Eco feminist Concerns in Select Poems of Kalyani Thakur Charal and Jupaka Subhadra

Abstract

In India, the repercussions of environmental degradation are firstly and mostly felt bythe indigent Dalit women. They are dependent on nature more than any other communities inthe Indian subcontinent since their daily lives demand such close interaction with nature andnatural resources. An ecofeminist reading shows that the women in the poems of KalyaniThakur Charal and JupakaSubhadra have explicit communion with the land, animals andnature. Being the „others' and the „oppressed', Dalit women might be able to better identifythemselves with nature in their shared ordeals. By uncovering the plight of the tyrannized,these poems herald critical actualities that are to be substantially addressed by the humanrace. As Vandana Shiva puts it; "We are either going to have a future where women lead theway to make peace with the Earth or we are not going to have a human future at all." Thepaper aims to understand the role of Dalit literature in conveying feminist and ecologicalissuesfrom a marginalised perspective.