LANGUAGE IN INDIA

Strength for Today and Bright Hope for Tomorrow

Volume 18:2 February 2018
ISSN 1930-2940

Managing Editor: M. S. Thirumalai, Ph.D.
Editors: B. Mallikarjun, Ph.D.
         Sam Mohanlal, Ph.D.
         B. A. Sharada, Ph.D.
         A. R. Fatihi, Ph.D.
         Lakhan Gusain, Ph.D.
         Jennifer Marie Bayer, Ph.D.
         G. Baskaran, Ph.D.
         L. Ramamoorthy, Ph.D.
         C. Subburaman, Ph.D. (Economics)
         N. Nadaraja Pillai, Ph.D.
         Renuga Devi, Ph.D.
         Soibam Rebika Devi, M.Sc., Ph.D.
         Dr. S. Chelliah, Ph.D.
Assistant Managing Editor: Swarna Thirumalai, M.A.

Language in India www.languageinindia.com is included in the UGC Approved List of Journals. Serial Number 49042.

HOME PAGE

Click Here for Back Issues of Language in India - From 2001

BOOKS FOR YOU TO READ AND DOWNLOAD FREE!

REFERENCE MATERIALS

BACK ISSUES

  • E-mail your articles and book-length reports in Microsoft Word to languageinindiaUSA@gmail.com.

  • PLEASE READ THE GUIDELINES GIVEN IN HOME PAGE IMMEDIATELY AFTER THE LIST OF CONTENTS.

  • Your articles and book-length reports should be written following the APA, MLA, LSA, or IJDL Stylesheet.

  • The Editorial Board has the right to accept, reject, or suggest modifications to the articles submitted for publication, and to make suitable stylistic adjustments. High quality, academic integrity, ethics and morals are expected from the authors and discussants.

Copyright © 2016
M. S. Thirumalai

Publisher: M. S. Thirumalai, Ph.D.
11249 Oregon Circle
Bloomington, MN 55438
USA
Custom Search

Corruption: “A Crime Against Humanity”
A Study of Rohinton Mistry’s Such a Long Journey

Dr. C.V. Padmaja
Dr. S. Sushma Raj
Dr. P. SrinivasuluReddy


Abstract

The paper figures out the concerns of the Parsis- the dwindling community living in a secular country. By centralizing the minority Parsi community, Mistry depicts the consciousness of the community, its anxieties and aspirations, perils and problems of existence at the individual and community level and the complex issues a minority ethnic community has to negotiate in a secular country. The volatile political situation which strangulated the country, highlighting the famous Nagerwala case, during the regime of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi forms the backdrop. Gustad Nobel who challenges the hegemony of the state stands for the marginalized in the narrative. His life showcases how the rights of an individual are violated in the form of corruption that is widespread in the society and how the characters are denied their basic rights more so because they belong to an ethnic community.

Keywords: Parsi, Marginalised, minority, ethnic community, corruption & rights

Introduction

Rohinton Mistry’s first novel Such a Long Journey showcases how personal history is intrinsically linked to the history of a nation. The novel provides the reader an authentic insight into the Parsi culture while throwing up several tricky issues that determine the mis/fortunes of a doubly displaced man pitted against ill-fated political events of a country which throw his life off-guard. The novel captures the socio-political-economic turmoil of the 70s in the history of one of the world’s largest democracies, India. The general tenor of the society projected in the novel is ridden with corruption in high places resulting in a fast fragmenting social order. The novel also deals with the problems of polarization of groups in spite of the fact that these groups, in this case the Parsi community, have been living in India since the 8th century.

The Parsi community is presented through different characters who invariably express their concern for their community and the changes that affect it. As A. K. Singh (1994) aptly puts it:
Mistry’s novel, as a cluster of narratives, deals with the Parsi community and its identity, with its national consciousness and then with the third dimension, too, viz. its identity with the world and the novel is to be studied in this context, if we wish to know the Parsi community as perceived by the novelist. The novel traces the history of the Parsi community in India through Malcolm Saldana’s bid to establish historical superiority of his religion over his friend’s (Gustad’s) as his Christianity came to India. Over 1900 years ago when Apostle Thomas landed on the Malabar coast long before the Parsis came in the Seventh century from Persia, running away from the Muslims. But Saldana is forced to give up Gustad’s rejoinder when he said, “This may be, but our prophet Zarathustra lived more than 1500 years before your Son of God was even born; a thousand years before the Buddha; two hundred years before Moses. And do you know how much Zoroastrianism influenced Judaism, Christianity and Islam?” (24).

This is only the beginning part of the article. PLEASE CLICK HERE TO READ THE ENTIRE ARTICLE IN PRINTER-FRIENDLY VERSION.

Dr. C.V.Padmaja
Associate Professor
padmamonu@gmail.com

Dr. S. Sushma Raj
Assistant Professor
s.sushmaraj@gmail.com

Dr. P.SrinivasuluReddy
Assistant Professor
sreenupydala@gmail.com

Department of English
GITAM Institute of Technology
GITAM (Deemed to be University)
Visakhapatnam-530045
Andhra Pradesh
India

Custom Search
  • Click Here to Go to Creative Writing Section

  • Send your articles
    as an attachment
    to your e-mail to
    languageinindiaUSA@gmail.com.
  • Please ensure that your name, academic degrees, institutional affiliation and institutional address, and your e-mail address are all given in the first page of your article. Also include a declaration that your article or work submitted for publication in LANGUAGE IN INDIA is an original work by you and that you have duly acknowledged the work or works of others you used in writing your articles, etc. Remember that by maintaining academic integrity we not only do the right thing but also help the growth, development and recognition of Indian/South Asian scholarship.