A few days ago, while talking to my translator friends, I discovered that once upon a time, Marathi was more prolifically translated into English than Malayalam. Most old translations are out of print and now there’s only a trickle of new translations. While it is still easier to find anti-caste and historical nonfiction writing, contemporary fiction is experiencing a serious shortage of Marathi voices.
Vasant Purushottam Kale or VaPu as he was lovingly called, was a stalwart in Marathi fiction. A through-and-through Mumbai man, Kale was probably one of the first writers globally who could also be read as audiobooks. Not audiobooks the way we understand the format today, but a writer whose writings were popularised as recordings on audio cassettes. He understood the multi-media format before it was a thing and his stage shows – Kathakathan – made him a familiar face and a household name. By the looks of it, every Marathi speaker and Mumbaikar in the late 1900s had encountered Kale’s stories in some form or the other.
A new era
Karmachari, Kale’s short story collection about the ever-fascinating common man was published in Vikrant Pande’s translation by HarperCollins India in 2018. Comprising 12 short stories, Kale’s characters are the middle-class junta of the Mumbai metropolis. Originally published in 1973, this is the time when the middle class did not formally exist. However, there was a fat chunk of the urban population that was making a living working government jobs and running shops and small businesses, while women of the house were stepping into the workforce to make ends meet. The aspirations of this group were realistic – to own a one-bedroom apartment, send the children to a good school, watch an occasional movie in the theatres, and retire with decent savings in the bank account.
Kale’s characters are strangers to the blinding wealth many in Mumbai boast of, but they are aware of the poverty that an unexpected expenditure can lead them to. As they catch the busy local trains and run back and forth from one end of the city to another, we also get a glimpse of a young nation that is just beginning to understand the caveats of modernity and self-rule. Now out of the stranglehold of joint families and village life, these newly urban families struggle to grapple with changing definitions of contraception, child rearing, parenting, and gender roles.
Each story is named after the protagonist. Of the 12 in the collection, two are named after women – “Kalpana” and “Vandana Samant”. Interestingly, both women work in offices and earn more than their husbands. But these are not cases of corporate ambition, rather, the women have taken to work because of exceptional circumstances where the husband is unable to provide for the family. Kalpana and her husband want to save enough money to buy a flat (doesn’t matter that it’ll take them twenty years to do so) while Vandana’s husband doesn’t earn enough to support their two-person family. Both are riddled with guilt for staying out of the house for so long – Kalpana’s son is growing up without her and Vandana lives in perpetual fear of her husband accusing her of cheating on him with her boss.
Through the dynamically different stories of the two women, Kale shows how the sudden shift in family structure and gender roles affected them – especially since the men still tightly held on to the orthodox perception of both. The lack of support from home and social setups not only made women susceptible to workplace discrimination but also harassment at home. While he had fairly progressive views, it is understandable why even writers like Kale were anxious about these changes that had little to do with woman empowerment and more to do with urban poverty which one was never entirely safe from.
New values and ideologies
The son’s death does not force tears out of a father’s eyes. Neither does the beloved daughter’s marriage when she leaves for her in-laws for good. In “Deosthali” and “Karkhanis”, Kale explores the themes of fatherhood and the extreme love that often borders on a perpetual state of anxiety. Deosthali has been so enamoured with his daughter since she was a baby that he cannot imagine a time when she won’t be with him all the time, meanwhile, Karkhanis has imagined in such vivid details of harm befalling his son that every day of his being alive feels miraculous to him. As the bridal party cries thinking about the daughter’s departure to Hyderabad, Deosthali – not entirely himself anymore – tries to convince himself that the faraway Indian city is no farther from the moon that humans had already conquered. Karkhanis’s refusal to take leave from office after his son’s death stumps his colleague but for him, it is a matter of relief. His son is finally out of all harm’s way and can rest in eternal peace. If these two men are unusual representations of fatherhood, Sadashiv presents an interesting alternative. His wife and he only have protected sex. Hiding this fact from his childless married friend, he sets out to find contraceptive pills late at night while his friend thinks they’re on the hunt for some painkillers.
A city is nothing without a bunch of eccentric citizens. There is Anamik, a rich man, who dresses in rags and boards the local trains every day to lie to fellow passengers. Except, his lies are meant for the greater good – he concocts stories about great suffering whenever someone talks about their own, and in so doing, assures them that some are many times worse off in comparison. Similarly, Vaidya, fat and uncaring of his appearance, lets his colleagues make fun of him without feeling any ill-will for them. Satwalekar, a government clerk, will put Aamir Khan to shame with his perfectionism. Not just at his workplace, he expects perfect behaviour from his new bride too and despite his immense annoyance, he’ll learn the hard way that perfectionism is a fool’s pursuit.
In “Gokhale” and “Joshi”, Kale illustrates the moral dilemma of the common man. Longheld lessons in honesty and steadfastness can face serious contests when presented with the opportunity to make a quick buck and climb the social ladder. Both Gokhale and Joshi stumble upon such lucrative opportunities, but what they do with it will be the true test of their characters.
The stories in Karmachari deceive the reader with their simple language and relatable characters. But spend a little time with each of them and they’ll reveal to you timeless stories of human behaviour and urban living. While some descriptions and predicaments are dated, one will agree that microaggressions at the workplace and home are still very prevalent issues. Especially for women and first-generation city-dwellers. By changing the focus from the sweeping family structures in the village to married couples in small flats in cities, Kale ushers in a new perspective on what prosperity and happiness might look like for a new generation of Indians.
Karmachari: Short Stories About Ordinary People, Vasant Purushottam Kale, translated from the Marathi by Vikrant Pande, HarperCollins India.
