About the Author:
Rabindranath Tagore was born in Calcutta in 1861, the youngest son of the influential spiritual leader Debendranath Tagore. The elder Tagore was instrumental in the Brahmo Samaj reformist movement, which was a monotheistic interpretation of Hinduism based the Upanishads of the Vedic texts and a community form of worship that eschewed the typical class delineations of the traditional Indian caste system. Rabindranath was raised in this religious tradition and it is clearly reflected in his work.
Rabindranath Tagore was a significant contributor to the modernisation of Bengali literature and published in all genres at the period, including poetry, theatre, prose, memoir, philosophy, and song lyrics. The vast bulk of his short stories were written at the end of the 19th century, but he didn't write in every genre all the time. The majority of Tagore's short stories were written in the 1890s, and this Penguin collection of his works nearly entirely concentrates on short fiction from that decade, as noted in the collection's preface.
About the Short Story:
Brothers Dukhiram Rui and Chidam Rui not only work in the fields together but live together on the same land. Every day, while they are out, their wives Radha and Chandara quarrel loudly with each other, and the whole village hears their screaming. Since they are all of a lower caste, life is hard for them—often Dukhiram and Chidam are cheated out of their rightful wages for their work.
One day, Dukhiram returns home from work famished. When he demands food, his wife Radha chastises him, asking how she can cook him food when he hasn’t supplied her with anything to cook him. Worn out by the day and angered by this exchange, Dukhiram impulsively stabs Radha in the head, and she dies shortly after. Their 18-month-old son wails in terror.
When the brothers’ landlord Ramlochan Chakrabarti comes by to inquire about the rent payment that’s due, he finds the bloody scene and a despondent Dukhiram. Chidam, in an effort to protect his brother, tells Ramlochan that his wife Chandara killed Radha during one of their spats. Ramlochan believes Chidam and gives him legal advice about how to protect his wife. And with that, Chidam is trapped in his lie.
Chidam ultimately coerces Chandara into confessing the murder to the police, claiming that he has a plan for getting her out of the mess. When the police come, Chandara indeed admits to the murder, but doesn’t follow Chandara’s plan. She decides that if her husband is going to betray her to make her take the blame for something Dukhiram did, then she’d rather be hanged than continue to live with Chidam.
When her trial rolls around, both Chidam and Dukhiram confess the truth to the judge. But when Ramlochan tells the judge that Chidam’s story closely resembles one that Chidam proposed telling to protect his wife, the brothers’ confessions are discounted as false. On the other hand, Chandara sticks to her confession that she murdered Radha, and this is taken as the truth. At the gallows, when a doctor asks if Chandara wants to see her husband one last time, she says “To hell with him!”
Works Cited
Tagore, Rabindranath. “Rabindranath Tagore: Short Stories “Punishment” Summary and Analysis.” GradeSaver, 20 February 2023, https://www.gradesaver.com/rabindranath-tagore-short-stories/study-guide/summary-punishment. Accessed 15 March 2023.
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