Status of Young Widows in Tagore Novels ‘Chokher Bali’ And ‘Chaturanga’ – A Study

Authors

Sangeeta Bhattacharjee

Abstract

“Chokher Bali” and “Chaturanga” are the two great novels penned by Vishwakavi Rabindranath Tagore . He had shown the vulnerable and miserable conditions of young widows in the society during nineteenth century Bengal. In “Chokher Bali” , Rabindranath created the character of Binodini , an young widow who suffered a lot and was torn in between taking a strong decision for her own happiness and to abide by the unwritten rules of the society where remarriage of a widow was not being looked upon wisely. Binodini became the prey for lust of the character Mahendra . She loved Mahendra’s friend Bihari . When Bihari proposed to marry her , she politely declined the proposal to keep the traditional norms of the society. She could not gather the courage and opted for going to Benaras with her aunt.
On the other way , the character Damini , a widow from the Tagore novel “Chaturanga” was shown quite opposite . She was deprived of property, money , house by her late husband who had made a deed in favour of a religious Guru before his death. Damini started fighting . at last defying all the social norms , she got married to Sribilas who loved her . Unfortunately her happiness did not last long as she took her last breath after a very short period of her marriage to Sribilas due to some deadly disease.

Keywords

Binodini, Mahendra, Bihari, Damini, Sachish, Sribilas

Status of Young Widows in Tagore Novels ‘Chokher Bali’ And ‘Chaturanga’ – A Study. Sangeeta Bhattacharjee. 2018. IJIRCT, Volume 4, Issue 2. Pages 19-23. https://www.ijirct.org/viewPaper.php?paperId=1802003