Bruised, but not Broken (poems)
-Challapalli Swarooparani
32. De la Justice
He is the low-born Karna*
Of a discarded colony
He is talkative
He breathes out
The camphor’s stink
Of un lawful courts.
You’re the masters of knack
You know how to kill
Without bloodshed
He was hounded.
Could anyone tell me why the new judge
Got his chair cleaned with the ‘holy’ water of the Ganga?
Your honour!
By your grace all villages have turned into prisons
And devour our questions
For full twenty years:
‘No one murdered the Dalits!’
‘Rohith’s death is personal!’
You slept on martyrs’ memorials
You chased a mother
Till she exhausted her tears.
Your stale judgements
Stopped with dust
The ears of the Pariah colony.
See, the goddess of law is not that
Mythical Kunthi Devi of the Mahabharata
Who, at last, wept
Over the corpse of
Her illegitimate son Karna!
* Justice Karnan, the high court judge in Chennai
(Telugu: “Sikshamriti”, translated by N. R.Tapaswi and published in Bheem Bhoomi Monthly, December, 2017.)
*****
(To be continued-)
Challapalli Swaroopa Rani hails from a village, Pyaparru, Guntur District, Andhra Pradesh. She is one of the five daughters of Mariyamma and Mantraiah. Went to Govt school in her place, completed her college at Guntur, the District head quarters. Then shifted to Hyderabad Central University and involved in student politics as a founder member of Ambedkar Student’s Association. She had her master’s in History & Archaeology, M.Phil in Medieval History and Ph. D in Regional Studies. Swaroopa has obtained Gold Medal in her Masters Examinations. She has got her first recruitment as Asst. Professor in History at Potti Sriramulu Telugu University, Srisailam and got selected as Associate Professor in Buddhist Studies in Acharya Nagarjuna University, Guntur. She lives in Vijayawada. Presently she is a Professor of Buddhist Studies and Director, Center for Women’s Studies in the same University. She is specialized in studies on Buddhism, Caste, Religion, Gender, Tribal Studies, People’s Culture and Literature.