Treatment of Dalits in Premchand's ‘The Shroud' (Kafan)

Abstract

The present paper is an attempt to bring into discussion and point out the grey areas in the portrayal of Dalit by Premchand (1880–1936) in his short story The Shroud (Kafan). Dalit means broken or crushed people. In modern sense it means the Shudra and untouchable. Dalits are at the bottom pedestal of Hindu social hierarchy. Dalits were made practically invisible from the main stream art and literature. They are shown in poor light. Sometime they are presented mere as a thing of ridicule, as Gheesu and Madhav are portrayed in the short story The Shroud (Kafan). Characterization of Dalit by Pramchand is not justified, as in the line of mainstream literature. It is more painful that story like ‘The Shroud' (Kafan) is from the pen of a literary figure that cannot be classified in a class, who is a class by himself.