"Vivid Evocation of Crippling Affliction in Indra Sinha's Animal's People - A Voice-over Sensitivity and Specificity"

Dr. Renuka Desai

Evocation, Crippling, Affliction, Voice-over, Sensitivity, Specificity

With a difference in expression, mode and medium of connotation and stringed directive intonation language is one of the strongest means of communication between all the organisms in the universe. Progress and progression of language and its artistic horizon expanded with the growth of civilization. The grammatically skilled, scientifically balanced and universally acceptable narrative techniques adopted by the writers of ancient, medieval and modern times played contextually purposive role and influenced the world of knowledge and wisdom since the ages. The crippling afflicted bodies or 'bio-psycho-physically: the other' characters are portrayed in almost all fiction and non-fiction literature with a pre-notioned and prejudiced dimension and projected them as a symbol of wickedness, villain, criminals, product of sin, representatives of devils and demons and ugly negative energy. This statement is harsh to digest but it is the ground reality of the ill fated marginalized bodily subalterns. On the contrary there are many rational thinkers, social reformers, revolutionist, social doctors who have put hard efforts to expose the extremity of the pathetic, miserable and horrible life lead by the persons with disabilities. Indra Sinha, the most creative humanist strived hard to pave the path and throw light on the burning issue and sufferings of disable persons especially the disaster hit victims and their offspring of post disaster Bhopal gas tragedy. An epistolary magical novel Animal's People is known for its unique style of narration which indirectly reflects the long term, ghostly aftermath effects of Bhopal gas disaster. The main character in the novel, an unreliable narrator Animal, through his recorded narrations sensibly voiced over the specificity of bio-psycho-physical status of crippled affliction duly evocating the miserable conditions of the victims of disastrous environmental imbalances and ugly faces of capitalistic attitude of the dominants over the marginalized disables. Indra Sinha wisely and consciously adopted innovative narrative techniques and strategies to focalize the voices of the voiceless, symbolized the vulnerable state of disabled bodies with reference to contextual scenario of post disaster global socio-economic and political stands. The author in his eco-critics, plotted the peculiar characters like Animal (Jaanvar), Zafar, Elli Barber, Ma Franci, Nisha, Somraj, Farouq, The Kampani, Chunaram, Anjali and Zahreel Kahn and the strategies adopted to symbolize each character with an intension to expose the human complexities of inter and intra personal relations with corresponding socio-economic-political stimuli.

Volume 13 Issue 9, September-2025

Pages : c346-c357