What kind of caste war is shown in Indulekha?
Answer:
- Indulekha was a love story but it was also about a caste issue.
- It is about the marriage practices of upper caste Hindus in Kerala, especially the Nambuthiri Brahmins and the Nayars.
- A younger generation of English-educated Nayar men who had acquired property and wealth on their own, began arguing against Nambuthiri alliances with Nayar women. They wanted new laws regarding marriage and property.
- In Indulekha, Suri Nambuthiri, a foolish landlord comes to marry Indulekha. The intelligent heroine rejects him and chooses Madhvan, an educated and handsome Nayar as her husband.
- Suri Nambuthiri desperate to find a partner for himself, finally marries a poorer girl and goes away pretending that he has married Indulekha.
- Another example is that of Potheri Kunjambu’s Saraswativijayam mounting an attack on caste oppression. This novel shows a young man from an ‘untouchable caste’ who runs away from his village to escape the cruelty of his Brahmin landlord.
- Later on, he becomes a judge and returns to a local court as one. In the end of the trial, he reveals his true identity and then Nambuthiri repents tried to reform his ways.