TRAUMA OF DISPLACEMENT: A STUDY OF SELECTED CONTEMPORARY ASSAMESE NOVELS A THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE AWARD OF THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY BY RATAN DEKA ROLL NO. 11614115 DEPARTMENT OF HUMANITIES AND SOCIAL SCIENCES INDIAN INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY GUWAHATI GUWAHATI, INDIA March 2018 TH-2152_11614115 Indian Institute of Technology Guwahati Department of Humanities and Social Sciences Guwahati 781039 Assam, India DECLARATION I do hereby declare that the thesis entitled “Trauma of Displacement: A Study Of Selected Contemporary Assamese Novels” is the result of investigation carried out by me at the Department of Humanities and Social Sciences, Indian Institute of Technology Guwahati, under the supervision of Dr. Liza Das. The work has not been submitted either in whole or in part to any other university / institution for research degree. (Ratan Deka) IIT Guwahati TH-2152_11614115 Indian Institute of Technology Guwahati Department of Humanities and Social Sciences Guwahati 781039 Assam, India CERTIFICATE This is to certify that Mr. Ratan Deka has prepared the thesis entitled “Trauma of Displacement: A Study of Selected Contemporary Assamese Novels” for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy at the Indian Institute of Technology Guwahati. The work was carried out under my general supervision and in strict conformity with the rules laid down for the purpose. It is the result of his investigation and has not been submitted either in whole or in part to any other university / institution for a research degree. (Liza Das) Supervisor, IIT Guwahati TH-2152_11614115 Uddastu1 M. Kamaluddin Ahmed Driven away from their land, These red-ants from a distance, Odds and ends upon their heads Soaked in the throbbing Of their brains. Is one of them tainted With blood dropping from their hearts? Those displaced people, I could never meet them. If I did I would have measured their fieriness Which rages more - The temperature in the brain, or The warmth in the heart? We too keep moving Along a railway track The nomads along the other - We never meet one another. The dust on our hair Glitters with distant twinkling stars And their epic life - is it drawn On the dust of their heels? 1 Translated from M. Kamaluddin Ahmed’s poem “Uddastu” in Assamese published in Prakash, April 2016. In Assamese “Uddastu” means displaced people. TH-2152_11614115 Contents Page Preface and Acknowledgments i Chapter I Introduction: Assamese Novels and Trauma Studies 1 Chapter II Trauma, Displacement and Labour in Chenabar Sont 50 Chapter III Jangam: The Flight of the Displaced 82 Chapter IV Trauma, Displacement and Community Formation in Ejak Manuh Ekhan Aranya 118 Chapter V A Sense of Return: Trauma and Memory in Makam 159 Chapter VI Conclusion: The Dark Holds Terror 196 Selected Bibliography 212 TH-2152_11614115 Preface and Acknowledgements When Assamese writer Rita Choudhury’s novel Makam was published in the year 2010, it received huge media publicity for its theme and the way it was written. I got hold of the novel and read it several times over a period of some days. It generated such an intense feeling in me that I started looking for similar novels in the Assamese language that treated forced removal or displacement of people from their place of living. This search for the novel with similar thematic concerns introduced me to Mamoni Raisom Goswami’s Chenabar Sont, Debendranath Acharyya’s Jangam, Umakanta Sarma’s Ejak Manuh Ekhon Aranya and Arupa Patongia Kalita’s Felani. These quests encouraged me to undertake further exploration of the similarities of matter and form among these writers. But no critical studies or books, either in English or Assamese, was available to help me in this regard. Thus an idea to go for further research in this area took shape, and I approached a few of my teachers and friends how to proceed with my exploration. During our initial discussions and conversations, the possibility of applying trauma theory to the representation of displacement in Assamese novel emerged. It has been an unexplored area in Assamese literature in terms of research and publication. My initial research revealed that this area is intricately related to other areas like memory studies, psychology, politics and sociology, that isolation is both impossible and undesirable. Although trauma theory has not been applied to the study of the Assamese novel till date, my humble intervention may become useful to those who choose to tread a new path and see Assamese literature from a new i TH-2152_11614115 perspective in future. But this limitation of the study has excluded Felani from my framework of research, narrowing its focus on the other novelists mentioned above. At the very outset, I would like to express my sincere gratitude and thanks to my supervisor Professor Liza Das for her guidance and immeasurable support during the research. It is because of her insights and efforts that the whole idea of this research took definite shape during the coursework as part of PhD research at the Department of Humanities and Social Sciences at IIT Guwahati. I am greatly indebted to the Doctoral Committee members including Retd. Prof. Krishna Barua (for the first three years), Dr. Pahi Saikia, Dr. Priyankoo Sarma and Dr. Debapriya Basu for their valuable inputs to my research work. I am also thankful to Dr. Avishek Parui who helped me with reading material and interesting ideas on my topic. The enthusiasm shown by the entire team inspired me to complete my research on time. They did not allow me off the track even for a single moment. I would also like to thank Dr. Mrinal Kanti Dutta for his inspiration and interest in my work. I must acknowledge the help and service that I received from the Librarian and the staff of Lakshminath Bezbaroa Library, IIT Guwahati, Central Library, University of Hyderabad, KK Handique Library, Gauhati University, Dr. B. R. Ambedkar Central Library, JNU, New Delhi and Dr. Trailokyanath Goswami Library, Nalbari College, Nalbari. I recall with gratitude and respect the unflinching support extended to me by Dr. Amar Kr. Nayak, Associate Professor in English, Nalbari College, Nalbari, Assam and my teacher throughout. A number of ideas of this thesis were generated during the course of numerous discussions with Dr. Nayak. I carried out this research while also working as a faculty at the Department of English, Nalbari College. So, I take immense pleasure in ii TH-2152_11614115 expressing my thankfulness to my teachers and colleagues at the department for allowing me the time, space and co-operation I needed. I take this opportunity to express my thankfulness and sincere gratitude to my respected parents - Joychandra Deka and Bhanumati Deka who always had keen interest in my work. I acknowledge the unstrained support provided by my affectionate wife Minakshi Bhattacharyya during my work. Among others, Bhabesh Deka (brother), Mamoni Deka (brother-in-law) and Kaushik and Shubham (my nephews) deserve special mention for bearing with my moods and whims all along. And for all my friends and well wishers, the wait is going to be over soon. (Ratan Deka) IIT Guwahati. March 2018 iii TH-2152_11614115 Chapter I Introduction: Assamese Novels and Trauma Studies The ordinary response to atrocities is to banish them from consciousness. Certain violations of the social compact are too terrible to utter aloud: this is the meaning of the word unspeakable. Judith Lewis Herman Geographically the state of Assam is situated in a sensitive zone. It is touched by an international boundary from more than one side. Human displacement to and fro Assam is a much-discussed problem across the political and academic disciplines of the region. Internal displacement as well as illegal influx from bordering countries to Assam have irreversibly changed the demographic pattern of the state. Unlike the voluntary movement of people from one place to the other, forced displacement leads to multiple complexities which are dehumanizing most of the time. The phenomenon of the trauma of displacement is sought to be studied here against a backdrop of several long histories of movements brought about by trading activities, exile and migrations through its representation in selected Assamese fiction of the post-Independence period. Informally, displacement can denote several phenomenons. Its most typical meaning is “removal of a thing from its place; putting out of place; shifting, dislocation” as given by Oxford English Dictionary (Hornby 442). It is in this sense that displacement is used to describe exiled persons. It can also connote “replacement or relocation” (see Basch et al). But like the word repression, Freud uses ‘displacement’ as a psychological term when, as Judith Herman notes, he chooses it “to designate the dream-process that diverts the attention of the psyche away from potentially damaging material.” Thus it is accepted that fears and forbidden desires are “masked by their association with relatively trifling symbols, objects or situations.” If used in a psychological sense then displacement may refer to “the transfer of feelings or behavior from their original object to another person or thing” (16). If we consider the praxis of the 1 TH-2152_11614115 term in the theoretical realm we will find that “displaced” is the word Freud used to describe misdirected feelings, and that laymen use to describe anything in any way out of place. So, the term displacement has both physical as well as psychological connotations. Internal displacement can happen owing to multiple factors. Internally displaced are defined as “persons or groups of persons who have been forced or obliged to flee or to leave their homes or places of habitual residence, in particular as a result of or in order to avoid the effects of armed conflicts, situations of generalized violence, violations of human rights or natural or human-made disasters, and who have not crossed an internationally recognized state border” (UN Office document).