Book review: Valli by Sheela Tomy

The luckless land

Sometimes, things come together in the most beautiful manner. A writer writes a powerful story in a regional language, part allegory, part homily, wholly eco-fiction. Then along comes a translator who reads the book in the original language and reaches out to the author, offering to translate it into English. And thus, the work thankfully reaches a wider audience.

This is pretty much what happened with Valli, evocatively written by Sheela Tomy in Malayalam,  for which she won the Cherukad Award for Malayalam Literature in  2021. Now the book been superbly translated into English by Jayasree Kalathil.

Valli is the story of  the people who populate the hamlet of Kalluvayal in a portion of the Western Ghats that falls in north Kerala, of the steady encroachment of tribal lands, the abrogation of tribal rights, the rape of the land itself, and the intertwined strands of closeness as well as clashes between the denizens of the land.

Anjilikkunil Kochouseph,  a `heart-hardened man` from the plains, comes  to Wayanad, brings over his kin, builds houses, plants paddy, tapioca, rubber, and basically flourishes in Kalluvayal. The clan dynamics are far from equable and their story is told in absorbing detail.

Subterranean song

While the people of Kalluvayal are at the forefront, the story is owned by the land itself; verdant, lush, rich with resources, reverenced by the tribals who understand its subterranean song like no outsider can, challenged by the greed of the settlers who come up from the plains with just  their single-minded determination to do well.

On this plundered land live the Adivasis, with their beliefs, culture, their rights, their very lives now under threat. The juggernaut of progress rolls on inexorably and we know how this story will end.

The tale begins around the early 70s and tells  of the Naxal uprising, and how it was put down. It tells of fascinating women, be it Sara, Susan, Isabella, Kali, the tribal Veda princess of legend or Unniyachi,  the mysterious tribal devadasi deity,  how they show sudden flashes of strength and power, and how that too is attempted to be put down as fast as possible. It introduces us to people like Thommichan, Peter, Padmanabhan,  who know and respect land rights, who try to bring about change through education and indoctrination; these men pay the price for standing in the path of that rolling juggernaut bringing in its wake resorts, concrete mansions, and of course, the permanent alienation of the tribals.

The passages that describe Wayanad  with its gauzy wraps of mist, its ancient trees, the  flora and fauna of its jungles, the swift-flowing Kabani river, fairly takes the reader`s breath away. All the characters in Valli are  given their many moments in the spotlight, all of them riveting the reader`s attention.

Message of conservation

Somewhere near the end  of the book, one of the protagonists puts a diary back on her mother`s bookshelf, next to a Gabriel Garcia Marquez book. And the reader is struck by a thought: that Kalluvayal is rather like a Macondo transplanted to Kerala, complete in its coexistence and confrontations, its acts of generosity and malevolence.

But make no mistake.  Valli, which can mean vine/ a young girl/ wages/the earth,  in Malayalam,  is an original. It blends environmental concerns with societal dissensions, it pitches oppressor against victim, it shows us just what we can and are doing to this land of ours, beyond Wayanad, across the country. There are Biblical quotations, there are passages in the Paniya language, followed by a succinct translation by Kalathil, and then there is Tomy`s simple message of conservation which comes through loud and clear.

It will indeed be the rare  reader who will read Valli and not be affected by it.

Valli by Sheela Tomy. Translated by Jayasree Kalathil. HarperCollins Books. 420 pages. Rs 599.