Interviews

Between the Lines with Radhika Iyengar

Fire on the Ganges is the first attempt to chronicle the everyday realities of the Doms. It plunges into Banaras’s historical past, while narrowing its lens to a few spirited characters from the Dom community. Through their tales of struggle and survival, loss and ambition, betrayal and love, it tells the at-times-heartbreaking, at-times-exhilarating story of a community struggling to find a place beyond that accorded to it by ancient tradition.

In conversation with HarperBroadcast, Radhika Iyengar talks about the years of research that went behind the book, her writing process and her unforgettable experiences in Banaras.

Q. As a journalist, you have worked extensively on various cultural issues, pursuing stories and voices from India’s ‘margins’. Tell us about your journey as a writer, and how you decided you wanted to tell these unsung, oft-ignored stories.

Radhika Iyengar: I think I have been driven by what I have personally wanted to read in mainstream media. Whether it is writing about a bold 18-year-old who started a community library in her remote village to encourage children to read; or about a surfing champion from the fishing community who taught himself how to surf using discarded doors, and now teaches children with cognitive disabilities how to surf as a form of therapy; or about 18th century aayahs who worked for English families during the British Raj, travelled with them to the United Kingdom, only to be later abandoned on foreign land – such stories interest me. The stories do not always and necessarily belong to the margins but at some level, try to encapsulate the human spirit, resilience, and one’s ability to move ahead despite extenuating circumstances.

Q. We know that the foundations of ‘Fire on the Ganges’ are in your multimedia long-form piece that you worked on during your Master’s at Columbia University. How did you conduct this extensive research and how it has led you to the book?

RI: I had read an article about the Dom community, which led to the initial curiosity. When I tried to learn more about them, however, there wasn’t enough information available. Whatever little was available, had a straightforward, singular narrative associated with the Doms, which is that the men labour at the ghats and perform crematory work. I wanted look beyond that lens. Surely, there were other facets to their lives. What were they motivated by? Did the children have access to education? How was the internet influencing or shaping the lives of the youth? Where were the women? Were they allowed to work outside their homes? These questions were the starting point for my thesis.

I travelled to Banaras and held a series of interviews, made notes, took photographs and put in the legwork to report. When I submitted the thesis, I had only covered a small aspect of their lives. There was still a considerable part about their lives, however, which needed to be reported on and was worth informing the world about. At that time, though, I had not thought about writing a book on the Doms of Banaras. That happened later.

Q. What did a regular day of your research trips to the Banaras ghats and alleys look like?

RI: My guest house was at a certain distance from where I was reporting, which allowed me to sometimes walk through the streets of Banaras. That gave me a good sense of the city. The waft of the hot potato fritters being fried, the sound of hawkers advertising their goods, the flux of vehicular traffic, the hustle of local tour guides, and the sight of several groups of pilgrims walking towards the Kashi Vishwanath temple – provided a snapshot of Banaras. There is not a single moment of stillness in the city; there is always movement.

The alleyways meander endlessly. They are narrow and can become crowded very quickly if a cow decides to halt midway and laze in the sun. There are sari shops, bangle shops, ittar shops, paan shops and small eateries pitched on either side of the alleyways. Motorcycles whizz past; cycles tinkle by. If you don’t know where you are going, it’s easy to forget your way. In fact, one of the locals once said, ‘Banaras is such a place that if you’re not careful, you’ll easily get lost in its maze-like lanes…But that’s the beauty of it too’.

Q. Could you tell us an experience or a story from Banaras that you encountered during your research, which has impacted you and stayed with you?

RI: What stayed with me was how the individuals in the community like Bhola or Lakshaya, whom I’ve written about in the book, rarely wasted any time. They were constantly thinking about their future, about how to get out of Chand Ghat and improve their lives. Their strategies kept changing according to the circumstances. That is, if Plan A didn’t work, they’d apply Plan B or Plan C, or do some jugaad to make Plan A work. They would try and find a solution, without giving themselves any time to regret or feel sorry for themselves. If something didn’t work out, they didn’t spend time mulling over it because they immediately needed to figure the next steps: ‘What’s next? What do I need to do to rectify this? How do I move past this hurdle?’

That was a big takeaway for me – to not pick oneself apart if things don’t work out, but to pick oneself up and move forward.

Q. We all know how Banaras is considered a sacred land in Hindu mythology, but the book also reveals the nexus between this sacred identity and its many fault lines. Various scholars have written about the psycho-social impacts of the caste system prevalent in the city (and across the country). How a community of Doms is endlessly tied to the family vocation, for instance. What were your experiences like, while getting to know these real, lived stories of caste prejudices and practices during your research work?

RI: In Banaras, particularly near the ghats, most locals will know which neighbourhood the other belongs to. Sometimes, the children who accompanied me to the ghats during my fieldwork, would consciously avoid a route that had a small Hanuman temple on the way, since its priest would reprimand them and shoo them away, if they lingered anywhere near the temple. These lived, every day experiences would understandably heavily impact the children psychologically. But they have no language, no tools to express how they feel or cope, because there is no concept of mental health there.

In newspapers, we often read about gruesome acts of caste violence like honour killings and lynchings, but there are also smaller acts of violence which occur every day. Over time, these experiences build up and become extremely detrimental, especially for the children.

Q. What were some of the other sources—books, movies, documentaries, et cetera—that helped you to tell the story of the Doms of Banaras?

RI: There isn’t sufficient literature available on the Doms in Banaras, so I tapped into other sources. In no particular order: Banaras: City of Light by Diana L. Eck, Joothan by Omprakash Valmiki (trans. by Arun Prabha Mukherjee), The Exercise of Freedom: An Introduction to Dalit Writing by K Satyanarayana and Susie Tharu, writings by Dr. B.R. Ambedkar, Akkarmashi by Sharankumar Limbale (trans. by Santosh Bhoomkar), Children on the Pyre by Rajesh Jala, Masaan by Neeraj Ghaywan and several others.

Q. As the book reaches out to its readers, what would be your message to those who traverse its intense landscape?

RI: I can tell you what I hope for. As a society, we tend to focus on our differences rather than our similarities. In fact, in our current political climate, this divisiveness has heightened even more. At the end of the day, as human beings all of us need respect, love, understanding and a place in the sun. So, the hope is to ensure that the readers don’t look at the Doms as mere characters on the page and forget about them once the last chapter of the book is over, but relate to them and empathise with them on a human level.

In conversation with Kartik Chauhan for HarperBroadcast 

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