Majya Jalmachi Chittarkatha is an autobiography of Shantabai Kamble

Shantabai Kamble

Shantabai Krushnaji Kamble is a Marathi writer and Dalit activist. She wrote first Dalit woman autobiography. She was from the community which economically and socially deprived class. But her family always built her moral, and gradually due to good educational assistance, she goes beyond the...

 published in 1983

1983 in literature

The year 1983 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*Ironweed by William Kennedy is published.*Salvage for the Saint by Peter Bloxsom and John Kruse is published. This is the final book in a series of novels, novellas and short stories featuring the Leslie Charteris...

. This is considered the first autobiographical narrative by a Dalit woman writer. This book shows the life of Indian woman who was from lower class of the caste.

Plot introduction

The autobiography

Autobiography

An autobiography is a book about the life of a person, written by that person.-Origin of the term:...

 Majya Jalmachi Chittarkatha by Dalit woman

Dalit

Dalit is a designation for a group of people traditionally regarded as Untouchable. Dalits are a mixed population, consisting of numerous castes from all over South Asia; they speak a variety of languages and practice a multitude of religions...

 writer Shantabai Kamble

Shantabai Kamble

Shantabai Krushnaji Kamble is a Marathi writer and Dalit activist. She wrote first Dalit woman autobiography. She was from the community which economically and socially deprived class. But her family always built her moral, and gradually due to good educational assistance, she goes beyond the...

, the protagonist

Protagonist

A protagonist is the main character of a literary, theatrical, cinematic, or musical narrative, around whom the events of the narrative's plot revolve and with whom the audience is intended to most identify...

 of the story, Naja, bears the brunt of class

Social class

Social classes are economic or cultural arrangements of groups in society. Class is an essential object of analysis for sociologists, political scientists, economists, anthropologists and social historians. In the social sciences, social class is often discussed in terms of 'social stratification'...

, caste

Caste

Caste is an elaborate and complex social system that combines elements of endogamy, occupation, culture, social class, tribal affiliation and political power. It should not be confused with race or social class, e.g. members of different castes in one society may belong to the same race, as in India...

 and gender. Naja is from the Mahar caste, one of the biggest Dalit communities

Dalit

Dalit is a designation for a group of people traditionally regarded as Untouchable. Dalits are a mixed population, consisting of numerous castes from all over South Asia; they speak a variety of languages and practice a multitude of religions...

 in Maharashtra

Maharashtra

Maharashtra is a state located in India. It is the second most populous after Uttar Pradesh and third largest state by area in India...

.

Najabai Sakharam Babar (renamed Shantabai Krishnaji Kamble after her marriage), was the first dalit woman teacher in Solapur district. she began teaching at the Solapur District Board School in 1942. Ten year, in 1952, she completed two years of teacher training and served as an educaion extension officer in the 'Jat' taluka of Sangli district.

She wrote Mazhya Jalmachi Chittarkatha ( The Kaleidoscopic Story of My Life) after she retire d from teaching in 1981. The autobiography was first serialised in Purva magazine in 1983 and was teleserialised as 'Najuka' on Mumbai Doordarshan in 1990. It has also been translated into French. The word Chittarkatha literally means a picture story but also indicates a sense of pieces of pictures being put together like a jigsaw puzzle.

Sources

• The Danger of Gender: Caste, Class and Gender in Contemporary Indian Women's Writing by Clara Nubile Published by Sarup & Sons, 2003