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Victimization As A Dominant Theme in The Playsilence The Court Is in Session by Vijay Tendulkar
Victimization As A Dominant Theme in The Playsilence The Court Is in Session by Vijay Tendulkar
ISSN No:-2456-2165
Vijay Tendulkar has been one of the most renowned as towards those who disown the responsibility of being a father
well as controversial playwrights of India. Vijay Tendulkar to her baby. She is not aware of the reality around her and
was a leading Indian playwright, movie and television writer, remains always unaware of the indifference shown to her by
literary essayist, political journalist, and social commentator. many. Inspite of understanding, comprehending and
He mostly writes in Marathi language. Vijay Tendulkar can be protesting against the cruel nature and attitude of the
acknowledged as the precursor of modern Indian drama. His dominating male world, she dreams, almost romantically.
contribution is marvelous and bulky in the development of
modern dramatic sensibility. His plays were translated in Benare’s position is similar to that of Rama in Vultures,
English as well as more than ten international languages. His who becomes miserable for being the daughter-in-law of a
plays were performed internationally in different languages. degraded family having people with Vulture-like qualities.
Binder also exposes women in the same deprived and denied
Vijay Tendulkar’s play ‘Shantata! Court ChaluAhe’ existence with all helplessness and hopelessness in their
(‘Silence! The Court is in Session’) was performed for the first reverie. Like Benare and Rama, Laxmi appears meek and
time in 1967 and became his finest work. It is inspired by a docile in the end of the play, she incites wrath in Sakharam’s
short story 'Die Panne' (Traps) by Friedrich Durrenmatt. mind and attitude, which makes him to kill Champa. After
SatyadevDubey in 1971, made a film based on ‘Shantata Champa’s murder Sakharam becomes totally a helpless man
Court Chalu Ahe’ for which Vijay Tendulkar wrote his first as he becomes totally a non-entity-wreck less and remorseless.
screenplay. In 1970 Tendulkar`s play ‘Silence! The Court is in Laxmi takes the full advantage of her life and she
Session’ gets the Kamala devi Chattopadhyaya Award. With getsSakharam completely into her hold or grip and she
success of this play Tendulkar gets recognition on the national becomes a woman to tame him or cow him down according to
scale. her likes and wishes. Laxmi gets an ambition to extract power
and authority. She becomes totally an ambitious woman in
In Silence, Benare, a modern, educated and economically dominating men and matters according to her likes and
independent woman is capable of carrying out her dislikes, whims and fancies. Champa’s character, on the other
responsibility but her co-actors fail to appreciate her. She is hand, exhibits women’s torture at different levels – physically,
punished severely for the crime that she has not committed. verbally, sexually, emotionally, and mentally. She suffers at
Her soliloquy which occurs in the end of the play not only the hands of her mother, her husband, her male-companion
reveals her mind but also the mindset of the hypocritical and and at the end of the play at her female-companion, Laxmi,
sheepish quality of an Indian society which is dominated by too. But both Champa and Laxmi share their suffering
the male dominance and arrogance. She becomes an speechlessly in a muted form. Both of them experience the
exemplary figure of women in an Indian society whose voice violation of their privacy and body. The substantial change
has been castrated, stifled and muted. In the soliloquy, Benare that has been effected on them generates violation of their
wants to expose and express her innermost thought about body and makes them to be slaves and social victims.
herself and about the world around her. But she fails to
understand that everyone around her does not want to listen to Tendulkar’s plays present the life of women in all its
her or to take care of her mind and longing but wants to satisfy ugliness and complexities bordering on socio-political issues,
their sexual urges by having sex with her. So, in the play, psychological maladjustments and sexual abuses. The tragedy
Benare’s mind and thoughts are not vocalized but her body is of a modern woman, exile in power and sexual politics, greed
vulgarised and corrupted. She becomes a mute woman- for money and fame, man-woman relationship, and
speechless and voiceless. psychological depressions on the psyche of a woman become
major thematic concerns of Tendulkar’s plays.Tendulkar
Benare embodies and exemplifies love, innocence and throws light on the relationship within and outside the family.
sincerity. Although life offers her nothing but a grief and In plays like Vultures, Kamala, and Kanyadan, he thoroughly
sadness, she is optimistic and has a positive view of and scrutinizes and explains the blood relationship of people on
attitude to life. She loves everything around her, which she is different levels. In Plays like Silence!, Vultures, Binder,
in possession of – her profession, her baby, her pupils and her Kamala, and Kanyadan, it is through the portrayal of women
male-companions without expecting anything in return from characters in these plays, Tendulkar exposes the vices and
them. She has no personal grudge against men, who have wickedness of the society. Women are often projected as
exploited, cheated and abused her physically, sexually as well exploited and losers. In an interview with Satya Saran and
as mentally and bring her life into disaster. She has no hatred Vimal Patil, Tendulkar admits:
I haven‘t hurt anyone. Anyone at all! If I‘ve hurt The roles Tendulkar’s female protagonists play eclipse
anybody, it’s been myself. But is that any kind of reason for those played by the men figuring in them. LeelaBenare plays
throwing me out? Who are these people to say what can or the leading role in Silence!.Benare, who is on the offensive in
can’t do? My life is my own. I haven‘t sold it off to anyone for the beginning, finds herself trapped at the close of the
a job! My will is my own. My wishes are my own. No one can play.Benare falls as a victim to the false male ego of
kill those. No one! I’ll do what I like with myself and my life! superiority. While she is bold, self-relevant, successful
I’ll decide [...] (58) working lady, having her individuality, her friends Kashikar,
Sukhatme, Karnik, Ponkshe, Mrs. Kashikar, the so called
It is this spirit of individualism Benare that leads her to gentry of the society, are failures. So to cover up their
take a bold step of getting pregnant with the man she loves; frustration, they perpetuate violence against her by making her
Professor Damle, though he develops cold feet later on and accused of infanticide in a mock trial. They dissect her private
refuses to give his name to her child. She frantically tries to life by making stories of her illegitimate affairs in the name of
persuade several people to marry her; so that the child can game. She grows conscious of it and cries out.
have a legal name. The game played by the participants in the
form of the mock court-trial represents the violent and In Silence!the mock-trial becomes an important one in
merciless way in which the dominant establishment deals with exposing the victimization of a woman by the male dominated
BIBLIOGRAPHY
PrimarySources
Tendulkar, Vijay. Five Plays. Bombay: Oxford University
Press, 1992. Print.
SecondarySources
Saran ,Satya and VimalPatil. “An Interview with Vijay
Tendulkar.”Femina. (June, 8 – 22,1984): 37. Print.