Satinath Bhaduri (27 September 1906 – 30 March 1965) was a Bengali

India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...

n novelist and politician. He was known by his literary pseudonym, Chitra Gupta.

Early life and career

He was born on 27 September 1906 in Purnia,

Bengal Presidency The Bengal Presidency, officially the Presidency of Fort William in Bengal until 1937, later the Bengal Province, was the largest of all three presidencies of British India during Company rule in India, Company rule and later a Provinces o ...

, where Indubhusan Bhaduri, his father, practised law. His ancestral home was in Krishnanagar in the district of Nadia. He obtained an MA degree in economics from the University of Patna in 1930. In 1931 he completed his BL degree. He started practising law at Patna between 1932 and 1939. He then joined

Indian National Congress The Indian National Congress (INC), colloquially the Congress Party, or simply the Congress, is a political parties in India, political party in India with deep roots in most regions of India. Founded on 28 December 1885, it was the first mo ...

and became a district secretary of Purnia. He was imprisoned in Bhagalpur Jail twice: 1940–41 and 1942–45. In 1948, he fell out with the Congress and joined the Socialist Party.

His works

Satinath's first novel was '' Jagari'' (1946), for which he received the very first Rabindra Puraskar (1950). This book earned him considerable fame, and was translated into English in 1965 as part of the UNESCO Collection of Representative Works. As a political novel, Jagari occupies a unique place in Bengali literature. He also wrote a travelogue, ''Satyi Bhraman Kahini'' (1951), about his experiences in Paris. His other noteworthy works include ''Gananayak'' (1948), ''Chitragupter File'' (1949), ''Dhorai Charita Manas'' (2 parts, 1949, 1951), ''Achin Ragini'' (1954), ''Aparichita'' (1954), ''Sangkat'' (1957), ''Alok Drsti'' (1964), Paruyar Notebook (collection of writings) etc.

Critical appreciation

Partha Chatterjee in his celebrated work ''The Politics of the Governed'' analyses the narrative of Dhorai charita manas which according to Chatterjee could be read as 'a faithful ethnography of colonial governance and national movement in India'The Politics of the Governed: Reflections on Popular Politics in Most of the World. Partha Chatterjee Columbia University Press, New York, 2004, 173pp

Themes

His short stories are satirical critique of judiciary, partisan politics, crude

feminism Feminism is a range of socio-political movements and ideology, ideologies that aim to define and establish the political, economic, personal, and social gender equality, equality of the sexes. Feminism holds the position that modern soci ...

etc. It is very difficult or almost impossible to analyze the parody-texts or these black comedies as critiques cannot make comments on self-avowed institutionalized organized funded science or anatomo-bio politics of lab-state science, survey techniques, statistics etc. The critical analysis of Bhaduri's discourse led to parody of parodies. A critique could cut a sorry figure to gauge the story-line with standardized as well as presupposed formalized tool. Bhaduri's stories are the instances of double session, where the existing civil and political society and the stereotypical literary critiques are at a time attacked with subtle wit. Bhaduri declared the death of model-theoretic formularized criticism. Most of his writings portray the lifestyle of the people of

Bengal Bengal ( ) is a Historical geography, historical geographical, ethnolinguistic and cultural term referring to a region in the Eastern South Asia, eastern part of the Indian subcontinent at the apex of the Bay of Bengal. The region of Benga ...

and

east East is one of the four cardinal directions or points of the compass. It is the opposite direction from west and is the direction from which the Sun rises on the Earth. Etymology As in other languages, the word is formed from the fact that ea ...

ern

Bihar Bihar ( ) is a states and union territories of India, state in Eastern India. It is the list of states and union territories of India by population, second largest state by population, the List of states and union territories of India by are ...

Death

He died on 30 March 1965.

References