Review: The Story of 'Battala'

Reviewed Work(s): Power in Print: Popular Publishing and the Politics of Language and
Culture in a Colonial Society, 1778-1905 by Anindita Ghosh
Review by: Sumanta Banerjee
Source: Economic and Political Weekly , Apr. 12 - 18, 2008, Vol. 43, No. 15 (Apr. 12 - 18,
2008), pp. 44-46
Published by: Economic and Political Weekly

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 generation of semi-educated lower middle
The Story of 'Battala' class Bengali entrepreneurs (whom she
describes as "petty bhadraloks"), with the
help of plebeian smiths and artisans, to set
SUMANTA BANERJEE
up small printing presses in Battala. They
brought out popular versions of puranic
the history myths,
of traditional moral tales, romantic
trans
to literacy, stories,
whether educational texts, almanacs - and
experience
Power in Print: Popular Publishing and the later, of
colourful reports of the
local scandals.
read Politics
and of Language and Culture in a write Colonial Printed on cheap paper, and bound in thin
the
Society, 1778-1905 by Anindita Ghosh; Oxford
collective
University Press, New Delhi, 2006; pp xi+348, Rs 650.
practice
paper jackets, the Battala books were low-
adults making priced anduse,
were thus affordable to thefor
print mediacommon-
people. As each
they were written in c
moment.The era of Bengali books in print began simple Bengali, a
Such with the mom
words spelt
with the establishmentCalcutta
colonial of a vernacular according to- colloquial pronunciation, w
and printing press in a small Danish settlementthese books could be read and compre-
educationally
near Calcutta called Serampore (Srirampur)hended
encountered a easily by
newthe minority of semi- te
ing press. The
in 1800 by Christian missionaries. The sameliterate people, and understood by the
encoun
distinct set up a college -majority of the unlettered masses to
year, the British rulerssegment o
known as
out of all places 'Battala'
- in the military whom they were read out in gatherings
citadel of - t
rived from the area in north Calcutta Fort William in Calcutta, for teaching thein villages or marketplaces. Battala litera-
newly arrived British civilians the localture thus became a bridge between orality
known by that name, where the first Bengali
printing presses were set up in the early
languages. In her first two chapters ('Socialand literacy in 19th century Bengali popular
19th century, and which brought out cheapProfile of a Language' and 'Literature, Lan-culture. Quoting extensively from contem-
guage and Reform'), Ghosh explains howporary observers, Ghosh points out that
popular books. They constitute a literary
genre which records the efforts of thethe Sanskrit-educated Bengali teachersthis wide reach of Battala reflected the
underprivileged people to use this newly
(employed by the Fort William authori-pluralities that prevailed in the culture of
introduced print media to register their
ties), in the course of writing textbooks forthe vast majority of the Bengali-speaking
voices. Their cultural tastes dovetailed them, standardised the Bengali languagepeople. By giving printed form to this
with the commercial motivation of the and literary forms (strictly based on theplurality of voices, ranging from the patois
printers and writers who also came fromnorms of Sanskrit grammar and classics).of the Calcutta streets to the slang of the
the same urban petite bourgeoisie and The Serampore missionaries, besides bring-village marketplace, from the domestic
lower classes. ing out their own Christian tracts andspeech of women to the dialect of
Anindita Ghosh, who teaches modern pamphlets, took on the job of printingMuslim boatmen, Battala publications
history at the University of Manchester,these books from their press. "The con-offered a counterculture vis-a-vis the "high"
narrates this fascinating story of the birthjunction of the need for textbooks for theliterature of the educated bhadraloks,
and development of the Battala printing(Fort William) College", Ghosh points out,who mainly followed the hegemonistic
industry. Based on rigorous research "and the availability of a printing press atmodel of a uniform "standardised"
over several years, her book unearths Serampore, thus provided the perfectBengali written style.
the vast world of popular print-culture opportunity for setting literary standards Yet, Battala, by today's standards,
and the social milieu of its composers in Bengali print for the first time". cannot be valorised as a progressive voice
and readers in 19th century Calcutta and But these "literary standards" (heavilyof radical reforms or anti-colonial strug-
neighbouring areas (like Dhaka in east Sanskritised and oriented to elite tastes)gles. It did not pose a political challenge to
Bengal). Supported by a lucid theoreticalwere soon to face defiance from an unsus- the ruling powers. As Ghosh explains
analysis, it introduces arguments thatpected quarter. Typecasting of Bengalilater, it usually subscribed to the prevalent
challenge certain conventional assump-letters for printing, initiated by Serampore,conservative socio-religious values by
tions regarding the elite-popular divide,had opened up the possibility of publishingberating female education and widow-
the homogeneity of the Bengali reader- and circulating multiple copies of a single remarriage. But, because of its preponder-
ship, and the marginalisation of popularbook (which till then had to be painstak-ance of erotic tales, scatological proverbs,
culture among other issues. Ghosh thusingly copied from one manuscript to an-raunchy female folk speech, satirical
opens up a debate on the power of theother) among a wider readership. Ghoshbarbs against the educated gentry, it
underprivileged to resist the culturaldescribes in her next two chapters (The was perceived as a cultural threat by
hegemony of the elite with the help of aBattala Book Market' and 'Contesting Printthe upper class proponents of a genteel
modern technology. Audiences') how this encouraged a newBengali, who even went to the extent

44 April 12, 2008 B259 Economica Political wi. 1. Ki.N

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 t BOOK REVIEW

of taking the
left. According help
to some later of
day historians, the arrival the
of print colon
culture, instead of silenc-
administration
these Bengali Muslimto ban
writers of some
Battala, ing pre-print ofpaved
tastes and traditions, its p
cations under the Obscene Publications reacting to the attempts to Sanskritise the the way for their survival within the
Act in 1856. Bengali language by the Hindu pundits ofprinted domain. More importantly, Ghosh
Fort William, in an atavistic return to their rightly states that the entire Bengali
Battala Publications
religious identity, sought to Urduise the bhadralok community could not be identi-
language. Along with the usual stuff of fied with the elite - since a large segment
At the end, Ghosh devotes three chapters
to some typical examples of Battala
moral-messages, social commentaries and consisted of the "petty bhadralok"
social satires, women's writings, romantic
and a stories which it shared with other ("...huge population of educated from
in publications, dobhashi literature the surrounding suburbs of Calcutta
Battala
special group of publications composed
had a high component of epic tales of awhich crowded the lower levels of the
a style that catered to the Bengali Muslim
heroic
readership in those days. Analysing thenature. "In a world threatened with city's government and commercial offices
modernisation,
satires (written and published mainly by dislocation, and corrup-...(whose) coarseness and vulgarity" set
tion",
the "petty bhadraloks"), Ghosh notes theGhosh explains, "the happy talesthem apart from the "refinement of the
"compounding of lower middle class the marvellous and the supernatural educated babu...").
of and
caste aspirations" in their attacks on the meaning and stability, community,
offered These arguments open up an interest-
anglicised members of the educated
andand
fraternity" to the Muslim readership. ing area of investigation, and call for some
She could have added some of the visual comments.
prosperous middle classes, who came * I agree that a strict binary divi-
illustrations
almost invariably from high castes. The of these "marvellous and sion cannot be drawn between elite and
attacks extended to women, whosupernatural"
were figures of the dobhashi popular cultural worlds in 19th century
stereotyped in these satires in a manner Calcutta. It is well known that the scion of
books, which were copied from the Persian
manuscript
that reflected the "converging male con- paintings - as distinct from
a Bengali elite family, Kaliprasanna Sinha,
cern of high and low, rural and urban
the on
style of the Battala woodcut prints that
used the Calcutta street patois to write his
the issue of gender and domestic order".
she reproduces in her book. popular farce Hutom Penchar Naksha, that
By making the woman the scapegoat, An
whootherwise excellently well- the lower class members of Bengali society
documented and engrossing narrative, made use of the elite-introduced print
was "variously depicted as nagging, domi-
thein Print is marred by a few minor medium to narrate their stories, and some
Power
nating and enticing", Battala reflected
concerns of the male writers and readers errors that could have been avoided with of the "respectable bhadraloks" surrepti-
of Calcutta of those days (mainly migrants proper editing. Dwarkanath Tagore (1794-tiously read their spiciest tales. But such
from neighbouring villages), who felt 1846) did not belong to the Pathuriaghataparticular instances of interaction between
harassed by constant demands for money family (p 53); nor was Prasannakumar the privileged eUte and the disadvantaged
from their wives left behind in the villages, Tagore (1803-68) known to be a Brahmolower sections (which also included the
were perpetually gnawed by suspicion of Samaj member (p 54). The two were dis- semi-educated "petty bhadraloks" like
their infidelity in their absence, and allured tant cousins, their common ancestor beingclerks, shopkeepers, traders, Battala
by both fear of and fascination for the urban Jayram Thakur (Tagore). But they branched writers and printers) in the cultural scene
seductive female archetype - the prostitute. off into two different families. Dwar- should not blind us to the wider socio-
Ghosh elaborates on these male-female kanath (Rabindranath's grandfather) built economic sphere, which was far from a
tensions when taking up Battala books aofhouse in Jorasanko in north Calcutta, level-playing field where the members of
and his descendants became members of
assertive female voices (in the chapter the two groups could compete in comfort-
the Brahmo Samaj, while Prasannakumar
'Women Refusing Conformity'), where she able coexistence. The educated upper
discovers a counter-culture of dissidence lived in Pathuriaghata, further west to
classes as the dominating power were in a
by women "in proposing ambiguous and Jorasanko, and established himself as better
a position to initiate a process of
alternative models of the social world, inleader of the city's Hindu gentry. change in Calcutta's society and economy,
holding on to particular speech genres which adversely affected the culture of
despite much reformist opposition. . ." The Survival and Continuity the lower orders by dislocating the tradi-
Ghosh unveils yet another facet of the But these little lapses do not detract from
tional folk artistes. Withdrawal of patron-
variegated contemporary Bengali socio-Ghosh's major arguments which should age from these artistes, propagation of a
cultural life in her chapter dealing withstimulate a debate among scholars work-refined Bengali, imposition of a new set
the 'Muslim Other' - Battala books bying on 19th century Bengali culture. Sheof moral values imbibed from their mid-
Muslim authors, which were written in aargues that, contrary to the usual belief,
Victorian mentors, and an offensive - often
hybrid Bengali (known as 'dobhashi', mix- the print technology could not be mono-
with the help of the colonial, administration
ing Urdu, Arabic and Persian words), andpolised by the "elite" (as evident from the- against what the elite considered "vulgar"
which often reversed the conventional counter-history of Battala). Further, con-in popular culture, led to the gradual
testing the theory that the print-dependentmarginalisation of most of Calcutta's folk
printed script of left-to-right reading and
followed instead the Persian and Arabic entertainments like 'kobigans', 'jatras',
elite culture marginalised pre-technological
style of reading from the right page to the folk cultural forms, she maintains that.'panchalis', female 'jhumur' songs, and

Economic &Political WEEKLY DSSSI APRIL 12, 2OO8 45

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BOOK REVIEW

street performances like swangs. flugschriften in Germany, skill-means of communication. The Battala
Even
England,
ingtryck
urban folk paintings like the Kalighat in Sweden, bibliothèque bleu inchapbooks, by offering them entertainment,
'pats*
France, or lubok in Russia. Like Battala, information and instruction, became their
were ousted by the entry of oleographs
they all shared the same features - printedstaple at that stage of their development.
and printed pictures in the market.
Ghosh points out that Battala, on
bycheap
mak-paper and priced at rates that In fact, even today in the vast Bengali
ing use of the print technology, affordable to the semi-literate poor; countryside and the urban slums, where
werehelped
a style that was in close proxi- the transition to the standardised form of
written in to
some of these pre-print folk traditions
mity to colloquial
survive. It indeed circulated reprints of conversation; and pre-literacy is yet to be completed, a new gen-
Gopal Urey's Vidya-Sundar Jatra, for romantic tales, religious myths, eration of semi-literate people are hungry
Dashu
ference
Ray's Panchalis, and popularised sex and violence, and almanacsfor such books. Anindita Ghosh should be
the
stories of
among
wood-print versions of the dying other things.
Kalighat happy to know that Battala is still alive
Significantly
'pat' paintings that embellished its books. enough, most of theseand kicking in modern Kolkata, catering
It is however necessary to delve of cheap popular print culture dis-to their various needs. From the same old
further
types
appeared
into the causes why Battala thrived, in England and other Europeandingy streets, traditional letterpress print
while
the other urban popular cultural forms
countries by the turn of the 20th century,shops are churning out cheap handbooks
while Battala
lost out in the face of the upper class continued to flourish in like Patent Oushad Shiksha (lessons in
offensive. Its success was rooted to the basic
Bengal. The expansion of formal educa-
making patent medicines) for paramedics,
form of the medium that it chose. The tion (through schools) in Europe during
compounders and ayurvedics who practise
print technology was by its very nature the late i9th-early 20th century period,
in the villages, or entertainment material
democratic - in the sense that its tools like BiyerGaan (wedding songs) for women.
absorbed the children of the previous gen-
could be manufactured by the commoneration of semi-literates into the main- While slim paperbacks carrying deceptive
spiritual-sounding titles like Hatha-yoga,
artisans and its products circulated among stream of educated population, who pre-
the masses. From the historical perspec-ferred (and could also afford) the new
serve hard core porn stuff to regular addicts,
there are ingenuously written romantic
tive, Calcutta's Battala was not unique. It standardised literature and newspapers to
had its predecessors in the cheap booksthe old fashioned chapbooks and broad-
tracts like Prempatra (Love-letters), which
profess to teach newly-married couples
that came out from every part of the world sheets. At the same time in Bengal, on the
how to exchange love missives!
wherever printing presses first came up - other hand, the semi-literate people were
from the 16th till the 19th century. Each still undergoing an evolution from the tra-
country had its own variety - chapbooks inditional oral to the new written and printed
Email: [email protected]

against illegitimate or 'bad' violence". She

'We Fight, Therefore We Are' then goes on to remind us that "(m)odern
torture has a practical rationale in the arena
of policing. It is integral to the mainten-
GAUTAM NAVLAKHA ance of the nation state's sovereignty where
national security needs override other
much one decries recourse
Violent Activism: A Psychological Study ofsocial values and legal rights. This legitmates
to violent means to achieve those forms of pain that the state can inflict
Ex-Militants in Jammu and Kashmir by Shobna
Sonpar; Aman Public Charitable Trust, NewOeihi;
political objectives, there is neither and those that are proscribed" (p 2).
April 2007; pp 227.
any sign of it abating nor a decline in at- Thus rehumanisation is necessary
tempts to suppress it violently. And while because the militants have a stake in post-
conflict reconstruction and without the
during the time of violent acts and after-
it is known that violence affects everyone,
including the perpetrators, violence participation of armed groups a stable
not The book under review is a psycho-
wards?
only begets violence but violence issocial social order and peace building cannot
per- analysis of violence, and an attempt
to unravel
ceived as the way to end violence. This is and understand the role of be achieved.
akin to the perception that onlythose
war who "have propelled their political
The author analyses the phenomenon
goals
against war can bring about peace. It is, through violent means" (p 1). The
from the perspective of 24 ex-militants in
therefore, important to take a close look at seeks to "make visible the experi-
study Jammu and Kashmir through a qualitative
violence. One area of inquiry is to under-
ence of ex-militants", to "bring fresh method.
in- "This consisted of a long semi-
meetto the understanding of violence" structured
stand why do people take to arms to sight and interview with individual res-
their political objectives? Is it that to
there pondents and one focus group discussion
help in "rehumanisation of these people"
are personal psychological factors which
(p 10). The author does well to point out
with another group of ex-militants" (p 11).
drives them to take to violent means? Or is it
that "(i)n popular discourse, the polarity
Through a review of the literature "signi-
that they are driven to it by circumstances? ficant themes" were identified and were
is not violence against non-violence. Rather,
What happens to them in the process,legitimate
both violence or 'good' violence is the
set "aims and objectives of the study". All

4" April 12, 2008 OSSI Economic &Political weekly

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