University of Heidelberg

In the Eurocentric colonialism of British India, the cultural interaction between the colonizer and the colonized was often asymmetrical and mostly hierarchical. In 19th century Calcutta, a new urban Bengali intelligentsia was emerged as a result of their acquaintance with Western education and cultures. They tried to come into terms with the socio-cultural repercussions of the time and by forming a problematic relation of “alienation and affection” with their colonizer, creating a new form of public sphere by establishing various sabha or associations, communities and groupings, forming different social, political, literary and religious identities. In this respect, satire was perhaps the ablest literary tool to explore the asymmetric cultural relations in colonial Bengal especially from mid 19th to early 20th century. Hence this period witnessed a rapid flourishing of satirical productions which left no sphere of Bengali life untouched.
 
Among the various forms of satire in the public spheres witnessed in Bengal i.e. prose narratives, novels, poems, farces, dramas, cartoons, caricatures, theatres etc., I concentrate mostly on the satires of Indranath Bandyopadhyay (1849-1911), one of the most popular satirists of late 19th century, who is now faded into almost oblivion. He represents the more conservative but hugely popular faction of the late 19th century Bengali intelligentsia. His satires often attempt a reversal of the colonizer-colonized positions in the colonial hierarchy, question the functioning power-relations and insinuate doubt in the validity of colonialism itself by overturning the justification of the claimed European ‘superiority’ over the colonized. His serialized comic pieces of Panchu Thakur (The Reveler in the Punch, in imitation of the British ‘Punch’), where his wit and humour find the most spontaneous expression, paves the way for such challenges more intensively.

Keeping in mind these considerations, his works seem to be apt for analyzing the reactions of the middle class Bengali intelligentsia, especially for deciphering the constant transcultural flows taking place in late 19th century Bengal.