Dalit literature will bury Sanskrit under "yards of books", and in the next 20 to 30 years, English will emerge as the national language, according to Dalit activist Prof Kancha Ilaiah.
Inaugurating a national seminar on Dalit writing, organised by the Centre for Comparative Literature, University of Kerala, recently, Prof Ilaiah said Hinduism as a socio-religious force was going to die within the next hundred years and no force would be able to prevent that. Dalit literature alone could challenge the "Hinduised and Sanskritised" Indian literature, he said.
It was wrong to label Dalit literature as post-modern. All the acclaimed writings so far, save those of some authors, had dealt with semi-secular Hindu topics or essentially Hindu topics. All such writings were centred round the Vedas, the Upanishads and the Gita. Literature so far had been a process of Hinduisation of knowledge. Such literature also did not speak anything about civilisation.
Dalit literature was really post-Hindu literature, which sought to do away with Sanskrit symbolisms. This process was set in motion by Dr Ambedkar. Sanskrit was essentially a casteist language, anti-people and anti-production, he charged.
"The so-called reforms initiated by people such as Raja Ram Mohan Roy, including widow remarriage and movement against child marriage, were essentially Brahmanical reforms. Such issues were never issues before the common man, " he said.
The Vedas, the Upanishads and the Gita had not inspired nationalism in Indians. "In fact, the reading of a holy book was not part of the Hindu tradition. Christians read the Bible and Muslims the Koran. The number of people reading the Bible in India was on the rise. But I have not seen so many people reading the Gita. If there had been no Bible and Koran in India, the nation would not have got freedom. If there had been no English, India would not have been a nation," he said.
Dalit literature was basically also about women's emancipation. "Although Saraswati is the goddess of learning in the Hindu mythology, there is no record of Saraswati writing a book. Lakshmi, though she is the goddess of wealth, was in actual Hindu life very poor because women were not allowed to possess wealth. On the other hand, we have the writings of Sumangala and Amrapali in Buddhist tradition," he said. That tradition of socio-spiritual liberation was carried forward by people such as Ayyankali, Sree Narayana Guru and Mahatma Phule.
Today the Dalits in the country had reached a stage where they were no longer willing to fight for their cause with weapons. Now they were fighting through books. "For every trishul that the forces of Hinduism distribute, we will distribute 100 books to Dalit children. Dalit literature has the power to change the Indian social structure, but Indian society is yet to recognise that power," he added
