LIBERATION MOTIF IN SELECT NOVELS OF MULK RAJ ANAND ...

All credit should be given to Anand, as critics have never failedto point out, for his pioneering efforts and fighting qualitiesso evident in his introduction of and persistence with themarginallised and outcast people in his fictional works,notwithstanding an orchestrated propaganda against him.Achebe, on the other hand, has had a fair critical review.There has been hardly any adverse or deliberately maligningpropaganda against his works, barring perhaps the controversyover his alleged denigration of the ~ritish colonial agents.This allegation, however, could not mar the overwhelminglypositive response to him, as his novels on the post-independencerulers and educated elite are a powerful and at timesdevastating critique of their topsy-turvy and anti-peopleattitudes, values, corruption and abuse of power. Achebersartistic excellence, range of his language and style, grasp ofIgbo culture, history and ethos, have all been meticulouslyobserved and praised by critics and comentators. All said anddone Achebe emerges as a consummate artist, always striving tocreate and innovate in terms of style, techniques,characterization and theme.A run-down of the survey of critical scholarship on bothAnand and Achebe amply justifies a comparison between the two-They share a whole gamut of interests, concern and artistictraits. Both the writers are confirmed as committed writers,committed to the cause of the downtrodden each in his country.