Issues of Biology and Transgressions in The God of Small Things

Arundhati Roy once in an interview said that her book, The God of Small Things is not about history but biology and transgressions. The transgressions in history began thousands of years back. 'That it really began in the days when the Love Laws were made. Laws that lay down who should be loved, and how. And how much. (The God of Small Things, 33) The scholars who read the novel might doubt that why should Christians be more concerned about the untouchable laws. The answer can trace from the novel and the history of Kerala. Syrian Christians in Kerala were originally from high caste rich Brahmins who voluntarily migrated into Christianity from the disciple of Jesus Christ, St. Thomas 2000 years ago. They felt very proud of their lineage and they married among themselves. Any type of transgression was intolerable and unthinkable for them.

This migration from one culture to another one was not completed in its full sense and this migration was itself a type of transgression to their original ancient religion. However, they did not renounce certain social practices and they inherited the age-old practice of untouchability even though they accepted Christianity. Untouchability was unknown to Christianity as per its principles. The Syrian Christians portrayed in the novel had many complexities due to this transgression from Brahminism to Christianity. Pappachi did not permit untouchables into the house. Caste Christians did not allow the untouchables to touch anything that touchables touched like Caste Hindus. In Mammachi's girlhood, Paravans were expected to crawl backward with a broom for sweeping away their footprints. Therefore, Syrian Christians or Brahmins would not step into the footprints of paravans. She told the twins that untouchables were not permitted to walk on public roads. They were not permitted to cover their upper bodies and use umbrellas. They should place their hands over their mouths when they spoke to touchables for diverting their polluted breath away from the touchables.

For escaping from the social plague of untouchability, untouchables in Malabar converted into Christianity. They did not want to continue as untouchables in the Hindu religion. A number of paravanes, pelayas and pulayas were converted to Christianity and joined the Anglican Church at the time of British rule. This transgression happened as the incentive given to them like food and money. As a result, they were again transgressed and known as Rice-Christians. Later they realized that this transgression did not bring any expected results. On the other hand, they were placed from the frying pan into the fire. They were more segregated as Christians. They had separate churches, services, and priests. There was a special favour for them that they were given a separate Pariah Bishop. After independence, they were cheated that they were not entitled to government benefits like job reservations or bank loans at the lowest interest rates. Because, as per official records, they were all Christians and so considered as casteless. 'It was a little like having to sweep away your footprints without a broom. Or worse, not being allowed to leave footprints at all.' (The God of Small Things, 74)

When Velutha was eleven years old, Mammachi on vacation from Delhi noticed Velutha's remarkable skill. She persuaded Velutha's father Vellya Paapen to take admission to the untouchables' school that was founded by Mammachi's father-in-law Punnyan Kunju for the untouchables. Johann Klein, a carpenter from Bavaria came to Kottayam and conducted a workshop for the local carpenters under the Christian Mission Society. Every day after school, Velutha went to Kottayam and worked with Johann Klein. At the age of sixteen, Velutha finished his school education and became a talented carpenter. Traditionally, Paravans were not supposed to do the work of the carpenter. By the persuasion of Mammachi, Velutha became a skilled carpenter. Thus, he also transgressed his traditional work inherited from his ancestors.

All appreciated Velutha's transgression from ancestral work into the carpenter's work. He made a Bauhaus dining table with twelve dining chairs in rosewood and made a manger for the Infant Jesus to be born. Besides these carpentry skills, he was an expert in repairing machines. 'Mammachi (with impenetrable Touchable logic) often said that if only he hadn't been a Paravan, he might have become an engineer.' (The God of Small Things, 75) Because he had repaired radios, clocks, water-pumps and looked after all the plumbing and electrical work of the Ayemenem house. Velutha was the designer of the sliding-folding door of the back veranda of the Ayemenem house. Velutha had freely touched the things that touchables touched. According to Mammachi, it was a big concession for a Paravan. Usually, she did not persuade Velutha to enter the house except for needy circumstances.

Velutha was an inevitable person in the Ayemenem house and Paradise pickles & Preserves because he reassembled the Bharat bottle-sealing machine and he maintained a new canning machine and an automated pineapple slicer. He was the man who oiled water pump and a small diesel generator. He built the aluminum sheet of the factory and the ground-level furnaces for boiling fruit. Velutha's father Vellya Paapen was against any type of transgression. He was a paravan who had seen the crawling backward days in his childhood. Therefore, he always tried to stick to the established social code. He was very loyal to the Ayemenem family because when he had an accident with the stone chip, Mammachi had paid for his glass eye. He always felt that his new eye was the eye of the Ayemenem family. 'His gratitude widened his smile and bent his back.' (The God of Small Things, 76)

Vellya Paapen was afraid of his son, Velutha. He felt that Velutha might transgress everything. He was not afraid of what he said or what he did in his life but the way he did everything. 'Perhaps it was just a lack of hesitation. An unwarranted assurance. In the way, he walked. The way he held his head. The quiet way he offered suggestions without being asked. Or the quiet way in which he disregarded suggestions without appearing to rebel.' (The God of Small Things, 76) According to Vellya Paapen, these qualities were acceptable for the touchables. For Paravans, these qualities to be construed as insolence. Any way Vellya Paapen felt that Velutha had already crossed the boundaries decided for the untouchables. He expressed his fear and anxiety about his son.

The novel, The God of Small Things presents the tragic consequences of migration from culture to another, transgressions of ethos and the evil influences of one country on the other. The family of Ayemenem was racially Brahmins, converted into Syrian Christians. Rev. E. John Ipe was a pious Christian, reputed and respected for his Christian ethos. It was reported that the chief head of the Syrian Christian church, the Patriarch of Antioch met Rev. E. John Ipe in Cochin. He had the honour of kissing the hand of Antioch. The pious and virtuous Christian origin of the family and its subsequent decay and decline suggests the rise and fall of the Roman Empire.

In addition to this, the references to foreign countries, England, Vienna in Austria, America, and similarly the visitors from Australia, Ireland, and England in the novel, stressed the various roles played through the migration on the decline of the family. It is pertinent to note that these acquaintances and associations influenced the concerned characters to acquire new habits, qualities, and attributes. For example, Pappachi returned from Vienna with jealousy for his young and charming wife. He indulged in wife-beating and attempted to spoil the beauty of his wife. Pappachi's fashion and fascination for England made him Anglophile, and the resultant egoism, self-centeredness, inability to understand others' emotions made him an enemy of his wife and children.

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Chacko visited England only to return as a scheming and selfish villain. Baby Kochamma went to America to study. She came back as a bloated cucumber. She was desperate, intolerant, and sadistic. She was unable to see Ammu having sexual satisfaction from Velutha because she was deprived of the same. Besides, the foreign elements introduced in the novel were the Australian missionary friend of Baby Kochamma, who played a secondary role in the destruction of the Ayemenem House. Irish Father Mulligan, who ultimately died as a Hindu sannyasi and English man 'Kari Saipu's the History House also witnessed many things. If we read the opinions of Arundhati Roy as expressed in her non-fiction, the mention of these foreign countries in the novel suggested serious and dangerous implications, and they also reminded us of the cross-currents and under-currents of foreign influences on the colonial as well as the post-colonial India.

The migration of communist ideology into the village, Ayemenem, gave a new hope of liberation to the untouchables who were dissatisfied with their plight in life. Velutha desired recognition and respect like any other human being. Therefore, when communism offered liberation, he joined them and carried the party flag in the march in Cochin. However, unfortunately, he was not only cheated but also robbed of his love and life. The corruption and moral degradation of some communist leaders embodied in K N M Pillai, who lacked qualms of conscience to deny the truth that Velutha was a card holding member of the party and to positively precipitated his death at the hands of the police. The communism in the novel and comrade K N M Pillai hadn't enough integrity to liberate the small beings at the bottom of the society, because the members consisted of new patriarchs like Chacko, an Oxford-educated communist-capitalist, lacking even ordinary morality when it comes to his 'man's needs' and Comrade K N M Pillai, an entrepreneur, who makes business with Chacko privately and calls him, 'management' in public and prides himself in organizing Kathakali, based on 'Mahabharata'.

Rahel's marriage was the story of another transgression. She was studying at the School of Architecture. Larry McCaslin came to Delhi for collecting study material for the thesis. He met her two times in two places. The first time he noticed her in the school library and after that a few days later he met her in Khan Market. He felt a jazz tune in him and he followed her into the bookshop. However, both of them were not looking at books. Arundhati Roy describes her transgression. 'Rahel drifted into marriage like a passenger drift towards an unoccupied chair in an airport lounge.' (The God of Small Things, 18) She went to Boston with Larry McCaslin. He thought about Rahel that he had received a gift in life. The emotional discordance between them was reflected when they made love. Her eyes offended him and her eyes behaved as they belonged to someone else. The hollowness in Rahel led immediately into divorce.

Baby Kochamma had many transgressions in her life even though her transgressions did not lead to marriage. For the sake of love, she did transgressions to her religious denomination. Her father was a priest of the Mar Thoma Church. Even though she decided to convert into Roman Catholic and joined as a nun. Later she refused to reconvert and preferred to remain in her life as Roman Catholic. When she was eighteen, she fell in love with a young Irish monk Father Mulligan. He was in Kerala for deputation from seminary in Madras. The purpose of the deputation was to study the Hindu Scriptures and denounce them intelligently. Instead of denouncing intelligently the Hindu Scriptures, he became a Hindu sannyasi after renouncing Christianity. Therefore, the story of Baby Kochamma and Father Mulligan was very interesting with a lot of ironies and complexities.

Father Mulligan and Baby Kochamma's father reverend E. John Ipe belonged to different denominations of the church. Every Thursday, father Mulligan visited the Ayemenem house to meet reverend E. John Ipe. Baby Kochamma at her tender age hovered around the dining table for the attention of father Mulligan. Baby Kochamma also tried to seduce the father Mulligan by exhibiting charity. Every Thursday morning, at the time of father Mulligan's arrival, she forcefully bathed a poor village boy at the well and addressed him with a good morning. In the pretext of asking biblical doubts, she used to meet father Mulligan every time. 'Every Thursday, undaunted by the merciless midday sun, they would stand there by the well. The young girl and the intrepid Jesuit, both quaking with unchristian passion. Using the Bible as a ruse to be with each other.' (The God of Small Things, 24)

Biblical doubts and charitable activity continued for a year and father Mulligan had to return to Madras. At last, Baby Kochamma transgressed her denomination of the church and became a Roman Catholic. She joined in a convent in Madras with the hope of legitimate meeting, father Mulligan, and discuss theology. She expected nearness of father Mulligan and dreamed them together. Very soon, she realized the futility of her transgression. Senior sisters in the convent already monopolized the priests and bishops with biblical doubts more sophisticatedly than Baby Kochamma. She became restless and unhappy in the convent. She knew that Mother Superior used to read all letters before posting. Therefore, she communicated her grief to the family in the name of Koh-i-noor befooling the Mother Superior. Her mother pointed out that it was Baby Kochamma in the name of Koh-i-noor. Reverend E. John Ipe immediately went o Madras and brought back Baby Kochamma from the convent.

Reverend E. John Ipe understood that her daughter achieved more than enough reputation improbable to find a husband. If she could not have a husband, then the next alternative was arranged an education. Her father arranged to study a diploma course in Ornamental Gardening at the University of Rochester in America. After two years of education at Rochester, Baby Kochamma became extremely large and there was no trace of the slim attractive girl. Baby Kochamma became more in love with father Mulligan instead of forgetting him. Her love was also more passionate than ever. Diverting her attention, her father made her the charge of the front garden of the Ayemenem house.

Father Mulligan had tried to condemn Hindu Scriptures intelligently and at last, he transgressed to his religion and faith. He became a Hindu sannyasi, a devotee of Lord Vishnu. Out of curiosity and a plan of denouncing the Hindu Scriptures, he contemplated for years. Father Mulligan's transgressions had more complications. Even though, he was in touch with Baby Kochamma for years. He used to write and send greetings on the occasions of Diwali and New Year. Baby Kochamma had a grievance against father Mulligan. She felt that father Mulligan offended her. Father Mulligan renounced the Roman Catholic vows for embracing Hinduism. Baby Kochamma expected that he would have renounced his catholic vows for embracing the love of Baby Kochamma. Instead of loving Baby Kochamma, father Mulligan loved the Hinduism very passionately and became the preacher of Hinduism. Father Mulligan sent a photo to Baby Kochamma in which he was addressing middle-class Punjabi widows. As a Hindu Sannyasi, father Mulligan was in a saffron coloured dress and Punjabi widows were in a white dress with sari palloos over their heads. 'A yolk addressing a sea of boiled eggs. His white beard and hair were long but combed and groomed. A saffron Santa with votive ash on his forehead.' (The God of Small Things, 298)

The character of father Mulligan was not only migrated into India with the Roman Catholic faith. He never went back to Ireland and he settled in India as a Hindu Sannyasi. He was a typical symbol of transgression and migration in the novel. The novelist had ironically presented the character, father Mulligan. Father Mulligan's story was presented as a scathing attack on conversions of the Hindus into Christian faith by the Christian missionaries like Ancestors of the Ayemenem family who had converted the family of Velutha into the faith of Christianity from the Hindu religion.

Father Mulligan died in an ashram in Rishikesh because of viral hepatitis. His death did not stop Baby Kochamma's identical entries in her diary, I love you I love you. Father Mulligan was still alive in the memories of Baby Kochamma. 'At least her memory of him was hers. Wholly hers. Savagely, fiercely, hers. Not to be shared with Faith, far less with competing co-nuns, and co-sadhus or whatever it was they called themselves. Co-swamis.' (The God of Small Things, 298) Baby Kochamma tried to reconvert from Hindu Sannyasi and came to lunch on Thursday in her dreams. Thus, Arundhati Roy had presented the theme of transgression with a more sarcastic tone.