question_answer

Read these two poems by Dalit writers. Why do you think the poster is titled "Hidden Apartheid".                                                                        [NCERT]

APARTHEID

One day someone dug up a twentieth century city

And ends on this observation.

Here's an interesting inscription:

'This water tap is open to all castes and religions'.

What could it have meant:

That this society was divided?

That some were high while others were low?

Well, all right, then this city deserved burying.

Why did they call it the machine age?

Seems like the Stone Age in the twentieth century.

- Daya Pawar

'Mother'

Dark, dark slender body...........this was my mother.

Drudged in the woods for sticks from morning on.

All we brothers, sitting, waiting, watching for her.

And if she didn't sell the wood, all of us slept hungry.

- Waman Nimbalkar

 

Answer:

The poster is titled "Hidden Apartheid" because in both the poems the practice Apartheid is not clearly expressed but the suffering and means of Apartheid are shown through poem. Like:

In the first poem the line "This water tap is open to all castes and religions" shows tin there was "discrimination in the society" but not openly expressed. Same way in the second poem poet wrote about the 'hunger' which signifies that there was "economic inequality" in society.