The Strange Case of the Idea of Rusticity

 The Strange Case of the Idea of Rusticity

Rustic landscape, people with burden on their heads, thatched huts and muddy trails and all other thousand and one images of a cool and calm life enchant one to the degree that one keeps paintings of village life hung on walls. Those paintings which depict women’s faces covered with their saree ends and a bullock-cart passing by have been seen by all in the cities. Such is the condition that one craves to go to rural areas on holidays, albeit only those rural areas which have a luxury hotel or spa in the midst. How good is this idea of rusticity? Benevolent and malevolent?

It can be gauged by all that the psyche of a city dwelling individual is different from that of a villager. Firstly, the whole fashion system is different. Villagers are conservative in their sense of fashion and tend to cover their whole bodies even in sweltering heat. The luxury of wearing shorts in the summer season is not theirs. And for women, come heat or rain or cold, it is like every pore of the body should be covered. Secondly, there is a great difference in verbal communication style of villagers. By communication it is meant the phrases, tones and matter that is used. A villager calls a ‘charcha’ (discussion) as ‘charch’, thus confusing any city dweller as to why one should go to a ‘church’ for talking. Also, the subject matter is always about the other: he did this to me/should this be a respectable way to behave and so on. Thirdly, there is a great focus on what is a respectable way to do daily things of life. It is as if the whole world will conjure against one if a certain benchmark activity is not done. The society will spit on them or ostracize them if a certain condition is not met.

City dwellers, on the other hand, are, first of all, carefree. No one cares in the city what the other is thinking, doing or speaking. This is starkly contrasted to the ways of a villager. Secondly, city dwellers have a very different sense of fashion. Even women in the city wear short clothes which may or may not be revealing. Again, very different from the culture of a village where even not keeping a ‘duppatta’ on head can bring sanctions from the society and familial people alike. Thirdly, and most importantly, city dwellers have, or at least work towards, free thought. The thought of going for a holiday to a hill station is not an alien thought for a city dweller, a thought of a grown up woman studying for a degree is not an alien thought for a city dweller, but, for a villager who is herself a woman, these thoughts bring reprobation and, at times, guilt.

Considering these differences, what can be judged about city dwellers and villagers?

Any individual with lofty ideals and a zeal to grow will affirm that these lines of Rabindranath Tagore are not only apt but a path to be followed.

Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high

Where knowledge is free

Where the world has not been broken up into fragments

By narrow domestic walls

Where words come out from the depth of truth

Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection

Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way

Into the dreary desert sand of dead habit

Where the mind is led forward by thee

Into ever-widening thought and action

Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake.

Unfortunately, not even one aspect of Rabindranath’s poem applies favourably to village life. The mind in a village is full of fear, stigma and rudimentary thoughts on both life and health. Academic knowledge there is negligible, the world there is ‘broken up into fragments’, into ‘narrow domestic walls’ with no ‘stream of reason’. There is no ‘ever-widening thought and action’ and the place is like a ‘dreary desert sand of dead habit’.

Under these circumstances, why are city dwellers enchanted by village life?

One passing reason may be to go away to a different place. But, why not, people these days like spending their whole day in malls and cineplexes. This reason to go to a far off village is clumsy.

The only reason that can be thought of is the glamorisation of village life by painters, novelists and, most of all, by Bollywood. Painters and novelists are not much at fault. But, Bollywood, especially the old age movies, has brought such havoc to the minds of people that the damage done cannot be remedied.

One has seen movies in which the hero falls in love with a rustic beauty. It was and is hilarious to see a love affair in those times of bullock-carts as, even now, love affairs in a village is a taboo and has negative repercussions like being ostracized from the society with headlines in newspapers of the ugly act done. Bollywood could not find a decent story then and built everything on one theme: love affair. It is sickly to even think of the damage done.

City dwelling young men married and fantasized village beauties and village beauties kept waiting for a ‘hero’ to come and take them away. The glinting screens did show great visuals about farming land trails but failed to show the ugly side of life there. It is not that city life does not have its own share of ugliness, but depicting one area of life as glossy and the other area dull is an irreparable crime that Bollywood has committed.

In all, the idea of a beautiful and calm rustic life is only suited for those who are naive and dull. Anyone with their senses intact knows what hardship it is to not only reach a village but also to live there. Politics has been played by various forces to bring a gloss, a shine over village life but that sheen falls apart like a house of cards once one gains first hand village life experience. 

Naivety is a crime as it replicates itself among the masses. Naive ones fantasize village life, real ones have a taste of village and run away. After all, it all comes down to common sense.