What is a summary of Rangbhoomi by Premchand?

Answer 1

Rangbhoomi as a novel is complex -- it has many layers to it which take time to unfold and come to the surface. The title itself means, "The arena of life" -- which is so apt to the entire book. It is life playing itself in its arena and in many shapes, forms and emotions. In this novel of epic proportion set in pre-Independence India, Premchand treads the tricky ground of tensions between the rulers and the ruled. Capturing the travails and traumas of peasant society, Rangbhumi celebrates the unassailable spirit of the common man. The novel revolves around the blind Surdas, who begs for a living, but is also the owner of a much-coveted piece of land. The land is used as a kind of commons by the fractious villagers of Pandepur; but it is also actively sought by a local industrialist, Sevak, who wants to set up a cigarette factory. Thus Surdas's land becomes a symbolic stage on which are fought issues of different routes to development. The novel depicts most graphically the devastation of peasant society and agriculture under colonial rule. Premchand treads the very tricky ground of tensions between the rulers and the ruled in this novel. Here, the ruled are the Indians and the rulers are an amalgam of the whites, the Indian landowners, and the Indian Christians. Rangbhumi spans the time between the 1920s and 1930s in pre-Independence India. It captures and celebrates the unassailable spirit of the common man, especially the farming community, which knows no defeat or submission, as its spirit is always on the mend, even as it is perceived to be finally crushed.