Chandalika

 "Chandalika" is a play written by Rabindranath Tagore(1861-1941).Rabindranath Tagore was a Bengali polymath who worked as a poet, writer, playwright, composer, philosopher, social reformer and painter. Chandalika is a story of a girl from the untouchable caste of India. Her life as a women and then as an untouchable women is full of rejections who then was moved by a Buddhist monk.

In this play the main character are mother, Prakriti (daughter) and Ananda(the Buddhist Monk).Prakriti, an untouchable woman, lives at the discriminatory society with her mother. She always used to questioned why she was considered as untouchable while she breathes the same air as others and she is a human just like all.One hot day while she was returning to home from fetching water from the river she met Ananda.Ananda, a disciple of Lord Buddha accepts a drink of water from a lady of the untouchable caste, and she falls in love with him. His honor of her as somebody’s making her feel that it’s her new birth.Living her whole life as unequal she was honored by him and she instantly gives her heart to the monk thinking that if she marries him she will be the happiest she had ever been. She says that she is unable to live without him and persuades her mother to cast a magical spell on him.Seeing her daughter’s suffering her mother becomes ready to bind him with her magical spell though she knows that she is doing wrong and monks don't get married.Instead they leave there house,wives,relatives and family behind in order to get inner peace. She has to work terribly hard for a long time risking her life. Finally, her magic wins, and Ananda is seen at her house overcome by shame.Ananda prays to Buddha, who breaks the magical spell and saves them from committing sin. Ananda despite his own pain pardons and blesses Prakriti at the end. Prakriti also realizes that if you love someone, you shouldn’t hold them in captivity but rather set them free.

"Chandalika" drama shows the sufferings and mental traumas of those who have not been treated fair just because they belong to a certain caste.It is the basic human right to be treated fairly and equally.If Prakriti had not been treated unequally her whole life she would have never fell in love with just the monk drinking water from her pot and talked her nicely.She had never been treated with such hospitality that she instantly gave  her heart to the monk.This drama shows that humanity doesn’t have any race and the variations on the caste of people contain equal purity of dignity.Similarly, there is the excellent philosophy of Buddha’s principle to tolerate everyone with respect, peace, and love.