“A Terrible Beauty is Born”: Investigating Dattani’s Ambivalence towards Indian Independence in Final Solutions

Abstract

The paper aims to dig deep into the history of Indian Independence and its traumatic effect on communalism through the lens of Daksha and her diary. Mahesh Dattani’s play Final Solutions (1993) revolves around the themes of communal hatred, riots, use of history, memory, partition or migration, religious prejudices, and woman’s identity formation in gender and caste-stricken society. Through the character portrayal of Daksha, Dattani exposes the native or Indian resistance against the British to bring freedom after many movements and fights. It has taken the precious lives of the freedom fighters and patriots, and then finally the country frees itself from the bondage of colonial rule. But yet ‘things have not changed that much’ during Independence and even after Independence in India though India is considered as a multicultural, multi-religious, and multilingual country. But Dattani’s ambivalent attitude is presented through his emphasis on the life of a woman like Daksha and the lack of unity, and harmony of the Indian people after getting Independence. Rather, it gives birth to the issues like casteism, communalism and communal hatred, violence among them. Apart from communalism, Indian Independence remains futile because it fails to bring freedom to the restricted or confined life of a young bride Daksha in a hetero-patriarchal society and even her dream to become a singer remains unfulfilled. Dattani deals with the issues related to class, caste, and gender in Indian society. He questions the religious ideologies, moral ethics, and marriage institution as well as he traces the process of woman’s identity formation in a man-made society. The paper attempts to show Dattani’s ambivalent attitude towards Indian Independence in Final Solutions.