Untouchable by Mulk Raj Anand

THE UNTOUCHABLE

The novel Untouchable describes the exploitation and abuse of the Untouchables a caste of people in India who are named as such because of the work they carry out on a daily basis , they are involved in ignominious , polluting or unclean occupations and are considered too unclean to come into contact with . The author , Mulk Raj Anand , utilized the medium of the poem to address the mistreatment of the Untouchables using the 18-year-old male protagonist , Bahka as a voice and representative of the suppressed Untouchable people . The story follows

Bakha through a day in his life in Bulashah . A son of a town sweeper Bahka is presented as an extremely napve character who suffers from exposure to new influences such as the white Tommy ' who inspires his "ambition to live like an Englishman (22 . Through his role on the English barracks he develops an image of himself as superior to the other untouchables as he has higher purpose , to clean the toilets of the white man . This view is evidenced when he specified the need to guard his new English clothes from "all base taint of Indianness (12 ) and fuels his view of himself as being above his fellow caste members . Such elevated views of himself lead him to seek a better was of being and an escape from his current existence

Through the course of the story the author of the presents Bahka with three possible solutions to the indelible problem and subsequently to his self-abasement and degradation . The first of the three is offered through Colonel Hutchinson , the Salvationist , who tells Bahka that by renouncing Hinduism and choosing Christianity he can end his caste However , Hutchinson is unable to explain the Christian faith to Bakha whose simplistic view of life entails he is unable to grasp the idea of original sin , he didn 't like the idea of being called a sinner . He had committed no sin that he could remember . How could he confess his sins Odd . He did not want to go to heaven (130 . For Bakha , the benefits offered by Christianity do not offer a solution to his untouchability To Bakha the missionary himself is not free from oppression and appears to suffer from his marriage and is therefore oppressed through an alternative means

Next Bakha encounters Mahatma Gandhi at a public meeting . Gandhi is quick to renounce untouchability as , the greatest blot on Hinduism (42 . However , Gandhi 's retelling of the story of the Brahin sweeper boy confuses Bakha and implies to him that even within his existence of the lowest form , he requires teaching and instruction from the higher castes . This lowers Bakha 's morale even further . Gandhi goes on to describe how the untouchables can purify themselves by cultivating habits of cleanliness (148 . This represents a dichotomy to Bakha , as the very nature of his existence doesn 't allow him the opportunity to purify himself the fact that he cleans up the dirt of others ensures that he can never...