Arijeet Mandal

The following Introduction briefly traces, albeit in jarring cuts, the evolution of caste question and its relationship with Indian cinema. It also tries to point out some aspects of Indian film theory, its lacunae and hopes that some of the questions raised here may give rise to future works by other (better) theorists. Pre-Independence cinema in India rarely addressed caste question, and if it did, then it was through an abstract global humanist lens. This tendency to address caste through a hollow and empty shell of a theoretical model unfortunately has stuck around even in these times, and only found newer ways to reinvent itself in Neoliberal times. To understand the reason of Indian cinema’s lack of addressing caste more directly and pointedly, it has to be seen as part of a historical process. Only then can we see the history of ideology that is “outside of itself”, that is, in the material conditions that made possible Indian caste-society as well as its cine-culture. It also tries to raise questions about the film form, and its many possibilities of experimentation with the caste question (i.e. both in ideological and experiential possibilities). Lastly, it introduces some of the key works in this issue. Of course, with the hope that the readers will forgive and give respite to the many lacuna of the issue, as well as the Editor himself.

During the last years of 1990s and the beginning of the millennia, North Bengal was shaken from its mundane reality right into a middle of a rebellion. With tears of history and warcries of the present, Kamtapur movement revealed itself. In this paper I have tried to locate the social, political, and ideological inclinations that are present within the movement. On one hand my paper intends to critique the presence of what can be called Kochbehar nationalism based on the memory of a pre-independence princely state, on the other hand I am also critiquing the trends and aftermaths of Leftist politics that has been assimilated into the movement itself. While the presence of these two different and to an extent contradictory political thoughts are present within the movement; I have also taken up these new trends in the lights of anarchist tendencies which put more importance on quasi-separations from dominant power centres than class-determinism alone, of course followed by a goal for local empowerment.

The first reaction after getting hurt or bruised among children and (often) adults is to put it in the mouth, and apply spit on it. There is a mention of the ‘spitting cure’ in Pliny’s account of history, as well as narrativised accounts of Jesus curing people with spit. It is as if we apply spit to what hurts us, or needs curing. And yet, spitting is related to age-old tradition of being treated as excreta, as an excess of the body, and connected deeply with scorn and malice. The following paper tries to explore how spitting has its own history. While most of documented history notes it as an administrative (London’s tuberculosis problem) or civic problem (city, street, monument maintenance etc), it has nonetheless a philosophical problem within it. The paper thus tries to decode how a spitting body has its own political and historical perspective, and that they are largely social in nature. The paper then discusses an ontic problem, and an ontological problem of spitting (in general). Lastly, the paper tries to formulate how spitting and its political-ontology in case of India is deeply ridden with problems of a class-caste society. The main texts that have inspired this work are Carlo Ginzburg’s idea of Microhistory in The Cheese and the Worms, but also from Dipankar Gupta’s idea of ‘mistaken modernity’ from his book of the same name. Lastly, in relating to the ontic and ontological problem I have taken inspirations from Heidegger’s notion of an existentialist history. These chief works, along with several others have lead me to study history of spitting and its philosophical premises.

The following essay tries to lay down an introductory analysis of the concept of disgust, and apply the very same ideas as an analytical tool for selected literary works by a Marathi/English bilingual author. Disgust is a universal emotion among humans, however, the conditions under which each person feels disgust are largely determined by their cultural conditioning. Vilas Sarang is an author who wrote several short stories that were published in different magazines between the 1970s to 1980s, later some of them were compiled into a collection by Penguin. His works incite disgust and revulsion in their imagery, but only on the surface, his main goal is rather to document the condition of the people living different kinds of life outside the moral structures of well-fed upper and middle classes and castes. His works are also a look into the modern Indian society that has fractured modernity, and wobbles from the weight of it.