'People have been terrorised to normalcy'

Scholar Anand Teltumbde discusses why caste becomes a form of entitlement and the writing of his prison memoir

- Prachi Pinglay-Plumber

Dalit scholar and management professor Anand Teltumbde had two books published in quick succession late last year—The Cell and the Soul (Bloomsbury India), a chilling account of life in prison where he spent more than two years as an undertrial, and The Caste Con Census (Navayana), part history and part critical examination of the hotly contested caste census.

Teltumbde, an IIM-A graduate, was teaching at Goa Institute of Management till he was accused of having a role in the 2018 Bhima Koregaon violence and arrested in 2020. He was granted bail only in 2022.

In an interview with Lounge, he discusses the writing of his prison memoir, why class trumps caste within the confines of prison, and the pitfalls of a caste census. Edited excerpts:

'The Cell and the Soul' is deeply personal while also providing the larger picture of society and the prison system. How did you plan the writing of this book?

I have not gone about it in a deliberate or designed way. I was very sure that after coming out—if I came out of jail, I would write about (my experiences). I had gone with a preparation to die there. But when I realised that I can read and write, I started making notes on what came to my mind. So this book comprises 22 notes that I wrote out of about 100.

You could say that jail imposes some amount of clarity on you. Your routine goes away. Mobility goes away. You are left with only two things: your mind and the system that seeks to crush you. At that moment, the personal and political become inseparable. The book emerges from such conditions. It doesn't become very personal in the sense because every experience inside a person is shaped by power hierarchy, by the violence embedded in the system.

Did you see any metaphorical resemblance between your time in jail and the fact that society is not free in the same way for all people?