‘Dalit women need to be allowed to speak for themselves’: Writer Kalyani Thakur Charal

Within the larger category of Dalit writing, where can we situate Dalit women’s writing?
Dalit girls, tribal girls, and girls from the minority sections of society are educationally and economically far behind compared to girls from other sections of society. There are a lot of obstacles in the way of Dalit literature, where the authors, publishers and sellers are all Dalit writers themselves. It is very difficult for a Dalit woman writer to transcend that barrier. Moreover, Dalit literature is not literature for pleasure because of which its subject matter and style of writing are very different. Dalit girls still haven’t progressed to the level of education that is required to contribute to Dalit literature. Hence, one can find only a handful of Dalit women writers. They need more educational and economic opportunities along with awareness about Dalit issues. Dalit female writers very obviously have different ideas than feminist writers because they are much further behind in generational education than the latter. As much as they need more opportunities to progress further, they also need more time.

Where can we place Dalit women’s writings vis-à-vis women’s writing in India?
The difference between Dalit women’s writing and Indian women’s writing in general is that there are very...

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