Hunger in Society: A study of Bhabani Bhattacharya’s so Many Hungers!

Abstract

The novels of Bhabani Bhattacharya mostly represent a realistic and humanistic view along with it contains the outlook of oriental v/s occidental life of human society. His vision of life is very positive. As a novelist he is seriously concerned with the plight of the poor peasants and destitude, the landless and the labourer, the out castes of the society who suffer a great deal simply because they are helpless and their fate is sealed in hands of the rich and influential class of the people. He draw our attention through the scenes of poverty and suffering of the poor people and the cruel and heartless attitude of the rich and affluent people who thwart the prospects of a happy life for the helpless and unfortunate poor, peasant. In the novel, Bhattacharya artistically deal with the hunger i.e. the journey of Rahoul’s and Kajoli’s family is the tour de force of self- realization and self-assertion symbolically, it is the revolt for gaining freedom by the educated middle class against the disorder caused by the British government by Rahoul who was aware that without gaining political freedom, exploitation of social importance. The author deals in detail with the social setting of the time, with his own style of objective treatment. The famine of 1943 brings so many hungers, the hunger for food, money, sex the exploitation of man by man seemed to him to have become the creed of the day. The prevailing social conditions also worked upon the growing mind of Bhattacharya and inspired him to create his first novel. The famine of 1943 which stalked through the scared soil of Bengal, was one of the events as he himself confesses.