in reality; that is the reality of her Dalit self.
TOUCH :-
Touch is the most elementary of all sensations which a human being has bestowed with;
even when in a meditation a religious man closes his eyes, ears and nose, it is the
sense of touch which keeps him connected with this world. This feeling of touch is
perhaps he first of senses and no one can get rid of it.
The same feeling of touch is thought to be a taboo when it tries to
transgress the compartmentalization of caste. Kandasamy describes it beautifully in her
poem “Touch”.(Javaid Ahmad)
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7. Prayers
The tragedy of a man - who wants to thank his God for the last time because his “disease
wrecked” self has come across a “partial recovery” from the “Ten days of Typhoid”- gets
depicted in Kandasamy’s poem “Prayers”. When way from the temple he bends in
supplication”, because he is barred to enter a caste Hindu temple, the intolerant public cannot
bear it. This is how sarcastically she portrays the consequences.
Shame:-
In another poem entitled “Shame” the poet describes the fate of a gang-raped girl who fails to
gain any kind sympathy from the people because she was a Dalit. It is the victim who gets
victimized time and again.There seems no option left for her except to silently embrace death.
Her caste makes her more vulnerable to harassments and prone to sexual crimes.
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It is the food and water, the most precious commodities for which a Dalit has to struggle
the most. Telgu poet Jeshuva writes, ‘ When his ,hand do not work ,The green fields
hesitate to yield crops ;He sweats, provides food for the world ,But he himself has no
food.(Javaid Ahamd)

8. One Eyed
One Eyed” was published in Ms Militancy . The poem talks about
Dhanam, a little girl who feels very thirsty, touches the pot and drank a
glass of water from the pot to quench her thirst with her “clumsy hand”.
The learned teacher in the school slapped on the little girl’s cheek
especially for breaking the rules. The concept of untouchability is
practised mainly against the lower caste as well as the lower section
people. They are the worst sufferers. As they do not have the political and
economic power to fight against the upper class people’s supremacy, they
mutely accept subjugation. They do not have the voice to express their
conditions and portray themselves before the world. Even the inanimate
objects surrounding her feel the pitied condition of the girl:
“The pot sees just another noisy child, The glass sees an eager and
clumsy hand, The water sees a parched throat slaking thirst, dhanam sees
a world torn in half. her left eye, lid open but light slapped away, the
price for a taste of that touchable water”(V. P. Rathi)
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9. Critics claim to read tinges of hysteria in Kandasamy’s poetry. Hysteria has been literarily
appropriated in a variety of ways beginning from the nineteenth century. It has been thence known
as the disease of the imagination, the disease that silenced the voice but enacted the self-
articulation of the feminine subject.” The portrayal of hysteria in early Victorian female characters
is discussed in Gilbert and Gubar’s The Madwoman in the Attic. In an interview with Silvia
Duarte, Kandasamy states,
“Society will not let angry young women exist, we will be labelled hysterics. Women aren’t
allowed to rebel or rage. If they do, they are tagged as hysterics or rather, being mad”.
This fiercely biased view of patriarchy which has hitherto silenced women from expressing their
stark resentment towards or against prevalent ideologies is challenged by each of Kandasamy’s
female protagonists in the poems of Ms. Militancy.(Jerin Jacob)
Critics about Kandasamy

10. SIGNIFICANCE OF STUDY IN PRESENT ERA
A nine-year-old Dalit boy died after he was
allegedly beaten up by a teacher for drinking
water from a pot in a private school in the Jalore
district of Rajasthan.India Today
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A 19-year-old Dalit woman in India's northern state of
Uttar Pradesh died after reporting she'd been gang
raped and brutally assaulted by four upper-caste men.
After fighting for her life for two weeks, the victim
died in a New Delhi hospital.(India Today)

11. Conclusion
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Dalit literature is revolutionary and literature is a weapon through which
they have tried to bring social awareness. Questioning, subversion,
interpretation etc., are the main features of Dalit writings.In Meena
Kandasamy’s writings also, it can be observed that she considers the caste
hierarchy as the fundamental reason for the subaltern class to remain
under the clutches of hierarchy of power and silently suffer the
exploitation. But in reality she is not able to forget the misdeeds of the
high-castes in past and thus she is also not able to remain hood-winked on the
present condition of “un-emancipated” Dalits and especially that of Dalit women.
Challapalli Swaroopa Rani :- ‘Dalit women poets feel strongly that dalit women issues
have not been adequately represented in the mainstream. Condemned for centuries to a
life of bondage, basic needs and questions of survival are still central for dalit
women’.Javaid Ahmad

12. Work cited
Arumugam, V. P. “Savage Treatment of Untouchables in Meena Kandasamy's "One-Eyed."” Savage Treatment of Untouchables in Meena
Kandasamy's "One-Eyed", 2019, p. 4. academia.edu, https://www.academia.edu/. Accessed Sunday October 2022
.
Jacob, Jerin. “Can the dalit woman speak? Kandasamy's vindictive poetry as a tool of political dissent.” Can the dalit Woman S
peak? Kandasamy’s Vindictive Poetry as a Tool of Political Dissent, 12 February,2018, p. 12. A,
https://www.academia.edu/33908665/Can_the_dalit_woman_speak_Kandasamys_vindictive_poetry_as_a_tool_of_political_
dissent. Accessed Sunday October 2022.
Kala, Chhabi. “Dalit boy beaten by teacher for drinking water from pot in Rajasthan, dies.” India Today, 13 August 2022,
https://www.indiatoday.in/india/story/dalit-student-beaten-to-death-teacher-rajasthan-jalore-for-drinking-pot-water-1987714-2022-08-13.
Accessed 2 October 2022.
Lone, Javaid Ahmad. “Meena Kandasamy: The Angry Dalit Voice.” Meena Kandasamy: The Angry Dalit Voice, 2012, p. 10. ResearchGate,
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/260285097_Meena_Kandasamy_The_Angry_Dalit_Voice. Accessed Sunday October 2022.
Mahto, Mohan Lal. “Meena Kandasamy's Touch: An Articulation of the Voice of the Marginalized.” Research Journal of Humanities and Social
Sciences, vol. 3, January 2015, pp. 11-17.
Mukhopadhyay, Ankita. “Gruesome rape in India’s Hathras reveals the plight of lower castes.” DW, 14 October 2020,
https://www.dw.com/en/gruesome-rapein-indiashathrasreveals-theplight-of-lower-castes/a-55274819. Accessed 2 October 2022.
Rathi, V. P. “Savage Treatment of Untouchables in Meena Kandasamy's "One-Eyed."” Savage Treatment of Untouchables in Meena Kandasamy's
"One-Eyed", June 2020, p. 164. ResearchGate,
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/342466334_Savage_Treatment_of_Untouchables_in_Meena_Kandasamy's_One-Eyed.
Accessed Sunday October 2022.

13. THANK YOU
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