A transcreation of Jaiwanti Dimri's Hindi novella, Surju Ke Naam, this is the story of Sukurmani, a young woman who migrates to Bhutan with her four-year-old son, Surju, in search of livelihood, stability and peace. A Dumka tribal from Jharkhand, the one constant in her life is change as she crosses many borders - from Ranchi in Jharkhand, to Kokrajhar to Darranga in Bodoland, to Bishalgarh in Tripura, to Rungthung and finally to Kanglung in east Bhutan - to escape ethnic clashes, unrest and himsa, the omnipresent and many-faced violence which follows her.
Set in the small, scenic hill town of Kanglung, much of the story is told through a dialogue between two women: Sukurmani and her Memsaab. Through her Memsaab's eyes, we get glimpses of Sukurmani's life, past and present. We witness her struggles to make ends meet as a single mother, an illiterate labourer and uninhibited tribal in an alien land. We also see her as a self-reliant, resilient woman living her own life with willful little Surju, who trails her like a shadow, a participant in all his mother's joys and sorrows. As the narrative unfolds, an unusual bond forms between these two different women: two Indian expatriates, one legal and one illegal.
A poignant and thought-provoking story simply told, it lingers even after the last word is read.
Jaiwanti Dimri is a bilingual writer, critic and translator. A recipient of the Arya Smriti Samman, Kitabghar (2002), in the genre of Hindi short story, her stories have been published in national journals, magazines and anthologies, and translated into English, Telugu and Marathi. A former professor of English at Himachal Pradesh University, Shimla, she has taught in Nigeria, Bhutan and the US, and has also been a fellow of the Indian Institute of Advanced Study, Shimla. Her published works include: The Inner Eye and Other Stories (2016); Images and Representation of the Rural Woman: A Study of the Selected Novels of Indian Women Writers (2012); The Drukpa Mystique: Bhutan in 21st Century (2004); Ernest Hemingway: A Critical Study of His Short Stories and Non-Fiction (1994); two novellas in Hindi, Pinddaan (2012) and Surju Ke Naam (2006); two Hindi short story collections, Gagar Bhar Paani (2004) and Dusra Narak Kund (2004); and Sahastra Netradhari Nayak (2009), a Hindi translation of Bhutanese writer Karma Ura's novel The Hero with a Thousand Eyes. Jaiwanti Dimri lives in Dehradun.
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