ANAND’S THE ROAD: A DALIT PERSPECTIVE (Pages 70-78) by Ms. Pranayaja in THE ENGLISH INDIA / ISSN: 2321-1172 (Online); 2347-2634 (Print)

Anand‘s novels have been thenand‘s novels have been themeans of giving form andutterances to the hopes anddesires, enthusiasm andsympathy and the thrills of joyand stab of pain of the time.Anand claims to be a realist. Without being arealist the true image of the place, period andpeople cannot be presented. Anand evinces a keeninterest in the eradication of social evils and hisnovels are artistic attempts to arouse theslumbering conscience of the poor and theexploited, the froth and scum of society. He led acrusade against those who took devilish pleasure insucking the life blood of the underdog. After a longinterval of twenty six years (after the publication ofUntouchable), Anand again dealt with the theme ofuntouchability in The Road published in 1961. Inthis novel the novelist is aware of the social andpolitical changes that have taken place. Anand hasa specific preoccupation in The Road. His mainemphasis as a social reformer is to lay emphasisupon mass action and collective transformation.Anand narrates the story of Bhikhu and his Dalitfriends who build road for the government andcome into conflict with caste Hindus who do notwant to touch the stones defiled by the so calledChammars. Dhooli Singh with his progressiveviews helps them. But Thakur Singh opposes him.In the end, Bikhu runs to Delhi to escapeuntouchability. The road, in the novel, is a symbolof progress and prosperity. In Untouchable, Bakhareturns home to give out the message of hopeoffered by the modern machine to his community.Bikhu, on the other hand, seeks salvation only forhimself and escapes into modernity. In these twonovels Anand confines himself only to the theme ofsocial outcastes.Keywords: Untouchability, Progress,Prosperity, Modernity, Outcastes.