Archive for September, 2009

A formidable presence in contemporary Hindi literature, Bhagwandass Morwal has been hailed as the chronicler of Mewat, the land of his birth and nurture. Straddling Rajasthan, UP and Haryana, the region of Mewat, despite its unique cultural compositeness, lies on the socio-economic margins of India. The creative contours of Morwal�s much hailed Kala Pahad (1999) and Babal Tera Des Mein (2004) are shaped by the shifting sounds, sights and sensibility of Mewat that are as much rooted in the individual experiences of the author as in the collective memory of the region. However, the consumerist-communalist onslaught of the contemporary, in the guise of modernity, progress and vote-politics, has started asserting both due and undue pressure on the composite Mewati life style. Morwal makes this experiential reality, a poignant blend of memory and desire, emotion and thought, the takeoff point of his creative imagination to offer a fictional glimpse into the present day Mewat. As such his narratives are in the service of common people; they take sustenance from the existential aspirations and inspirations of the laity, pitchforks it within the social, economic and political contours of contemporary India to present a simultaneous critique � both of the local and the national, the subaltern and the mainstream.