Assignment: P-207:(Contemporary Literature)

Hello Beautiful People,

This blog is 207 (Contemporary Literature) assignment writing on assigned by Prof. Dr. Dilip Barad sir, Head of the English Department of Maharaja Krishnkumarsinhji Bhavsinhji Bhavnagar University (MKBU).

Name          Bhatt Riddhiben D.
                     riddhi28bhatt@gmail.com
Sem 4
Roll No.          15
PG year          2020-2022
PG Enrollment No.  3069206420200004
Paper Name          207 (Contemporary Literature)
Topic Name          A Critical Study of Arundhati Roy's Ministry of Utmost Happiness 

Submitted to  Smt. S.B.Gardi Department of English

A Critical Study of Arundhati Roy's Ministry of Utmost Happiness

Abstract :

The Ministry of Utmost Happiness illustrates Arundhati Roy's endeavour to unite all of the subcontinent's castaways under one roof. The work clearly exposes her own political positions, which are founded on the notion that the personal is political. She attempted to cover every imaginable topic, from queer politics to Gujarat's 2002 pogrom, from violent casteism to neoliberalism, from the Emergency to the Narmada Bachao Andolan, and so on.In an era when concepts like "secularism" and "tolerance" are frowned upon, Roy took the initiative to expose the Indian subcontinent's political and social fault lines. Here I want to discuss Roy is a protagonist in The Ministry of Utmost Happiness. Indian vulture crises, deforestation, the plight of migrants and quarry workers, the plight of enslaved zoo animals, inadequate health facilities, scum-laden rivers, mushrooming slums, mounting poverty, rapidly expanding dumping grounds, unplanned urbanisation, unrestricted consumer indulgence, enslavement of Adivasi (tribal) girls, and genetic modification have all been thoroughly researched. She writes to elicit action and encourage her readers to take part in the process of nation-building and creating a more sustainable world. 

Introduction :

Arundhati Roy demonstrates incredible resourcefulness in creating a literary dais for individuals living on the outskirts of Indian society. Following the phenomenal success of her debut book The God of Small Things (1997), Roy went on to write nonfiction works that were both challenging and radical in tone. She frequently muses about problems of national importance.She is a novelist, a feminist, a literary activist, and an environmentalist at heart. The End of Imagination (1998), The Cost of Living (1999), The Algebra of Infinite Justice (2002), Public Power in the Age of Empire (2004), Listening to Grasshoppers: Field Notes on Democracy (2010), and Kashmir: The Case for Freedom (2011) are among her nonfiction books (2011)."I'll have to find a language to express the narrative I want to tell," Roy remarked in an interview in 2011, while discussing her return to fiction. Of course, I don't mean English, Hindi, Urdu, or Malayalam when I say language. I'm referring to something else. "A method of reuniting universes that have been torn apart" (Kumar). As a result, the piece will highlight how Roy has braided today's harsh facts with a fictitious plot. The study paper on Roy's most recent work of fiction intends to guide every resistance movement contained in the novel's characters and their conflicts, as well as to establish a noisy community in general.

Environmental Concerns in Arundhati Roy’s The Ministry of Utmost Happiness :

Arundhati Roy's position as an Indian female writer is both reformist and rebellious. Her literature is not extravagant, but rather intricately structured and highly complex, with a plentiful quantity of thematic themes, symbolisms, well-crafted characters, and precisely constructed storyline. Her most recent work, The Ministry of Utmost Happiness (2017), with its epic-like scale, defies traditional storytelling conventions. This novel is neither a political treatise nor a journalistic piece that summarises life in India.On the contrary, this storey investigates the sociological aspects and political sector with zeal in order to give readers with healthy facts. Roy's storey is well-informed, elegantly connected, pragmatic, and judicious.

Roy is a passionate and well-known environmental campaigner. She received praise for her debut novel, The God of Small Things, which was released in 1997. As a passionate nonfiction writer, Roy is involved in a variety of important sociopolitical problems. Her literary advocacy is objective, factual, realistic, and controversial. She has expressed her dissatisfaction with a slew of topics that demanded public attention.The increasing tide of globalisation, the dangers of consumerism and urbanisation, the worsening state of the environment, the growing influence of communalism, the Kashmir insurgency, the Maoist fight, and the fast changing face of Indian democracy are some of these challenges.

Roy's literary works have consistently contributed to the culture of environmental literature.Global environmental concerns have captivated her attention and instilled an unwavering attitude in her works. "To, The Unconsoled," says the epigraph to The Ministry of Utmost Happiness. The writer's melancholy is reflected in the epigraph, where she acknowledges this same presence of individuals who are unconsoled. Though the readers are unaware of these unconsoled people's identities, their presence is undoubtedly dominating. The novel's prologue gives a peek of the author's tendencies and worries as the tale proceeds. The focus of the author then traverses across the cityscape. The setting in the novel is of Delhi, the capital of India. Roy’s panoramic description of the city throws light on her peerless literary ingenuity. She observes that:

“Around her the city sprawled for miles. Thousand-year-old sorceress, dozing, but

not asleep, even at this hour. Grey flyovers snaked out of her Medusa skull,

tangling and untangling under the yellow sodium haze. Sleeping bodies of

homeless people lined their high, narrow pavements, head to toe, head to toe,

head to toe, looping into the distance.” (TMUH 96)

Roy's portrayal of the Delhi Zoo in the voice of Tilottama is accurate.

The well-being of the animals is not a top priority for zoo officials. There is no veterinary care provided, the cages are empty, and the audience is not screened for taunting the animals or feeding them hazardous substances. Visitors torment the animals for cheap entertainment. The gibbon hung from a branch at the zoo because its cage was cluttered, while the hippo swam in a filthy pond. The zoo prisoners' and their cages' conditions are both deplorable. The zoo depicted in the novel does not function as a haven for the animals. The narrator goes on to say:

There was an Indian rock python in every cage in the snake house. Snake scam.

“There were cows in the sambar stag’s enclosure. Deer scam. And there were

women construction workers carrying bags of cement in the Siberian tiger

enclosure. Siberian tiger scam. Most of the birds in the aviary were ones you

could see on trees anyway. Bird scam.”(TMUH, 235)

The narrator then travels across the city reaching a massive dumping ground where she

observes, “. . . miles of city waste, a bright landfill of compacted plastic bags with an army of ragged children picking through it. . . . In the distance, garbage trucks wound their way slowly up the garbage mountain” (TMUH 234).

India’s Struggle With Social Issues in Arundhati Roy’s The Ministry of Utmost Happiness :

When Anjum boarded the train to Ajmer to visit the Dargah; another incident of violence broke out with the burning of a train in Gujarat: “A railway coach had been set on fire by what the newspapers first called „miscreants‟. Sixty Hindu pilgrims were burned alive. They were on their way home from a trip to Ayodhya where they had carried ceremonial bricks to lay in the foundations of a grand Hindu temple they wanted to construct at the site where an old mosque once stood.” (MUH 44)

This terrorist attack was thought to have been carried out by Pakistani terrorists, thus police detained hundreds of Muslims in the name of Pakistani terrorists. Gujarat's then-chief minister,

“...appeared on TV in a saffron kurta with a slash of vermillion on his forehead, and with cold, dead eyes ordered that the burnt bodies of the Hindu pilgrims be brought to Ahmadabad, the capital of the state, where they were to put on display for the general public to pay their respect” (MUH 45).

As the killings continued for several weeks around the country, the act of violence elicited even more violent replies…

“The mobs were armed with swords and tridents and wore saffron headbands. They had cadastral lists of Muslim homes, businesses and shops. TAhey had stockpiles of gas cylinders...the police were often part of the mobs, and once the mobs had finished their business, the corpses no longer resembled corpses” (MUH 45).

With the country in turmoil, Anjum was also gone and had lost communication with anyone. Later, a figure named Mansoor discovered Anjum in a male refugee camp and returned her to Khwabgah. This experience dramatically altered Anjum's personality; instead of being a joyful person, she became a very quiet and sorrowful person. Anjum used to communicate to Zakir mian, whom she lost during the riots, after she moved to the graveyard. She would recount the saffron army's heinous comments that “Mussalman ka ek hi sthan! Qabristan ya Pakistan!” (MUH 62).) These statements were terrifying, and they haunted Anjum for the rest of her life. With the events of India, where humanity were slain and mercilessly tortured for their existence, Roy went on to a new India, where he saw an elderly man standing up to the corrupt India.

“He had something for everyone. He electrified Hindu chauvinists...with their controversial old war cry, Vande Matram!...When some Muslims got upset, the committee arranged a visit from a Muslim Film star from Bombay who sat on the dais next to the old man...wearing a Muslim prayer cap...to underline the message of Unity in Diversity”(MUH 103).

To appease Dalit rage, he would take water from a Dalit's daughter's hands, and for military moralists, he would demand that terrorists be executed. He was the one who was attempting to occupy a place in everyone's heart by uniting everyone against corruption under one roof. He went too far for the nationalists, uttering phrases such as:

 “Doodh maangogey to kheer denge! Kashmir maangogey to chiir denge!” (MUH 103)

Soon, the country was united in its opposition to the corrupt regime, with several rallies and protests taking place in the nation's capital. Anjum, Saddam, and Ustad Hameed also attended one of the Jantar Mantar protests to see the "Second Struggle for Freedom." Everyone was stepping up to share their storey of hardship and tragedy. The Association of Mothers who have lost sons in Kashmir's liberation struggle has presented a banner that reads:

“The story of Kashmir

DEAD = 68,000

DISAPPEARED = 10,000

Is this Democracy or Demon Crazy?”

No TV camera pointed at that banner, not even by mistake. Most of those engaged in India‟s Second Freedom Struggle felt nothing less than outrage at the idea of freedom for Kashmir and Kashmiri women‟s audacity” (MUH 115)

Roy has clearly revealed the underlying goals of those so-called revolutionary events, since nothing came of those rallies and marches. It all appeared to be a sponsored performance since the victims stayed victims and no one save the political readers profited from the scenario. None of the concerns were fixed, and Roy made certain that her fictionalisation of reality depicted the terrible realities of today's India. The Mothers' Association was extremely dissatisfied, and they were intimidated and labelled as Muslim terrorists. Roy had always been quite honest and forthright about the difficulties that needed to be acknowledged and handled. It took her 20 years to complete this exquisite work of fiction It took her 20 hard years to write this exquisite piece of fiction, but she made certain that those 20 years were present in her book. She set her work in modern-day India, yet she dealt with so many issues that had brought India to its current situation.

The center is referred to as duniya in this novel (world). The word duniya, according to Anjum, a transwoman from the walled city of Shahjahanabad in ancient Delhi, alludes to the outer world where individuals with identity and gender exist. This outside world has no place for persons like Anjum, who belongs to the third gender, also known as hijra in India. Her mother, Jahanara Begum, and father, Hakim Mulaqat Ali, gave her the name Aftab. They had hoped for a son, but Jahanara Begum was taken aback by the birth of a hermaphrodite. She kept her kid's gender a secret from her spouse for a long time and quietly grieved the fact that her infant lacked a gender.Children mocked Aftab for his effeminate demeanour, and his father was also hostile to him. The narrator discusses Aftab's mother's predicament:

“In Urdu, the only language she knew, all things, not just living things but all

things – carpets, clothes, books, pens, musical instruments – had a gender. Everything was either masculine or feminine, man or woman. Everything except her

baby. Yes of course she knew there was a word for those like him – Hijra. Two

words actually, Hijra and Kinnar. But two words do not make a language.”

(TMUH, 8)

Aftab had been captivated as a kid by the beauty and vibrancy of a hijra named Bombay Silk, whom Aftab had followed till he arrived at the gates of the Khwabgah. Khwabgah housed a varied population of transsexual people. This was a haven for the damaged and destitute who were shunned by society outside the Khwabgah. When the outer world became intolerable, Aftab fled to the Khwabgah - the House of Dreams – from his parental home.

Aftab was unable to handle the biochemical alterations that were occurring in his body: “His body had suddenly begun to wage war on him” (23-24).Anjum's storey takes a drastic turn when she decides to leave the Khwabgah with her adoptive daughter, Zainab. The villagers of Khwabgah were shocked by her decision because she had nowhere to go. "Now she wanted to return to the Duniya and live like an average person.The question was, "Are such goals on the part of someone like her realistic or unreasonable?" (29-30).

Conclusion :

After concluding we find that The presence of the unconsoled is overpowering at The Ministry of Utmost Happiness. Every heartbreaking incident in the storey leads to the unconsoled and suffering characters.Their predicament jolts the strong and privileged's numbed conscience.The unconsoled are those who bear the brunt of environmental degradation, whose agony is an unavoidable byproduct of socio-political turmoil and state-sponsored violence in the form of the infamous Gujarat riots, Kashmir insurgency, communal fanaticism, cow vigilantism, farmer displacement, and the Maoist struggle.This work is less of a storey and more of an offering to mankind, an offering to comprehend reality, an offering to recognise where we stand now, and, most importantly, an offering to empathise. With the novel's final lines, Roy provided us a ray of optimism that, while today may not be what we expected, tomorrow would undoubtedly have something for everyone of us. Arundhati wrote: 

“...Guih Kyom the dung beetle. He was wide awake and on duty, lying on his back with his legs in the air to save the world in case the heavens fell. But even he knew that things would turn out all right in the end. They would, because they had to.” (MUH 438).

Work Cited :

• Clark, Alex. “The Ministry of Utmost Happiness: A Patchwork of Narratives.” Rev. of The Ministry of Utmost Happiness, by Arundhati Roy. The Guardian, 11 June 2017.<http:www.theguardian.com/books/2017/jun/11/ministry-utmost-happinessarundhati-roy-review/>

• Mohsin, Syed & Taskeen, Ms. Environmental Concerns in Arundhati Roy’s The Ministry of Utmost Happiness: A Critical Study.2017.  Vol.8. 78-87.

• Roy, Arundhati. The Ministry of Utmost Happiness. India: Penguin Random House, 2017. Print.