This novel is an unsparing indictment of the people of Sadnahati, a fictional Muslim-majority village in West Bengal. One wonders whether it is ill-timed, given the persecution faced by Muslims all over India. However, the point of Ismail Darbesh’s novel is precisely this: to resist the harassment of Muslims by reclaiming the space snatched away from them, the space where they stand as they are, complete with their failures and idiosyncrasies.
Darbesh, who belongs to a family of traditional garment-makers in West Bengal’s Howrah, writes as an insider. He takes back Muslim people’s right to nuance, to a complex critique of their own community. “Sadnahati was a predominantly Muslim village,” he writes. “And so, the problems of this village were basically the problems of Muslims.”
Talashnama: The Quest
HarperCollins India
Pages: 572
Price: Rs.699
What is now a nearly 600-page English novel began as a series of Facebook posts written in Bengali. Apart from its theological preoccupation, the story has all the elements known to capture the public imagination (perhaps this is the reason behind its success among social media users): a love triangle of sorts, heroes and their faux pas, sparring factions among Muslims, disputes over mosque land, a minor skirmish leading to a riot on an eidgah (an open space reserved for Eid prayers), another narrowly averted riot following an interfaith marriage and elopement, familial conflicts, violence, and betrayal.
The central drama of the novel is spun around Riziya and Maruf, who are progressive Muslims; Tahirul, the imam who has his moments in the light but ends up squandering them; and Suman, a secular Hindu who gradually regresses into conservatism. Suman belongs to Jogipara, a neighbourhood of Sadnahati with a number of Hindu households.
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In this setting, the author engages in an intellectual discourse with Islam, showing how differing interpretations of the Quran and the Hadith allow entirely divergent modes of practising the religion, some rational and others regressive. Maruf likens the trajectory of Islam with that of a river: “The river carried along gravel, pebbles and garbage with it. The pebbles could be likened to the customs and conduct of various countries and communities. Sometimes, like a tributary, a divergent philosophy, which was in conflict with Islam, joined this river. Gradually, those too became a part of the religious and cultural heritage. In time, these acquired such a sacred status that they became as essential as the other duties under Islam. Consequently, the religion became terribly burdened.”
This metaphor, used by Maruf as he deliberates on the merits of religious reform versus community reform as a possible solution to the problems of Sadnahati, is a bright point in the corpus of Darbesh’s argument.
Vivid descriptions
The troubled waters of Sadnahati are further muddied by the machinations of the CPI(M) and the Trinamool Congress. The CPI(M) members build a nexus with the religious folk of Sadnahati, leading to devolution of its politics. One Abid Sheikh, a CPI(M) member, holds Prophet Muhammad to be the greatest communist of all times, “greater even than Marx and Lenin”. Suman is waylaid by a right-wing Hindu organisation that is unnamed, though its identity is easy to guess.
What is now a nearly 600-page English novel began as a series of Facebook posts written in Bengali. | Photo Credit: By Special Arrangement
What is the first step towards the integration of a community that has been deliberately othered by the Hindutva establishment? Certainly, familiarisation plays a part. And Darbesh’s novel performs a vital function here by portraying the traditions, food, festivals, rituals, and customs of the Muslims of Sadnahati from the heart. The renderings of namaz-e-janaza (a funerary prayer), Chandraat (the night of moon-sighting during Eid), and Shab-e-barat (a religious ritual), as the characters perform them, introduce the way in which the community mourns and rejoices. Darbesh’s intimacy with his people is his strength.
Reformist aim
Clearly, this is fiction aimed at social reform. Sadly, Talashnama is let down by the English translation, which appears to be literal, and weak in general. The original is written in colloquial Bengali, replete with local wisdom and idioms. These rhythms are lost in translation—each metaphor, laboriously spelt out for the reader in the next sentence, sounds strained. Darbesh’s use of irony in the original writing is also often lost in translation: one can only read a phrase like “a sense of [whatever the sentiment happens to be]”, inserted by way of explanation so many times before it begins to sound lame.
“The rendering of religious rituals as the characters perform them introduces the way in which the Muslim community mourns and rejoices. Darbesh’s intimacy with his people is his strength.”
The novel has a steadfast allegiance to its women, which is commendable, except that the author seems to be mildly infatuated with Riziya, insisting on her beauty and fair complexion. He piles up misfortunes on her: she is orphaned, raped, widowed, ostracised. Grave outcomes also befall most of his heroes: lonely deaths, fall from grace, suicide.
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After a point, Darbesh’s condemnation of the people of Sadnahati seems a bit too unremitting. Towards the climax, in a haste to resolve multiple plot lines, he resorts to striking down characters. And then there are implausible resolutions: at one point, an emotional appeal by a village elder, Sadek Ali, makes a riotous mob change their mind.
Throughout the novel, there is also the rather odd conflation of intellectual powers with moral sense. The one thing Riziya, Tahirul, Maruf, and Suman have in common is education; in fact, one can scarcely come across the last three without being subjected to lengthy sermons on religion and spirituality. In Darbesh’s world, only intellectuals can have moral dilemmas, it seems. The equation of education with enlightenment and its presentation as a possible solution to Sadnahati’s troubles conflate to result in what feels like a deep distrust of the uneducated poor.
Nevertheless, Darbesh boldly offers a rare and enriching view of the life of the rural Muslim in India. This is a voice that must be heard more often.
Shaoni Sarkar is a freelance journalist based in Kolkata.
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