Baby, Indian by birth, is the character at the centre of the Wonder Girls trilogy. Originally, I didn't to want write a story that was not mine to tell. But I did want a diverse cast. So I researched and created a plausible backstory for Baby that would explain why she knew very little of her cultural heritage and how she came to be a London street kid. She would be the gang leader but we would not be inside her head.
However, it was during the development of this first book my then mentor suggested I make the story a dual narrative and Baby the second point of view character, I bowed to the mentor's experience and did just that. It was receiving some difficult feedback, from one reader, after I published the book, that convinced me I needed to not just to know but to tell Baby's whole story. At the time I was in the middle of Book 2 and my head was full of the Basque Children. The feedback stalled me a bit but after a while, I picked myself up and pressed on. You can read Baby’s backstory in books two and three. I am now very grateful to my mentor and that reader, for pushing me to write it.
Mukta Salve
A young Dalit woman, born in India around 1841, Mukta Salve, with the student resistance leader Sophie Scholl, inspired much of Baby's character and story.
In India’s caste system (a hierarchy that defines a person’s place and value in society) a Dalit is the lowest. Dalits were often referred to as ‘untouchable’. They were given the dirtiest jobs, for example, dealing with rubbish, sewage and the dead. They had very little access, if any, to education or health care. They were even excluded from Hinduism, the religion that defined them. Crimes committed against Dalits went unpunished.
At fourteen years old, after only 3 years of education, Mukta wrote her essay ‘About the Grief of the Mahar and the Mangs’, the Mahar and the Mangs being sub groups within the Dalits.
Mukta not only documented appalling atrocities committed against Dalits, and questioned Hinduism, she also analysed how the highest caste, the Brahmins, manipulated religion to maintain their influence over Indian society.
Mukta saw how her parents suffered under the caste system and in her essay, refers to the ‘merciful British government’ who mitigated the pain of Mangs and Mahars. She writes how harassment and torture stopped under British influence, and how some Brahmins were motivated to start schools for Mangs and Mahars. Her essay was published in the journal, Dnyanodaya, in 1855.
Though abolished on paper, videos from Indian commentators such as Annenberg Media show that in India, even in the 21st century, the caste system remains entrenched.
The following two bite-sized chunks of research only form a small part of Baby's story but they have also influenced my telling of it.
The Charkha
The Charkha is a small portable spinning wheel in use since the 14th century but popularised by Ghandi, the leader of India’s resistance against the British. It symbolises independence and self-sufficiency.
While under British rule, India was forced to send its cotton to Britain for spinning and weaving. The cloth was then sold back to India at a high cost. The Charkha enabled women, particularly, to change that. It gave them the means to set up and run their own cottage industries.
The Charkha is even represented on India’s flag as a 24 spoke wheel. I love this short film about how a modernised charka is changing the lives of Kashmiri women today.
The Partition of India
Britain finally gave India its independence in 1947. But done in such a hurry, ‘Partition’ was disastrous for the Indian people. Borders were drawn to make two nations India and Pakistan – to separate the two main religions. Though Pakistan was also divided into East and West, East Pakistan eventually becoming Bangladesh.
The Muslims were to be in in Pakistan, the Hindus in India but there were more than two religions in India and people did not live so conveniently. This resulted in millions of people having to uproot, to leave villages where their families might have lived for hundreds of years and move to areas where they thought they might be safe.
Fears for the safety of women led to families being divided. Because the details about the new borders were not released until after Partition, there was much unrest and bloodshed. Kashmir in the north, is still disputed.
This post has been a draft for many, many weeks. I am nervous about appearing to condone colonialism – 'The control over one territory and its peoples by another, and the ideologies of superiority and racism often associated with such domination.' Oxford Reference. But Mukta, definitely a Wonder Girl, should be heard.
I include these snippets of research mostly in the paperback versions of the books you can buy from me directly. Click below here to get your copies.
Thanks so much for reading.
Lots of other options to buy including ebooks as well as paperbacks directly from me (yes please!) here: https://www.jmcarr.com/books
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