2023, Vol. 5, Issue 2, Part A

This abstract discusses the emergence of Dalit literature in India in the mid-twentieth century, focusing on Marathi writer Baburao Bagul's role in this literary movement. It begins by examining the historical context of Indian literature, which largely ignored or invisibilized the representation of Dalits and lower castes due to preoccupation with anti-colonial consciousness. Bagul's works can be understood as a subversion of the predominant Brahmanical literature, which was viewed as the literature of the upper-caste Brahmin population, and an attempt to give voice to the voiceless in society. The abstract also discusses the origins of the Dalit literary movements and the pivotal role of B.R. Ambedkar's framework of equality and justice in encouraging the Dalit youths of the 1950s to pursue higher education and engage with literary production. The emergence of Dalit literature in the 1960s provided a space for Dalit characters to exercise agency and autonomy within literary texts, with characters often speaking in the common parlance of their own communities and rejecting Brahmanical and Sanskritic paradigms.