Soma Mondal, Assistant Professor, Department of English, Gobardanga Hindu College
Abstract
The Portrayal of woman is widely presented throughout the epics, poems and dramas in Sanskrit literature. Kalidas wrote his works to satisfy the interest of specific audiences and readers which points to the absence of innocence in the narration. The general characteristics of the women in the play were their compassion and generosity, their persistence and patience spirit, love, faithfulness, loyalty and the desire for happiness which are considered as” the golden rule”.
The term feminism has an antiquity in English accompanying by means of females’ crusading from the late 19th era to the present-day, the issue stands advantageous towards extricate equalist concepts or else opinions as of equalist politically aware activities, aimed at even in epochs somewhere around has been not any substantial politically aware engagement about females’ subservience, individuals have been worried with and conjectured about righteousness intended for womenfolk. Feminism inclines towards climax the subjugation of females besides their situation in a man overriding the social order. Female Activists contend that womanhood remain deprived of rights of freedom, equivalence, and choice production. They stand preserved as substandard and reliant on men. Female stays not permissible to increase her ability to speak. If she increases her power of speech, it is at that moment muzzled through the social order. Female remains anticipated to track the customs and accomplish the belief of the world. Or else, she stands grimaced and entitled a lawbreaker. In patriarchal culture it is the woman who is envisioned to be the conserver and transporter of culture and tradition; the defender of uprightness and pride. Her accepted predispositions and requirements are forfeited and her eccentricity compressed in order to endure the codes of tradition and culture that predicaments her life and individuality within the restrictions of ethics and family integrity. Women distinctiveness has always been an illustration of culture. Any change in the distinctiveness of women reflects the cultural change. This is true in any realm round the globe and is everlasting and yet progressive. The role played by women is measured to be very significant since the emergence of civilization. Recently, Globalization has given a great improvement to the position of women. They are contending and at times challenging the man. Earlier fragmentation, modernization had also brought outrageous transformation in the culture. Women went to work which gave them incredible economic, political and societal liberation. The place woman inhabits in the society is insightful of the culture predominant in the society and transpires to be an indicator of the boldness and the degree of patriarchy prevailing in the society at a specific point of time. Every single literary writer, poet or critic presents his origins and concepts in numerous shades and colors that would go with the mood with the taste of the society. They do a delightful demonstration of voicing the culture through the voice of their characters. Beginning from Rishi Vyas later Kalidas, Jhumpa Lahiri, Bharati Mukherjee, Shobha De, Arundhati Roy have been successful in projecting the societal attitude and responsiveness towards feminine gender through their literary effort. Shakuntala is one such character in Abhijnana Shakuntalam. Shakuntala as an attractive maiden. She has congenital this beauty from her fairy mother Menka. King Dushyanta falls in love with her at the very first vision. Her divine beauty makes him incapable to control his desires. He admires her beauty in the words that: King: It is as it should be. To beauty such as this No women could give birth; The quivering lightning flash Is not a child of earth. (13) Kalidasa has presented Shakuntala as a duty-bound descendant and as well conscious of social exclusions. She loves her family and takes care of her parents’ integrity. However, she loves Dushyanta and gives herself to him, yet she does not go with him in the absence of her parents. She is represented as an emblematic Indian woman. She is courageous as well as shy at the same time. She attempts to come close to the king but does not expose her emotional state. She is so nervous that she cannot look straight into Dushyanta’s eyes. He designates her position: King: Although she doesn’t speak to me, she listens while I speak; Her eyes turn not to see my face, yet nothing else they seek. (15) Shakuntala is illustrative of women’s condition in male-controlled Indian civilization. In patriarchal Indian culture women have been preserved as men’s subsidiary. However, they have been addressed as supernatural being all the time but at the equivalent time they have been put beneath control of man made guidelines and principles. Shakuntala’s father presents her to the king as if she is an entity. Moreover, he teaches her that: Kanva: Obey your elders; and be very kind To rivals; never be perversely blind And angry with your husband, even though he Should prove less faithful than a man might be; Be as courteous to servants as you may, Not puffed with pride in this your happy day: Thus does a maiden grow into a wife; But self-willed women are the curse of life. (48) Shakuntala, virtually all the times remains in a submissive protagonist. When the king Dushyanta repudiates identifying her, she wishes to go back to her parents’ hermitage. But Gautami and Sharngarava disagrees taking her back with them. They ask Shakuntala: Sharngarava: If you deserve such scorn and blame, what will your father with your shame?
But if you know your vows are pure, Obey your husband and endure. (60) She is left behind at the compassion of her spouse. It obviously demonstrates the subsidiary situation of a woman in Indian society. However, to whatever extent Shakuntala may be defenseless but she has a durable sense of self-esteem. When the king discards her and blames her as “intuitive cunning of the womanhood”, she gets dreadfully annoyed and retorts saying: Shakuntala: Wretch! You judge all this by your own false heart. Would any other man do what you have done? To hide behind virtue, like a yawning well covered over with grass! (59) Dushyanta gets disconcerted and influenced by her responses and says “her anger seems to be unfeigned.” She takes upon herself the accountability of attitude and nurture her child who is prophesied to be the king of the terrain. With her head held high, she leaves the palace to be rushed by a spiritual light. Thus, Kalidasa has represented Shakuntala in accurate Indian essence. In spite of her self-respect, she is not so much established in her uniqueness. Throughout the play she is celebrated in terms of her exquisiteness and responsibility. She loves Dushyanta from very beginning. Even after he discards her, she leaves the palace instead of fighting for her right. Moreover, when he reclaims his remembrance and comes to her, she agrees to take him without any grievance. Shakuntala, thus, be suitable for the image of a traditional and perfect Indian woman.
Kalidas is prejudiced while characterizing the hero and heroine of this epic. Even the birth of Shakuntala is the result of Menaka’s intriguing seduction to the sage who was in deep penance. The Gods were horrified from the growing powers from his intense meditation and thus they sent a nymph, Menaka, to disrupt his expiation. The sage could not control himself seeing the enticing Menaka and their union gave birth to Shakuntala. Spivak (2010, p. 52) argues: Women in India are subalterns since ages. The goddesses in Hindu religion are brutally suppressed which paved way for the colonization of ordinary women of the nation. “Imperialism’s (or globalization’s) image as the establisher of good society is marked by the espousal of the woman as object of protection from her own kind” The women even during the God’s time were used only as the seductive force. Not only this, Menaka was obliged to return to heaven once Gods’ purpose was satisfied, leaving behind her child with Vishwamitra (Shakuntala’s biological father). Shakuntala was raised by her foster father, Kanva, the great sage without motherly love. She could be brought up in wealthy privileged family if her real parents stayed together. She had to spend her childhood and youth in the hermitage surrounded by the forest. She did not have her own rights to act as she followed every order of Kanva to act according wise. Vrinda Narayan (2008) argues: In the Hindu religion, there has been partial success in terms of gender equality reform laws and family law. While this is a major advancement relative to other religions in India, it is still not a complete triumph in terms of feminism and relieving “oppression.” However, she followed her heart, in the absence of Kanva, to love and marry Dusyanta that turned to be catastrophic. Despite being the daughter of a nymph, she lives as a commoner because Menaka could not dare to deny Gods’ decision.Dusyanta was another patriarch who had sheer control over Shakuntala. She fell in his love despite knowing his reality because his machination trapped her blindly. Despite knowing who Dusyanta was in real, Shakuntala crazily started loving him. Dusyanta, not the sacred love, was tempted highly by the beauty and slender physicality of Shakuntala. As per etymology, the word Shakuntala is formed with the union of two- i.e. Shakunta; the bird and la; nourishment (Khanal, 2021, p. 91. Kalidas is conveying that true definition of beauty is Shakuntala. He even imagines of their physical proximity. Therefore, even before marriage, Shakuntala was impregnated. Generally, all woman characters appear at the marriageable age as wives or loved ones. But the commonality in most of the female characters in the works of Kalidasa is the benevolence and mercifulness, the persistence and patience, the desire for happy love (Khanal, 2021, p. 88). Although, Dusyanta disclosed his identity during marriage, Shakuntala surrendered herself to him despite recognizing his identity. Both of them were full of sexual appetite but Dusyanta was openly frivolous and flirtatious to Shakuntala. As a woman, she was tamed to conceal her desire.
Shakuntala reaches to the king’s palace at Hastinapur. The king, Dusyanta, denies recognizing her. Monona Wali says that, “This is the poignant moment where we feel Shakuntala’s pain – by denying paternity, the king has denied her any legitimacy in this very strict society.” Shakuntala’s effort to make him recognize her fails because she does not have that signet ring whereas king has forgotten everything of his past. It is all because Durvasas’s curse. It shows the negligence of Shakuntala to protect that ring. While bathing in Gangas, she lost the ring. However, she was solely oblivious of this. King Dusyanta even insults her for charging falsity to him. Thakur (2012, p. 461) explains that, “Religions, like Hinduism, call for women to be faithful servants to God and their husbands. They have a term called pativrata that describes a wife who has accepted service and devotion to her husband and her family as her ultimate religion and duty.” A bold argument of Spivak (1996, p. 248) truly substantiates this case: I will later place the mobilizing of woman into sati with the place of the epic instance of “heroism”- suicide in the name of “nation”; “martyrdom”- suicide in the name of “God”; and other species of self- “sacrifice.” These are the transcendental figurations of the (agent of the) gift of time. The feminist project is not simply to stage the woman as victim; but to ask: why does “husband” become an appropriate name for radical alterity? Why is “to be” equal “to be wife?” This may even lead to such questions as the contemporary equation “to be” with “to be gainfully employed.” The wife’s role is ever considered to be the slavery. Her purity is tasted whether she is virgin for the man but man’s character is never questioned even if he is promiscuous.
Although, Dusyanta gets ready to provide sepulchre to Shakuntala until she gives birth, Shakuntala’s epiphany of her own depreciation does not allow her to shelter in king’s palace. Menaka comes to help Shakuntala. She takes her to the hermitage of celestial sage, Kashyapa, where “the pregnant Shakuntala takes shelter” (Tiwari, 2011, p. 300). Regarding this, Utkarsh (2024) views: This book compares Shakuntala to today’s modern-day woman and wife. A woman who is independent, assertive, courageous and yet endowed with tenderness, the capability of great love and the ability to take risks as well as give up oneself unreservedly, and a wife who insisted on equality and respect from her man; who reminded her husband of his duty towards her; who told him what honour is and what an honourable man should do. Dusyanta’s denial somehow parallels with Ram’s rejection to accept Sita in Ramayana. As the epitome of female virtue, Sita’s presence in the epic paradoxically serves to reinforce her absence (Paul et.al., 2022, p. 7). Kalidas has partial presentation for Shakuntala’s wrestle of her self development and nurturing her son. Indian literary representation shows the woman only as the astray. Shakuntala births to the son who is depicted as more powerful than her. She is circumscribed by the male’s hegemony. This proves that “even more unanimous than the rejection of discrimination against women by law is the rejection of the idea of the biological inferiority of women to men and condemnation of the subordination of women by men, particularly when it is violent” (Mackinnon, 2006, p. 10). Shakuntala cannot recognize Dushyanta at first, “It is not my husband. Who is the man that soils my boy with his caresses? The amulet should protect him” (Kalidas, 1999, p. 88). As Dushyanta spells, “My darling, the cruelty I showed you has to turned to happiness. Will you not recognize me?” (Kalidas, 1999, p. 88), Shakuntala’s emotions flow instantaneously due to the years of departure and she easily forgives him. Dushyanta immediately feels that Sarvadamana is his son by seeing his bravery and fearless nature. The boy is trying to tame a lion cub by dragging him and forcing him to open its mouth and count its teeth. Dushyanta after watching this scene says, “Why should my hearth go out to this boy as if he were my own son?” (Kalidas, 1999, p. 85). “The boy is seed of fire” (Kalidas, 1999, p. 85) as like him as Dushyanta means. Kalidas has not left a single space to confess that boys do have innate different aura of strength and audacity. Even after having the strong anticipation about the boy’s mother, Dushyanta asks, “What was the name of good king whose wife she was?” Thus, by looking at the nature and survival skills of boy, Dusyanta speculates that the boy might be born in the pious grove of father of gods. Although, some kind of intuition makes him to accept the boy as his son but still he is suspicious because lots of the women may have the same name. The doubt he showed to his pregnant wife years back is still rooted inside him. Collins (2000) argues that, “Those who have been colonized or have historically held less power offer a valuable “outsider” perspective that supports agency and resistance. As “outsiders,” women of color have typically developed an intimate knowledge of the dominant culture in order to develop coping and survival skills.” Although, Shakuntala raised Sarvadamana singly she is marginalized in every way. The bitter pain, isolation and brutal insult Shakuntala endures are placidly cornered.
Feminism is a complex notion that has vast differences in meaning and connotation for people spanning generations, ethnic identities, sexual orientations, social classes, nationality, and myriad identities. Feminism is not a static notion; rather it evolves with us throughout our lives and is shaped by the various lenses we use to view the world at large and, most importantly, ourselves (Hooks, 2000). Feminist literary criticism is the critical analysis of literary works based on the feminist perspective. In particular, feminist literary critics tend to reject the patriarchal norms of literature “that privileges masculine ways of thinking/points of view and marginalizes women politically, economically and psychologically,” according to Paul Ady, associate Professor of English at Assumption College in Worcester, Massachusetts. Instead, feminist critics approach literature in a way that empowers the female point-of-view instead, typically rejecting the patriarchal language that has dominated literature. (Award, 2017) Modern feminist literary criticism had its roots in the post- World War II feminist movement that spilled over into the intellectual circles of America’s Colleges and Universities. The true origins of movement can be traced as far back as the late 18th century with Mary Wollstonecraft’s “A Vindication of the Rights of Women” (1792). Other writers such as John Stuart Mill, Margaret Fuller and Simone De Beauvoir followed suit from the mid-19th century to the mid-20th century.
The term empowerment is widely used in the context of women development. It is a state of mind and attitude of an individual. Kalidasa has presented the theme connected with cultural and social norms being based on the high ideals of Hindu religion. Kalidasa’s motive was to depict that neglect of duty is punishable. However, Shakuntala is an empowered woman with her positive self- image and self- confidence and is able to keep up her dignity in the oppressive environment.
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