Very few books in Punjabi go beyond the first edition. The reader, the writer and the publisher are all responsible for this. The reader thinks that buying Punjabi books is a waste of his hard-earned money. The writer living in his fool’s paradise, keeps on adding to literary garbage, oblivious of the buffoonery of it. And the publisher is out to fleece whosoever crosses his path, may he be the without any distinction.
A famous Punjab writer with dozens of books to his credit once met Hazari Prasad Dwivedi to seek his opinion on his writing. The scholar gave him patient hearing turned a few leaves of his magnum opus and then said: “You have written enough, now please read something.”
Despite this dismal state of affairs in the world of Punjabi books, there is a silver lining though. There are novelists and short story writers who have redeemed the world of Punjabi letters. Mitter Sen Meet is one of them. He shot into prominence with the publication of his novel “Taptish” which ran into a reprint between 1990 and 1992, a rare event in Punjabi writing.
“Taptish”, as the title indicates, is about the investigative methods of the police, which involves manipulations, corruption and false- hood, to cook up a story that may not stand up to the judicial rigors even at the lowest level. “Taptish” subjects the devious warp and woof of the post-colonial coercive structure to microscopic inspection, and the pathology of the sick system is brought to the open for all to see Mitter Sen does not suggest any solution though it is implicit – the way-out lies in meticulous implementation of the liberal democratic ideal of a welfare state,
“Taptish” is followed by “Katehra” (witness box), a novel dissecting the Indian judicial system from the lowest to the upper- most levels. Prosecutors are disrobed here, the hypocrisy of the judges is exposed and the misdeeds of the rulers are laid bare. Severe strictures are passed on the judicial system in free India.
If one is eager to learn about the dispensation of justice with all its fabrications, prevarications, concoctions and perjured manipulations, one should go through this book. “Katchra” is an insider’s story since Mitter Sen himself is a public prosecutor and has worked for a number of years in courts of law at various levels in Punjab.
The story-line in “Katchra” is very simple. A child from a well- to-do family in a small town like Bamala is kidnapped and then murdered. The body is found in a gunny bag thrown in the com- pound of the town hospital. On the very day of the kidnapping, the police registers a case and hauls up every one with a criminal history. The Chief Minister of the state also nails from this area. He makes a public declaration that the killers world be arrested before the bhog ceremony is performed.
The police comes under tremendous political pressure. In order to save their skin they cook up a story, and the body found in the hospital compound is actually planted by them. They found the corpse of the child from a deserted place. But in order to lend some credibility to the fabricated story they need a body to be “found” in the hospital compound. Two criminals, Pala and Mecta, who are al- ready in police custody, are then produced as the murderers, ransom being their motive. According to the police, the child Banti is kidnapped from the school by these history sheeters. They keep him at various places and write a letter to his family to arrange for the ransom amount. Since the demand is not met, they kill the child and throw the body in the hospital compound. Though these criminals are arrested by the po- lice on the very day of the kidnap- ping and thus before the child is done to death, they are shown as if they are arrested after the body is recovered a few days later.
As the case has to be solved before the bhog ceremony as promised by the Chief Minister, the police resorts to a summary solution. The Chief Minister proudly announces to the gathering at the ceremony that the murderers have been arrested and would be severely dealt with in accordance with the law of the land.
After this the long arduous legal process begins. Challans are filed within the stipulated period but how the police, public prosecutors, court officials and others function is brought into sharp focus laying bare the malfeasance of the officials operating the diabolical structure of the legal system. The entire town is divided into two camps. One camp stands by the arrested boys as they are innocent and the other is against them since they have a criminal record. Evidence is fabricated; witnesses are manipulated and the system of judiciary is made to act as a willing accomplice in these wicked machinations. How even honest judges sometimes fall victim to political pressure, maybe to protect their career, or for some other petty gain from the discretionary quota of the Chief Minister, or for the sake of their children’s career is vividly delineated in meticulous details.
In short, everybody involved in the legal process receives a severe drubbing at the hands of the author. Being an insider Mitter Sen has first-hand knowledge of this field which he skilfully fictionalizes to provide delightful reading. His hold on the Malwai dialect of Punjabi is exceptionally good. His sincerity of purpose is beyond doubt
“Taptish” and “Katchra” are in the tradition of Srilal Shukla’s “Rag Darbari”. More such writing is needed to expose the cupidity and corruption of those who operate the levers of power at different levels of society. The intelligentsia in general and writers in particular have remained insensitive to the monstrous distortions in the system brought about by manipulators. The people of India have been cheated by the clever ruling oligarchy, which while wallowing in its ill-gotten wealth and power, becomes totally oblivious of the judgment of history. As the vanguard of society, the intelligentsia has a special responsibility in such gloomy times as the present. They must not sacrifice the truth for the sake of petty selfish gains.
Mitter Sen Meet has shown the way. A man of letters as critic of society has a special role to play in the history of literature. Universities in the region should prescribe such novels as texts at the under- graduate and post-graduate levels which may help in cleansing the murky moral environment. This novel ends with the tragic failure of the judicial system. But in our times, different components of the social fabric are heading towards a catastrophe, tragedy being too individual and personal.
Article extracted from this publication >> September 2, 1994
