Epic Woman Stepping into Reality: Depiction of Draupadi with a Feminist Lens with Reference to Three Indian Novels

Lower status of women is a stain on any society. The problem is becoming glaring in India in the wake of atrocities caused against women ‘from womb to tomb’. Even in this twenty first century, the impact of manuvadi ideology is getting evidently felt. ‘A thinking woman spoils everything’ is still the mindset. Maladies like honour killing, bride burning are still gloating over the security of women in the wake of the internalized mindset of patriarchal dictum, viz. ‘A woman does not deserve any freedom’ (Na stri swatantryam arhati). Since time immemorial, she was always taken for granted though she had never remained silent. The depiction of Draupadi in various writings underscores woman’s protest against male dichotomy and her refusal to live by disabling definitions that mark women as inferior

Fervour for Femocracy Reflected in the Works of George Bernard Shaw: A Study of His Plays with Reference to the Synergising Feminist and Democratic Ideologies

It is the truth universally acknowledged that conventionality is not morality. All that is accepted may not be absolute every time but could just be a time bound adjustment to make the ‘system’ work in itself at a particular period. But as time changes, the laws, rules, or socio- economic codes which permeated one particular era, may stand obsolete for another phase of time; the blow to it always comes in the form of reaction expecting one to retrospect over the existing dichotomy as well as change in the system to meet the changing needs of time. Some may take a safer stance by operating within the system to make it work in itself as well as to keep themselves floating while some may abrogate the norms to change the foundations and re- construct the whole order to adapt to the new surroundings. George Bernard Shaw (26th July 1856-2nd November, 1950) belongs to the second band of reactionists, who will not mind bearing wrath of socio- Cultural temper to unveil hard core reality. A non- conformist ‘naughty nineties' writer of partly Victorian era and basically early twentieth century created a new vista through his ‘unpleasant’ plays by focusing the basis of society in his attempt “ to take literatures seriously,” the fact pinpointed by his later successor T. S. Eliot; as a committed dramatist,  he ‘strip (ped) the ragged follies of the time. Naked, as at their birth and with a whip of steel, print (ed) wounding lashes in the iron ribs.’ If, for him, ‘every great truth commences with blasphemy,’ Shaw's blatant attack did not spare anything and anyone right from slum landlordism, quackery, false notions of Valour, prostitution, idealization of feminity and all. In his propagandist mission to expose all evils, His fervour for ‘femocracy’ is grabbing attention even in the twenty first century and makes him win unequivocally, the label of ‘ Male feminist’ along with being an ‘odd-man- out' to his own milieu. The term, a geological compounding of ‘ female’ and ‘ cracy' and so ‘women’s rule’s has been interchangeably used for women Empowerment and women’s era has been a buzzword in intellectual as well as ‘socialete' circle in today’s time. Shaw, in his fierce endeavour to withdraw women from the stock image of ‘angel in the house’, undoubtedly becomes the recipient of ‘femocrat' tag