Reading Sashi Tharoors Twenty two Months in the Life of a Dog Sukanya Kuttas psyche is in every bit a split

psyche in which both the man and the dog have a say. So whatever meaning interpretation Kutta makes of any particular moment or incident is at the same time the realization and de-realization of the moment. To be precise when Dr. Subramaniyam or his wife, or the youth Congress leader, or anyone analyzes or dissects a certain moment they look at it from one particular point of view. But Kutta has both the perspectivesthe dogs as well as the mans. And both are real for him. So he cannot decide upon which to rely on. The concept of meaning has been jeopardised in the funniest possible way in this text. According to PostStructuralists, meaning is predicted and subjective. And as soon as something becomes subjective, the possibilities become infinite. Here not only a particular moment or situation becomes de-realized but for the people who sense this de-realization find themselves in an uncertain position regarding their identity. Besides that, human perception is portrayed as a hegemonic power center in the cognitive world. There is a peremptory tone in all the human characters e.g. the doctor, the politicians of all ranks. Kuttas thought is posed as a revolt to that hegemony of cognition. A human figure with a dogs heart, Kutta is a personified riddle in the play and being unable to solve that riddle, the doctor had to erase the riddle by retrieving the dog as it had been. In fact, the principal subject of the play which is comically derided and at the same time serves as the basic thematic foundation of the playEmergencycan be problematized in many ways. First emergency, according to the ruling party is necessary, indispensible, and for public good. Now how much necessary this state of emergency was can be judged only when one can be sure
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about the specificity of the public. Who are the public? If they are the sum total of individuals of the country, then it is assumed that all the individuals are alike. Thus as Kierkegaard says, all the individuals are leveled into a phantom called public here. But one can make a sum of two objects in the way one and one make two only when the two objects are identical. Two human beings are in no way identical and therefore they cannot be considered collectively. On the other hand, if we dissect the public and each ones case is considered separately, necessity and goodness of things differ from one person to another. The individual, the mass, the public everything is dissolved into a numerical that denotes the population which along with the prospective number of votes hints at a future scarcity of food and energy. Thus human being is stripped off their essence and is fetishized with the monetary use value. The Government which has the hegemony of power in terms of politics is unable or unwilling to dissociate man from its use value and look at it in itself. According to the members of the Youth Congress, every Indian male has become an apparatus of human reproduction, thereby potential threat for the countrys growing population. The Indian male thus has been dissociated from its all other essential qualities and is relegated to such a status which is exposed to the surgeons knives. When one would be able to consider a man without all the paraphernalia of ones identity like citizenship, gender, class, caste, creed, religionall which are basically the social constructs and create the illusion of Ione can perceive the essence of the person.