question_answer 10)

Describe the ways in which the novels in India attempted to create a sense of Pan—Indian belonging.  

Answer:

(i) Many historical novels were about Marathas and the Rajputs which produced a sense of a pan—Indian belonging in Bengal. They imagined the nation to be full of adventure, heroism, romance and sacrifice—qualities that could not be found in (he offices and streets of the 19th Century world. The novel allowed the colonized to give a shape to their desires.   (ii) Bankim's Anandmath is a novel about a secret Hindu militia that fight Muslims to establish a Hindu kingdom. It was a novel that inspired many kinds of freedom fighters. (iii) Shivaji, the hero of the novel Anguriya Binimoy (1857) written by Budhadeb Mukhopadhyaya's (1827-94) engages in many battles against clever and treacherous Aurangzeb, what gives him courage and grit is his belief that he is a nationalist fighting for the freedom of Hindus. (iv) Imagining a heroic past was one way in which the novel helped in popularising the sense of belonging to a common nation. It was another way to include various classes in the novel so that they could be seen as belonging to a shared world. Premchand's novels, for instance, are filled with all kinds of powerful characters drawn from all levels of society.