Hello Friends,
This blog is my response to the task assigned to us by our Prof. Dr. Dilip Sir in the thinking activity of the novel The Ministry of Utmost Happiness. So, read, understand and enjoy. Happy Learning!
Click here to view Prof. Dr.Dilip Sir's blog
1. Political Issues
In this novel, Roy has depicted various political issues that exist in contemporary society since Independence. These political issues are created by groups of powerful people involved in the various activities meant for the welfare of humanity but to gain some profits they compromise with their values and let the citizens suffer they do corrupt things. She tells the issues of Kashmir in which various groups are involved like the Indian army, Indian leftists who oppose the occupation of Kashmir, and the Kashmiri locals and militants who apparently resist the military occupation. All these groups on the surface show moral and religious ideals but in reality, they are the houses of corruption and for their own personal profit they exploit the common people and kill them in the name that they are terrorists.
The aim of the Indian Army and Indian officials is to let Kashmir get one with India as one country but they want the war to continue so that they can gain profits from it. But this costs the life of people, a threat in their lives which doesn't allow them to live peacefully. This is the worst thing of any group that can happen, they are meant to secure and safeguard people but they do the contrary things. They cheat people, they harass and kill people, they let the war continue so that their business of making money continues in the name of war. In such a scenario there can be no peace nor any progress but the nation can be said to be moving towards the degradation of human values and it affects all spheres of human lives.
Through her characters like Naga, Roy tells that he is a corrupt journalist and works for the government. He is the puppet of the government, to gain power, he will reveal the news only that government wants him to tell. This helps him to gain more power, promotions, and more profits. These are all the examples that are the outcome of capitalization. All want their personal benefits and so they compromise with the moral values and let others suffer for their own power and economic gain.
The plight of common people who suffer could be best expressed as in the below quote:
Musa glanced at the page in the notebook that faced the one in which Tilo had written the poem. It said:
"How
to
tell
a
shattered
story?
By
slowly
becoming
everybody.
No.
By slowly becoming everything."
2. Gender concerns in the novel
Gender concern is the major issue in one part of the novel. This is shown in the novel through the character Anjum.
"It doesn't matter. I'm all of them. I'm Romi and Juli, I'm Laila and Majnu. And Mujna, why not? Who says my name is Anjum? I'm not Anjum, I'm Anjuman. I'm a mehfil, I'm a gathering. Of everybody and nobody, of everything and nothing. Is there anyone else you would like to invite? Everyone's invited" (Roy)
This novel shows that transgender people are deprived of rights to live in the mainstream society, struggle while growing and being neglected by family or forced ideologies upon the child to follow some norms. The teasing by other children and so a child is forced to stay at home while other siblings go to school. Anjum here is a character who is loved and cared by her mother for a very long time. When Aftab sees from his balcony the Bombay Silk, he admires her way, her dress, and one day follows her till Khwabgah. This is how he then frequently visits the Khwabgah and one day goes there to live permanently. Here Aftab is transformed into Anjum and lives the life she had dreamt and which was not possible to live in Duniya.
The psychology of transgender people is very painful. They face duality in their mind and body. It is a female trapped in a male body or vice versa.
"But for us the price-rise and school-admissions and beating-husbands and cheating-wives are all inside us. The riot is inside us. The war is inside us. Indo-Pak is inside us. It will never settle down. It can't."
The war is of dual genders in one's body. There is a war of instincts of female voice and male voice, there is a clash of dual identities that has snatched away from their peace of mind.
The novel begins with the graveyard and ends in the graveyard. Anjum finds her happiness away from the mainstream world and stays in a graveyard, maybe the reason is that these identities are not allowed to live in society. They are deprived of their basic living human rights and so they have found another way which involves many struggles, pains, and difficulties in their survival.
When the municipal authorities warned her from living in the graveyard, she told them that she was not "living in the graveyard" but that she was "dying in it". Anjum's passage from "the world of dreams" to "paradise" was a response to the kind of fear that threatened her survival as species in the universe. (Danish Suleman & Dr. Faizahani Binti Ab Rehman)
3. Environmental concerns in the novel
In the preface of the novel, Arundhati Roy has shown special concern for the environment.
"The vultures died of diclofenac poisoning."
"Silver beards of saliva dripped from their beaks, and one by one they tumbled off their branches, dead.
Not many noticed the passing of the friendly old birds. There was so much else to look forward to."
In the above lines, Roy wants to tell that human beings for their own pleasure exploit the birds and animals. The diclofenac that is given to the cattle which serves as a muscle relaxant to get more milk is in a way lethal chemical for vultures that consume their dead bodies. This is one example but in globalization and capitalization, human beings have become the destroyers of nature in many such ways. They forget that their lives are ultimately dependent on nature. Humans are killing the roots of nature upon the fruits of which they are dependent.
The novel ends with the chapter of Guih Kyom. It is a dung beetle. This tells that everything in nature is very much significant, from tiny insects to giant animals, all have their own importance. Nothing of Nature's creation is unworthy or unimportant. All have their role to play which plays a vital role in the natural cycle, even if one element is destroyed then the entire cycle gets disturbed.
"Everybody, that is, except for Guih Kyom the dung beetle. He was wide awake and on duty, lying on his back with his legs in the air to save the world in case the heavens fell. But even he knew that things would turn out all right in the end. They would, because they had to."
The novel ends on a hopeful note that everything will be alright despite many ups and downs and never-ending struggles. These little dung beetles do play an important role in fertilizing the soil. They circulate the soil and provide manure to plants. So, they are friends of nature and help in providing necessary nutrients to the soil. Apart from it, these little dung beetles are playful insects, they make a ball of sand or dung and bury them deep in the ground. So, there is beauty in every creation of nature, only one needs to have deep insight to praise that beauty of nature.
These two examples of vulture and dung beetle are just a window to look into nature and find every bird, animal, insect more significant and not to take any of the species of nature for granted but to protect them from all harm. Celebration of festivals like Kite flying day or Holi, Diwali, but people have to take care of the surrounding birds, animals, and nature around and take special care not to harm them. Celebration is a joy but not at the cost of harm of anything in nature. One cannot smile while causing pain to other species. There has to be a bond of mutual harmony among all the species of nature.
4. Narrative Patterns in the novel
The entire novel is in third person narration except for the two chapters of the novel, that is seventh and eleventh, The Landlord. These two chapters have first-person narration.
[My second novel] is like a city - it has form and then that form is ambushed, and yet it still has form . . . it's not an accretion but it circles around itself, it has a structure . . . . It is an Indian city, it has unauthorized colonies, it has illegal immigrants, it has do Dogs and cows and creatures and bats . . . it is a porous Indian city with its own plans (Roy, personal communication, Jan 16, 2018)
"Fictional and non-fictional elements co-exist in the novel" (Ann Theres Joy)
Thus, it can be said that this novel is a mixture of many things like salad bowl still all of them retaining their individual identity. The novel has many characters like that of Midnight's Children, a complex novel and storyline running between them like flowers hidden among the leaves or sun behind the clouds.
Works Cited
Roy, Arundhati. Ministry of Utmost Happiness. Random House India, 2018.
Suleman, Danish, and Faizahani B. Rehman. "Transgender Issues in Indian Society from the Viewpoint of Arundhati Roy’s Novel, The Ministry of Utmost Happiness." South Asian Journal of Social Sciences and Humanities, vol. 01, no. 03, 2020, pp. 159-172.