Group 4: Tagore “punishment”

In the short story Punishment By Rabindranath Tagore, Tagore makes a point to depict the very real issue of the oppression of women. Punishment takes place in west-central Bangladesh in the late 19th century. The mistreatment of women takes place all over the world, but it was extraordinarily bad in the middle east in this time period. In Tagore’s story characters Dukhiram and Chidam were returning home from the fields like any other day when Dukhiram screamed at Radha, his wife, for food. When Radha responded sarcastically about Dukhiram not bringing anything home to cook, Dukhiram stabbed her in the head, leading to her death. Throughout the entire story blame is being placed upon women. Chidam even made his wife take the blame for the murder and wanted to oust Radha as the aggressor in the incident something that Chandara could not bring herself to do. In doing so, he was shifting all of the blame off of men and onto the women who were inferior to them in his eyes. In the end of the story justice doesn’t win and Chandara loses her life because even the law would not believe the eye witness testimonies of Dukhiram and Chidam, who had finally realized what they have done and told the truth. Radha chose to take the full blame to die with her pride and to finally escape. These horrifying scenarios exemplify the struggles that women continue to go through today in these regions. One of the many pressing issues in the Middle East today is that of widespread sexual assault against women of all ages. In many of these countries’ women are subjected to arranged marriages, and older men often marry very young girls who are too young to consent. There are still plenty of stories involving brutal physical violence like those in Punishment, whether it be acid attacks, beatings or even cold blooded murder. Women in many middle eastern countries still cannot vote, enter certain establishments, leave their homes without a man and are also forced to cover almost their entire bodies. Rabinranath Tagore, being a humanist as well as a womens rights advocate uses the theme of dehumanization upon women to bring light upon it as it’s a very real issue that still occurs quite often today.