This document provides an analysis of the play "Final Solutions" by Indian playwright Mahesh Dattani. It summarizes the plot and examines the characteristics of the three main female characters: Hardika, who represents the first generation and witnessed partition; Aruna, who is a religious housewife; and Smita, a more liberal third generation woman. The document also discusses how Dattani uses these differing female perspectives to investigate women's reactions to communal prejudices and tensions in India.

2. Paper name : Indian English Literature post-
Independence
Topic : Female character in Final Solutions
Semester : 3
Roll no. : 2
Submitted by: S. B. Gardi Department of English
MKBU

3. Mahesh Dattani :
● Born on 7 August, 1958 in Bangalore karnataka.
● Mahesh Dattani is a well-known modern Indian
playwright.
● He is first Indian playwright to be awarded the Sahitya
Academy Award in 1998.
● He is playwright, stage director, an actor, a screen writer,
and a film-maker.
● He is continuing contributing the Indian-English drama.

4. 4
“The function of the drama, in my opinion, is not merely to
reflect the malfunction of the society but to act like freak
mirrors in a carnival and to project grotesque images of all
that passes for normal in our world. It is ugly, but funny.”
Notable works:
Where There’s a Will (1988),
Final Solutions (1993),
Do the Needful (1997),
Dance Like a Man (1989),
Tara (1990).

5. Final Solutions :
● first performed in 1993.
● Final Solutions has taken the issues of the majority
communities in different contexts and situations.
● The main character, Dakhsa also known as Hardika in the play
fuses past and present.

6. 6
Dr. Pankaj Kumari in his article written:
In Final Solutions, Dattani tries to investigate that the reactions to
communal prejudices are closely associated with gender difference.
Women like Hardika, Smita and Aruna even in their feminine grace
and silence can better retaliate to their oppressors. It shows women
can think beyond their physical conscience on the matter like
communal violence. Aruna and Hardika are no longer interested in
their sympathies, Smita too subsequently develops suspicion and
resentment for Javed and Bobby. Through the anger of these three
women, Dattani suggests that at mental level women are more
closely related to communal and religious identities and have a
deeper realization of the humiliations done in the name of religious
fanaticism. The anger of these three women is an example of
independent thinking.

7. 7
Women in the play :
Dattani has always given importance to women in his
plays. The women in his plays are sometimes meek
submissive, calm and cool in nature. Whereas
sometimes they are intelligent, brave, courageous and
protest when required.
In this particular play Dattani talks about three different
women who represent three different generations.
Hardika represents the first generation, Aruna
represents the second generation and Smita represents
the third generation.

8. Continue…
Hardika,is also known as Daksha in the play, who
has seen the partition of India and the communal
tension as well. Hardika even talks about her
father’s dream of an independent India. Hardika is
such a woman who did love the Muslims until they
killed her father in a communal riot.

9. Female character in the Play
Hardika/ Daksha :
● Hardika is the mother of Ramnik.
● She is also known as Daksha in the play when the
play revolves around the past.
● Daksha writes down everything in her diary because
diary is her best friend.

10. 10
● Right from her first day at her in laws house to
making a new Muslim friend namely Zarine, she
writes down everything in her diary.
● The diary symbolizes the past and the present.
Daksha as a young girl in the past writes down
everything on the pages of her diary and Hardika in
the present, teaches things to her family about the
past, from her diary.

11. 11
Aruna :
● Aruna, wife of Ramnik Gandhi, is a typical Indian
house wife who is a Godfearing person as well.
● She has spent her whole life in pooja path and she
doesn’t like to compromise with anything that is
elated to her God.
● She also believes that everybody has their own way
to worship God.

12. 12
Smita :
● Smita is a girl who believes in liberal ideology.
● She does help her mom in her pooja work because
she loves her mom but she doesn’t personally
support all the things from heart.
● Rather at one point of time she gets tired of her
mother’s prejudices and conveys her feelings to her
mother.

13. Citation:
Bhattacharya, Suchismita . "Communal Tension and Gender
Bias in Mahesh Dattani's Play Final Solutions," International
Journal of Pure and Applied Mathematics, vol. 119, no. 16,
2018, www.acadpubl.eu/hub/.
Dubey, Sweta. "Mahesh Dattani: A Strategic Playwright,"
Journal of Emerging Technologies and Innovative Research
(JETIR), vol. 5, no. 5, 2018, www.jetir.org.
Kumari, Dr. Pankaj. "Post-Feminists analysis of female
characters in Mahesh Dattani’s Final Solutions," Final Solutions

14. Thank you