‘Zin’ – What the Kurd Tragedy Tells Us.
‘Zin’ – What the Kurd Tragedy Tells Us.
(Synopsis: The article analyses the novel as a border-defying emotional and intellectual engagement. It finds parallels between Kurd experience and other societies where State oppression thrives by ghettoising minorities, denying them statehood, citizenship, or othering them as second-class citizens. The parallels between present-day India and the fascist regime suppressing Kurd resistance portrayed in the novel also is explored in detail. The author's concern for the Kurd people is viewed, not as the condescending sympathy of one from a more privileged community, hailing as she does from Kerala, a relatively stable segment of Indian society, but as that of one who embarked on soul-stirring, empathetic sojourn in the heartlands of Kurd experience. In doing so, the author's defiant stand against 'nationalistic' idealisation of her own 'peaceful' community is seen as challenging the complacent moral codes or the patriarchal deep state that prevails in her homeland. Thus the novel is seen as a deeply political indictment of fascist oppression, the manifestation of which is both regions-specific and universal.)
Despite
having a population of about 35 million and geographical areas with territorial
dimensions of almost the size of Iraq or half of Turkey, Kurdistan could never
attain the status of statehood. Following the Ottoman defeat in the First World
War and the Treaty of Lausanne in 1923, it reached the present status of being
divided among Turkey, Iran, Iraq and Syria. Today, the Kurd people have
autonomous regions both in Iraq and Syria, while Armenian parliament has one
Kurd representative. In Turkey and Iran where the struggle for Kurd autonomy is
still raging, the resistance groups are dubbed terrorist organizations. Prison
life, persecution, and capital punishment are their lot. The participation of female
fighters in the battlefields, reportedly estimated to about 40 percent of its strength,
was decisive in several historic epochs like the fall of Saddam, the redemption
of the Yazidi women of Sinjar and the defeat of IS in Iraq and Syria. In
addition to the national war-front, these women fighters do address the
domestic war-front where women need to emancipate themselves from patriarchal
oppression. Literary works dealing with Kurd life cannot overlook them and
their contribution to Kurd resistance.
Haritha
Savithri, award-winning author and translator hailing from Kerala, the
southernmost State of India, sets her debut novel ‘Zin’ in Turkish Kurdistan.
The novel, beautifully translated into English from the Malayalam original by
K. Nandakumar, shows her sharp eye for the painful disintegration of
conflict-zones and shares the sufferings of its people with a heart ready to
share and not just watch and comment. Her perilous travels along the land,
guided by devoted friends out there, have gone into the narrative with great
results. She did stand witness to the ravages the fascist regime has inflicted
on the legacies of a land that had cultural antiquity of thousands of years, a
legacy manifested in the secular harmony among its people, and its linguistic
and artistic diversities.
Reverberations
“All the human rights
violations the world-over are of the same mould… the discrimination each
country practices against its minority communities. State-spawned measures to
oppress them, weaponizing power.
Planning and execution of genocides, forced disappearances, political
vendettas, fleeing for life, chambers of persecution, audacity to justify acts of annihilating fellow-beings
like fleas in the name of nationalism, dividing people in the name of religion,
misusing religion for political gains, and, above all, the short-cuts that
State indulges in in order to silence its people with fear.”
The above passage
translated here from the novelist’s forward to the original Malayalam edition
(omitted in the English edition to protect certain identities) clearly shows
how the tragedy of the dispossessed people the world-over is the same and why
she ventured into imagining the Kurd predicament as a universal one, resonating
beyond boundaries.
The premise of the
novel is a familiar one in recent fiction and movies: a young girl sets out in
search her lover hailing from another country, who went home, giving word of quick
return, only to disappear without trace. When she lands there, the country is
in political turmoil and she learns that her man was an activist in the thick
of things. Her pursuit lands her in the midst of military repercussions, making
her witness to and victim of the fates of the country itself, before making a
very narrow escape, broken and bruised though she becomes, thanks to the
intervention of several agents and factors: the boundless support of the
university youngsters propelled by undying idealism, friends out there ready to
sacrifice themselves to protect their guest-sister, the last-minute
intervention of the international community and the high-level political moves
from her native country, and, above all, her sheer spirit and will-power. Here,
the young girl is an Indian from its southern-most State named Kerala, a place
where socio-political turmoil is more of heard-than-experienced, while the lover
is from the cauldron of Turkish Kurdistan under the fascist regime that is
contemporary reality. The name or the precise identity of the dictator is
seldom mentioned except in one instance where it says: ‘‘that man. That despot,
that tin-pot dictator!’’ The girl, a research scholar at Barcelona University, found
her soul-mate in a fellow scholar. This entire premise recalls books like The
Execution of Charles Horman: An American Sacrifice, by Thomas Hauser, its
movie version Missing (1982) directed by Costa-Gavras, or, a more recent
example, Colonia (2015) directed by Florian
Gallenberger, the last one closely resembling the novel’s structure itself.
Hauser’s novel and Galenberg’s movie are both based on real stories, and both
are related to the reign of terror in Chile under Augusto Pinochet, following
the military coup toppling Salvadore Allende’s socialist government.
Seetha’s Quest?
The novelist has
several times talked about why her Keralite protagonist was given the mythic name
of Seetha. In the novel, according to her great granny, she was ‘named Seetha’
so that she ‘would be like King Janaka’s daughter.’ In the puranas, Seetha
was wife of Rama, the ‘purushothama’, the epitome of male persona on
earth. Yet it was no protection for her from being humiliated by the
patriarchal values, and Seetha disappears from the heart of the epic after a
certain stage. But she does shine like a beacon, even after physically disappearing
into the earth's belly. In the novel, even though Seetha is at the center, the
focus is not in the emotional conflicts of broken love. That’s how the book
becomes a tribute to the Kurd friends who welcomed the novelist as one of their
own, and recognized her as one who would give voice to their untold stories.
The atrocities including gang rape, abortion and protracted near-death torture
that Seetha has to endure are true specimens of Kurd experiences. The
inhumanities suffered in the chambers horrors alias torture cells as portrayed
in the novel are typical of ‘prison literature.’ Though the genre per se
refers to works portraying the life of the author himself/ herself in prison, contemporary
fiction has several such examples where meticulous, spine-chilling, graphic
portrayals of such horrors abound. Yalo, by Lebanese author Elias
Khoury, portrays the repeated persecution sessions undergone by the
protagonist-alleged-terrorist during the civil unrest of 1975 in Lebanon. The
Pulitzer winning novel The Sympathizer by Vietnamese- American author Viet Thanh Nguyen, is
another example. The ‘counterrevolutionary’ who has been ‘defiled’ in American
ways endures unbearable torture in the ‘re-education’ camps. Novels portraying
Khmer rouge concentration camps like First They Killed My Father: A Daughter
of Cambodia Remembers by Cambodian-American author Luong Ung, and In
the Shadow of the Banyan by another Cambodian-American author Vaddey Ratner
are other examples.
When Seetha makes
it out of the prison, the major factor that makes it possible is the devotion
of her activist friends and Kurd rebels. They don’t give up on their people or
their friends, as the character named Musthafa puts it, come what may. But the
Kurd girls like Dilva, immolated after repeated gang rapes in torture cells, do
not get Seetha’s chances. The absurdity of statistics about casualties in
conflict zones, based on ‘the bits and bones of corpses they could find’ is
something that can relate to any other places in the world where similar
conflicts prevail. The question resounds:
“What about people incinerated without leaving even a
piece of bone or hair? People who were buried alive by the soldiers? Those who
were “disappeared”? In which statistics will your UN include all these? Women
who have been raped or raped and killed? Young men who have been beaten to
within an inch of their life and now live as cripples? Our babies who did not
get medical attention and died from infections from the shit they mixed in our
water tanks? In which of your statistics have they been accounted for?”
That the ending of
the book has disappointed some readers was evident from certain reactions that
came out when original Malayalam edition appeared. In a way it is not without
some ground. In the literature of exile, created by writers compelled to leave
or disgusted with the uncertainties at homeland caught in civil unrest, there
recurs the trope of escape to a more democratic western country as an easy
closure. It may be argued that this Kite Runner model deus ex machina
doesn’t suit a work of serious intent. Even in works fictionalizing Kurd experience,
there are examples for this pattern. For instance, Daughters of Smoke and
Fire, by the Iranian-Kurd novelist Ava Homa, portrays the protagonist
opting to exile herself to Canada with her lover, in order to escape
life-threats from Iranian authorities. She would continue her pro-Kurd activism
there.
But in the case of
Zin, a close reading would reveal that it is not the familiar trope that
is working here. Approaching the novel as Seetha’s journey would be a very
partial reading. The heart of the novel is not what happens to Seetha, but what
she sees, witnesses and experiences and how it becomes the fictional recreation
of a terrible historical juncture that a people endure. And the novel doesn’t
pretend to offer any closure to it; nor is it possible. Seetha’s quest for love
becomes relevant only as a framework to explore the Kurd experience from
inside. Structurally, this technique has been prevalent since modernist
masterpieces such as James Joyce’s Ulysses, and is flourishing even in
contemporary, postmodernist or post-postmodernist fiction. And Zin makes
good use of it.
Universal
Designs of Othering
Dubbing the
marginalized or ‘othered’ communities with ‘terrorist’ tag, destroying their
culture, language and lifestyle and ghettoizing them by wrecking their
livelihood are methods fascism invariably resorts to everywhere. The truth is
far from what the State paints. Bahadir, the committed law-practitioner says:
“Don’t treat them as equals; at least start treating
them as human beings! Then members of all these organizations will lay down
their arms.”
The novel abounds
in pictures of heart-rending atrocities that Turkish regime metes out to the
Kurd people. It’s not limited to massacres, atrocities towards women and
similar war crimes, but there are savage measures no modern society can think
of like defiling wells and aqua ducts with shit.
The novelist is
very particular about presenting the experiences of discrimination as a
universal one. Tamo Mibang, the Northeast Indian officer who leads the Indian
intervention for Seetha, talks about how he has always endured
the humiliating ‘Chinky’ tag,
despite his bureaucratic status. Construction of the other and governments
thriving on it are nothing new to him.
“Eternal victims. In some places, these are Kurds. In
others, Muslims. In yet others, Adivasis. Elsewhere, Dalits…”
“Kurds actually give life to the Turks. They need
Kurds to feel better, to feel they are not lesser. They need to convince
themselves that there are others beneath them.”
“What happens is dehumanization.”
Musthafa gives the
same idea when he says: ‘taking birth as a Kurd in itself is a confrontation
with the system.’ In contemporary world literature it could be the words of any
other communities like Palestinians, Sri Lankan Tamils, Uighur Muslims, or
Rohingyas.
The uncompromising
approach Seetha has against patriarchal values informs her attitude towards
Indian society and explains her decision not to go back to Kerala, even after
release. She blurts out that in India, family honor is thought to rest in
between the legs of girl children. “we have a society .. that puts the blame on
raped women and pronounce them as the culprits.” Even mothers of such hapless
female victims hold this honor code higher than their lives. In contrast to
this ‘Keralite’ ethos, Seetha sees the readiness of her Kurd friends to
sacrifice anything to protect her as the mark of their indelible moral
superiority. That’s why she identifies herself with them and her love for
Devran becomes the love for Kurdistan. And that’s how the novel, though written
by a non-Kurd, becomes a tribute to their endurance. Quite often, she does weep
profusely, at times even to the discomfort of her comrades like Timur. Yet she
scoffs at the masculine taboo on tears and comments that Turkish men are just
like their Kerala counterparts in this regard.
The parallels between Turkey, that suppresses Kurds, and contemporary India run throughout the novel. ‘That’s how a fascist government works. Sow seeds of fear to nip in the bud voices that may be raised against them.’ This observation about the Turkish treatment of Kurds is a precise one about contemporary India as well. The cynical comments about how the Turkish government erected majestic walls while its citizens are left loafers, looks like an Indian troll today. But, beyond the cynicism, the fact that Turkey erected the third largest wall in the world splitting people of the same blood twain, brings out the absurdity of wishful map-making. The miserable irony of it here is the fact that the only escape route from Turkish Kurdistan is through Syria, burning itself as it is, which was thus divided beyond access. Also, it is well worth remembering that the Indian subcontinent was the worst to suffer for whimsical cartography prompted by political expediency, resulting in the largest-ever human exodus in modern history. The pit Turkish journalism has fallen into is another parallel with Indian situations. A female journalist character exclaims: ‘I chose this profession to tell truth to the power. Now I live by writing stories favorable to the government in a manner that suck up to them!’
Streaks of
Light
That the world of
the novel is steeped in the darkest of human experiences could be the
explanation why the novelist highlights even the tiniest sparks of love,
friendship and camaraderie beyond borders, wherever it may be found. The help
the Turkish old man Abdulla provides Hosane and Musthafa while at Sarya-Hosane
couples’ is one such example. Similar is the case with the old matriarch Narjes
who risks her life itself with the patrolling army, in order to save them.
Without the protection the guerilla fighters -the female Peshmerga- including
Berivan and her comrades offer, they would never have survived. Seetha would
bear her eternal indebtedness to her rebel friends, the epitome of which would
be Timur’s life-sacrifice for her. What Dadwar, the taxi driver, passionately
reveals about the secular cultural legacy of his homeland is an eye-opener for
Seetha:
“Only Muslims? No way! Among us Kurds you have
Christians, Jews and followers of other religions. Our language, our culture
and this revered land make us one, make us Kurds!”
But he is pained
to see the State-orchestrated demolitions of Christian churches, heading to
destroy that harmony. He shows Seetha the sights of Sur, four thousand
years old cultural center, razed to the ground. Dilva would perish for the Kurd
cause, but only after exemplifying the most valid lesson for her lover Arman:
namely, the waiting motherland is far more deserving than the waiting mother.
Incidentally, this is in sharp contrast to Seetha’s predicament: she, coming as
she does from the relatively stable socio-political atmosphere that Kerala
offers, doesn’t feel that her land is waiting for her. 'Nationalistic'
idealization of homeland holds no charm for her.
Seetha’s perilous
quest for Devran becomes a break-neck speed run-for-life adventure as well,
from the very start. Turkey officials are just behind her, tipped off probably
by the restaurant owner to whom she inadvertently revealed her identity. It
would soon be clear why Timur was uncomfortable throughout the day and why he
never liked the man. He would tell her that she needs to grow up and has to
give up the naiveté to trust all, in a land were even breathing is under the
scrutiny of intelligence department. The country is different from what Seetha
has known so far, as one character puts it: ‘The Constitution doesn’t run this
country. Guns do.’ This need not
necessarily be Kurdistan; it applies to anywhere in the world where similar
circumstances prevail. Yet, the novel doesn’t dwell on the thriller mood of
genre fiction, but follows the painful Kurd predicament in all its
socio-political magnitudes. In doing so,
the novel reminds one of Yasminah Khadra, the Algerian novelist. The term ‘zin’
from Kurmanji language could be a reference to attempts to tame the untamable,
like the saddle on a horse, and suggest that the quest of a people for identity
and foothold cannot be contained by any force.
-Fazal
Rahman
More on Kurd Experience:
Memed, My Hawk by Yaşar Kemal
https://alittlesomethings.blogspot.com/2024/08/memed-my-hawk-by-yasar-kemal.html
Zin by Haritha Savithri (Malayalam)
https://alittlesomethings.blogspot.com/2024/06/zin-by-haritha-savithri-malayalam.html
Murivettavarude Pathakal by Haritha Savithri/ മുറിവേറ്റവരുടെ പാതകൾ (Malaylam Travelogue)
https://alittlesomethings.blogspot.com/2024/04/blog-post.html
Daughters of Smoke and Fire by Ava Homa
https://alittlesomethings.blogspot.com/2024/08/daughters-of-smoke-and-fire-by-ava-homa.html
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