Scripting Dalit Resistance by Indranil Acharya

Scripting Dalit Resistance by Indranil Acharya

This anthology presents English translations of ten plays by Raju Das (1953-2025), one of the foremost Bangla Dalit playwrights and activists. Written and performed between 1980 and 2022, these works engage with the networks of oppression and injustice that inform the realities of Dalit lives.

The plots range from reworkings of episodes from the Mahabharata and dramatisations of historical events and individuals to fictive narratives rooted in contemporary political contexts. These varied narratives not only expose modes of socio-cultural marginalization but also suggest possible avenues for the empowerment of the oppressed. The plays underscore the forms of resistance that Dalits carve out in their everyday lives, offering powerful insights into survival, dignity, and agency.

Part of the Voices from the Margins series, this critical edition will be an essential resource for students and researchers in Literature, Comparative Literature, Modern Indian Literature, Minority Studies, Dalit Studies, and Gender Studies. It will also be of interest to those engaged with contemporary Indian and South Asian literary cultures, Social Sciences, History, and Sociology.

Indranil Acharya, PhD is Professor of English and Coordinator, Centre for Translation and Foreign Language Studies at Vidyasagar University. He edited ten books and authored more than twenty articles in reputed national and international journals on Dalit and Adivasi Studies. His recent awards- Fulbright Fellowship, Anil Gharai Memorial Award and Vidyasagar Shiksha Samman- recognize his contribution to Marginality Studies. Dr Acharya is currently engaged in ICSSR Major Research Project on the PVTGs of West Bengal.

Shubhendu Shekhar Naskar, PhD is Assistant Professor in the Department of English Literature, Language and Cultural Studies, Vidyasagar University, West Bengal, India, and a recipient of the Charles Wallace Research Grant. He has authored the monograph Aesthetics of Dalit Theatre: Perspectives on Caste, Class and Gender and edited Dalit Dialogues: Indian Dalit Plays in English Translation and Performing Protest: Marathi Dalit Plays in English Translation. He serves as the series editor for Theatre of the Marginalised: Dalit and Adivasi Performance Traditions in South Asia.

Pranab Kumar Mandal, PhD is Associate Professor of Theatre and Performance Studies at the School of Arts and Aesthetics, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, India. His writings have been published or accepted for publication in journals such as Theatre Research International, Asian Theatre Journal; Theatre, Dance and Performance Training; Studies in Theatre and Performance; and Contemporary Theatre Review. His edited book The Grassroots Play: People, Place, and Performance in Indian Theatre is forthcoming from Peter Lang in 2026.

Sankha Ghosh is Assistant Professor in the Department of English at The Heritage College, Kolkata, and a PhD research scholar at Jadavpur University. He holds an MA in English from Jadavpur University and an MPhil from Visva-Bharati. From 2019 to 2020, he served as Project Fellow in the RUSA 2.0-sponsored project “Tagore in English: Essays of Decolonization” at the Department of English, Jadavpur University. His essays and translations have appeared in Partition Literature and Cinema (Routledge, 2019), The Oxford Anthology of Translation, among others.