Caste consciousness and subalternity in Bhaburao Bhagul's when I hid my caste

Dalit literature is a vast academic discipline in which many writers have written and have presented the discrimination based on caste in India. There have been many writers from India who have focused on Dalit literature and have depicted the plight of the Dalits in India. They have presented the people of the upper caste as the oppressors and the people of the lower caste as oppressed. Baburao Bagul has written a Dalit epic in which he has depicted both patriarchy and caste discrimination in India. He has shown how the people oflower caste in India have to face discrimination and the women of lower caste have to face double suppression in the society. Dalits are treated as subalterns, who have no voice and social andpolitical representation. According to Antonio Gramsci, the subalterns are the ones who are marginalized and have no political and social representation in society. This theory is applicable in Baburao Bagul's When I hid my caste when we see how the author hides his caste and then is beaten by the upper-class people; and how Banu and Kamla are suppressed by the society and how the readers feel pity for them when they read about their conditions in the society. The present paper would look into how the theory of subaltern is applicable in this Dalit epic and how Bagul has presented the pitiful conditions of Dalits in the text.