Charitraheen

Sharat Chandra Chattopadhyay

Genre: Romantic,Social

Language: Bengali

The novel is set in the Bengali society of the early 1900s. The story has four main women characters–two major, Savitri and Kiranmayi, and two minor, Surbala and Sarojini. The former two are accused of being charitraheen. It is most interesting that all four characters are totally different. However, even today, it is as thought-provoking and involving as it would have appeared to the readers of that bygone era, when novelists were quite a few and even those who wrote, seldom touched upon controversial issues of infidelity and social conventions.

The story begins with the love story of Satish and Savitri. Satish, a staunch Kulin Brahmin, falls for Savitri, who though belongs to a Brahmin family, is a widow, working as a servant in the mess, and is almost untouchable for the Hero in the tight lidded Hindu Society of the 1900s. As both of them are too aware of social hierarchy and diktats, they try to conceal their mutual feelings. They hide their love under the garb of humble care and servitude, thus deluding themselves and others.