These forgotten people in my collection – they experience joy and pain. And they have NAMES, IDENTITIES!

The cleaning woman whose name remains unknown, whose shadow does not fall on her employers: her name is Raasamma. We buy vegetables from a vendor, but never address her by name: Sundari. And those widows, young and old, who await death on the banks of the Ganges? They had names once upon a time, they had lives that society now denies them. When we complain about clogged toilets, we don’t notice th Kaavanna and Kondamma who are condemned to removing night soil. And list goes on and on – so many lives discredited and dishonored. I just want to make them visible so that they may regain their dignity, so that my readers may challenge these socially constructed divides!

About kamakshi

Kamakshi Pappu Murti is a retired professor of German Studies. She has published children’s books centered on young and older teens. Murti has also published murder mysteries featuring two indomitable female sleuths, avatars of Agatha Christie’s Jane Marple: “Murders Most Matronly” and “Murders in the Ivory Tower.” Her scholarly writing addresses multi-cultural issues, and gender studies (“India: The Seductive and Seduced ‘Other’ of German Orientalism” and “To Veil or not to Veil: Europe’s Shape-shifting ‘Other’.”

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