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Though Westland Publications, which acquired the rights to 14 works by Manoranjan Byapari, wouldn’t reveal the figure, it’s certainly a life-changing one for the Kolkata-based Dalit writer. Till a few months ago, he was working as a cook at a hostel for the hearing impaired and struggling to make ends meet.
The former Naxalite, whose life is as colourful as his stories, has a significant body of work, having pioneered Dalit writing in West Bengal. However, he got noticed by a wider audience only after a session at the Jaipur Literature Festival. Arunava Sinha, who is translating Byapari’s first book titled “There’s Gunpowder in the Air (Batashe Baruder Gondho)” for Amazon-Westland, calls it a turning point. “Several publishers vied to sign him after the fest, and even a Bollywood director took notice. Till then, Byapari wasn’t very well-known even in Bengal and hadn’t been published by the mainstream press,” says Sinha.
An earlier turning point was a chance encounter with Mahasweta Devi. On a hot summer afternoon while ferrying an elderly professor on his rickshaw, he asked her the meaning of the Bengali word jijibisha. Not only did she explain the meaning (the will to live) but also gave him a chance to write in her Bengali journal. “Rickshaw Chalai (I Pull A Rickshaw)” became Byapari’s first published work.
Even in his novels, the milieu and characters are drawn from his life. For instance, ‘Gunpowder’ is based in Alipore jail, where he did time,” says Sinha. In fact, it was in prison that Byapari was taught to read and write. “There was no pen and paper so a fellow inmate used to scrawl the alphabet in the mud with a stick,” says Byapari, who is in his sixties.
His literary journey encompasses a dozen novels, many short stories and an autobiography. But it wasn’t enough to make a living, forcing him to work as a crematorium guard, watchman and sundry other odd jobs. Even now, he says, hardly anyone in his Kolkata neighbourhood knows about his newfound fame. “All that matters these days is how much money you make, and I’m just an impoverished writer,” says Byapari, who still likes his khaini (chewing tobacco) and sports a gamcha.
As for his writing, he says the spotlight will always be on those who live on the margins. “That’s the world I know. Rich people have their own problems I am sure, but they’re not battling oppression and hunger.”
Age (he doesn’t know his date of birth, only that he was born in Bangladesh in the ’50s and came here as a refugee) hasn’t mellowed Byapari’s anger against the system. “As a Namashudra, he did face prejudice. People think Bengal doesn’t have a caste system but terms like chhotolok and bhadrolok amount to the same thing,” says Sinha.
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