"Parineeta" - by Sharat Chandra Chattopadhyay

“Parineeta” – By Sharat

Chandra Chattopadhyay

Introduction:
“Parineeta” is a Bengali novel penned by
eminent novelist “ Sharat Chandra
Chattopadhyay”. Born into a typical
conservative bengali family in Hooghly,
Sharat was an adventurous soul. Through his
writings he depicted the social practices that
existed in 19th and 20 th century in Bengal.
His notable works includes Devdas, Srikanta.
Parineeta depicts the story of teen orphan
girl “ Lalita” who is sweet tempered innocent
raised in her uncle Gurucharan's house and
is infatuated to “ Shekhar”, son of her
neighbour Nabin Roy. The story is set in
Calcutta.
Body : The story revolves around the
protagonists Lalita and Shekhar who are child
hood friends. Shekhar is a well educated man
and son of rich established Industrialist Nabin
Roy of Calcutta. Whereas, Lalita on the other
hand, is an orphan girl living with her
maternal uncle Gurucharan , who is humble
clerk. Gurucharan considers Nabin Roy as his
loyal and very own friend. But Nabin Roy is
cunning man who mortgaged Gurucharan’s
sole house for mere profit.
Lalita and Shekhar are very possessive about
each other. Nabin insists his only son Shekhar
to get married to his industrialist friend’s
daughter . But Shekhar constantly denies.
Shekhar is a man of nutshell, irresponsible
and ambiguity as he doesn’t realises his
feelings towards Lalita. In her relationship
with Shekhar, Lalita was absolutely
submissive. All her decisions and actions

2
were influenced by Shekhar's whims and
moods. In the midst of romantic notion,the
author brings Girish, the brother of Lalita
neighbour . Girish is a well educated rich man
who after seeing on Lalita fell in love with
her. He wished to marry Lalita. Girish helps
out Gurucharan, Lalita's maternal uncle in
clearing off his mortgage with Nabin Roy.
Lalita realises the cunning nature of Nabin
Roy on one hand and helping hands of Girish
on the other. She starts spearing little time
with Shekhar and gives more attention to her
friends and Girish. This attitude of Lalita
displeased Shekhar and he realised the
paramount of Lalita in his life.
On one fine occasion unintentionally, Lalita
garlands Shekar which deemed auspicious by
virtue of rituals and she betrothed to him.
There upon,she begin to regard herself as
Shekhar’s wife . But Shekhar,who was aloof
3
and irresponsible, knew that his father would
never accept his marriage to an orphan
socially and economically backward class girl.
Gurucharan fixes Lalita’s marriage with Girish
as he wasn’t aware of her already getting
married. Gurucharan was in his last position
and he wanted Lalita to get married to Girish.
Lalita leaves Kolkata with Girish to London.
Here, when Shekhar knows about Lalita’s
marriage proposal with Girish. He felts
cheated and hates Lalita. Nabin Roy
persuades Shekhar against Lalita and makes
him ready to get married to his wealthy
friends daughter. Lalita refuses to marry
Girish in London and discloses him that she’s
already married to Shekhar. Gurucharan
loses his life in London. Lalita's comes back
along with Girish, to perform last rituals of
Gurucharan in kolkata where she hears about
Shekhar’s marriage. She felt lost hearing this
4
news. She tries to reach out Shekhar but
Shekhar denies to confront her as he feels
cheated. Girish explains the reality of Lalita to
Shekar and cunning and persuading nature of
Nabin Roy. Shekhar realises his mistake and
discloses his reality of getting married to
Lalita in front of his family. Finally, Shekar
accepts Lalita as his wife.
Conclusion: In this novel,the female

protagonist “ Lalita” is submissive and
bovine. She has surrendered herself to idea’s
of male protagonist “ Shekhar”. Shekhar is
self- centered, irresponsible and thick
skinned person when juxtaposed with Lalita.
For me the critical part of this novel is the
situation of lalita which is very familiar with
that of many other women’s even in 21st
century conservative India . “ If you are
women, you should have no voice,no
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opinions,no desires,all that you need to do is
to be submissive to man. But that’s not true.
Women can earn respect on themselves and
don’t require to be dependent on man for
survival. The only distinction is women uses
her power to strengthen her family honor,
traditions and society.

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“Parineeta” – By Sharat

Conclusion: In this novel,the female

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