The Study of Female Characters in Sudha Murty’s Dollar Bahu

Abstract

The female characters of Sudha Murthy oeuvre are not only endowed with the name of an elastic resilience, but they are also in fact, a conscious opposition to the cultural hegemony that attempts to restrain them. In my critical analysis, I enlighten on how these women are inverting normative prescriptions in their behavior, actions and heroism. They rebel through the mould of collective expectations by claiming individuality, taste, and fortitude, thus rejecting the domination of the patriarchs, domestic tutelage, injustice in the system and archaic conventions. Their daring act of nonconformity is not a simple vigilante event; it is the act itself, which enables them to create an autonomous story, which puts to pieces any suggestion that they can be nothing more than echoing echoes of others. The paper then questions how the characters of Murthy break their boundaries; how they struggle and triumph in a world dominated by men. By the stories, Murthy challenges the concept of empathy, understanding, and empowerment, and so motivates us to fight in favor of the rights and equality of women. Her writings break the norm and make the reader (at least me) reevaluate the preconceived ideas about the abilities of women in society, thus standing the so-called young, independent women as the sellers of their agency.