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Abstract
The dissensions for gender equality have been persisting since generations, advocating and publicizing western feminism and its theories, Indian feminist writers endeavoured their best to propose some modifications in the mindset of the people. V.M. Basheer was one of the prominent Malayalam novelists who pioneered writings with a focus on women issues. Among the feminist writers in Kerala it was Basheer who depicted women characters in his fiction on equal footing with men. His women characters are highly divergent in nature owing to varied unexplored themes that he portrayed in his novels. Before Basheer‘s writing, feminist ideas had crept in India through the contemplations of some feminist activists like Muddupalani through his poem in Telugu Radhika Santhwanam, Tarabai Shinde through her essay—Sthri-Purush Tulana and through Tagore‘s novel – Damini. Basheer‘s women characters in contrast to that of his contemporaries like Thakazhi, Lalithambika Antharjanam,O. Vijayan, Mukundan etc. were portrayed as extremely independent and outspoken. This was considered unusual for any stratum of the society at that moment in history. This paper makes an attempt to hypothesise that Basheer‘s idea of feminism parallels with the views of one of the eminent English feminist Mary Wollstonecraft who was the pioneer to demand equal rights for women in a patriarchal society. According to Wollstonecraft women should not be considered weaker or inferior to men. She further insisted that women must be treated as
equal to men since they play a pivotal role in the society like upbringing of children. She believes that gender roles are not natural but social. Aforementioned ideas have been reflected in Basheer‘s selected novels. This paper presents a thematic and theoretical analysis of women‘s characters in the selected novels of Basheer.