Vandana Kumari Jena is a master of understanding human nature and that is evident in several stories in this collection. These stories are hard-hitting, yet soul-stirring and strike an emotional chord with the reader, writes MANDIRA GHOSH
Written by Vandana Kumari Jena who is an author and the Secretary, Department of land Resources, The Future is Mine is collection of short stories, on different themes and plots with a humane touch created and crafted with conceptual clarity. The stories are penned in a succinct language and lucid style, marked by a gripping and engaging narration, with unpredictable twists and turns, and in some cases, with an undercurrent of a message.
Complexity in lives of urban women are vividly reflected in the stories. With deft strokes, she narrates the realistic stories of such women drawn from various strata of society. In her Preface, she mentions: “I have passionately championed women’s causes throughout my life. The women I have portrayed in my stories are strong women, who while living in male dominated societies, have confronted orthodoxy, conservatism and deep-seated prejudices and fought valiantly against evident injustice.” And she very rightly believes “that women are actually the stronger sex.”
Her protagonists, mostly women, drawn from mostly urban India and that she has made a deliberate attempt to demonstrate a very delicate and humane nature of relationships between friends, husband and wife, officer and the colleagues and also between memsahibs as well servants. She does not believe in giving sermons but the stories of different nature tell about urban Indian women and sometimes of their complex lives, their difficulties in managing home and beyond as Tagore invented, “Ghare Bayire — home and beyond” — fire engulfs in the outer world but women are not just safe confined to be just inner. They have experienced the outer world and with all its follies and fear, the outer world is a must and full of adventure. Without bashing the men of the society, she believes in a non-dogmatic feminism. She does not provide solutions but the journey of the lives of women provides the glance of the problems faced by women and the dignity with which they handle them becomes the end word and solutions.
Characters such as Aarati, Tanvi, Sangeeta, Shika, Renu, Kavita, Ankita, Charu, and so many of them we find among us, are full bodied and real, but they are also distinct as they author made them so. She has taken up mostly urban motifs and symbols parallel with the people of rural strata connecting India and Bharat without becoming judgmental, or preachy.
The poet in her provides beautiful descriptions of the monsoon in Orissa, the State to which the author belongs. She as Charu looked at the sky in surprise: “She had never been able to get over the monsoon in Orissa. The lightning zigzagged crazily across the sky. The thunder roared and rumbled loudly. She saw the rain splash hard against the windowpanes and splatter noisily on the car roof.” This mesmerising picture of urban rain is dramatic in the context of the story Silent Night and is most memorable. The description of Munnar, winter are praiseworthy too.
Illusions is an interesting story and reminds us of our teachers whom we do not want to forget whether they taught us Hindi or Sanskrit, Physics or Maths.
Jena is not radical and happenings around the world are not much represented in the stories which we may expect sometime in her later volumes. Human emotions of love, hate, jealousy, compassion, revenge, interest her and sometimes she speaks as a psychologist. For example, in the story Deja Vu, revenge is taken 20 years afterwards, a very human instinct; or in the story The Encounter, once again where Rati, becomes an established author and takes revenge on a neta Upreti, a friend who insulted her during school days for not being able to speak in English. A very common phenomenon told in a very uncommon way. A common thread of human follies too thus goes into her stories. An unmarried surrogate mother readies herself to give birth to a child is very contemporary and powerful.
Drawing on delicate family bonds, tender emotions and inter-personal relationships, her stories, the plots, the themes and the techniques predominantly the flashback techniques are distinct and unique.
She has effectively and unobtrusively used some of her official experiences and observations to underlay some of her stories. Striking a healthy balance between the demands of her office and the call of her literary creativity, she must have penned this volume.
Jena’s life in the Indian administrative world makes her write more interesting stories. The title story, The Future is Mine, is the story of Aarati, whose abduction by insurgents leaves her traumatised. This is a powerful story what may happen to woman in the present world as the fairer sex is vulnerable in this violence-prone world as she moves out of her safety to a dangerous outer world. That finally she was safe in this world made her believe in miracles once again. This true life story is indeed marked by originality, and suspense. The author is a master of understanding human nature and that is evident in several stories, for instance, in how a young woman visits Munnar and discovers her family’s best kept secret in the hills.
Thus, The Future is Mine is an eclectic collection of stories, some humorous, some serious and yet others full of suspense makes a compelling reading. The underlying thread running across the stories is women, their resilience, their infinite compassion and indomitable courage. These stories are hard-hitting, yet soul-stirring and strike an emotional chord with the reader.
After reading and going through her memorable stories, we regain our lost faith in humanity and are compelled to find that all is not so bad in the world. She is successful in creating a realistic world and not just an imaginary world of illusions, with real characters ranging from various stratas of the society. She creates a more humane and a sensitive world. We thank the author for this reason.
The reviewer is the author of Cosmic Dance of Shiva and Impact of Famine on Bengali literature, and can be reached at mandiraghosh55@gmail.com