Sevasadan

'Sevasadan' is one of the most representative novels of Munshi Premchand. Soon after it was published, the novel kicked up national debates on such pertinent social issues as prostitution and the place of women in the Indian society. Social taboos dominated the scenario as much as reformers' zeal to tight the rot in the social value system.


The story oscillates round a glamour-struck young girl's life. who was brought up with utmost love and care but whose father had to suffer ignominy at the hands of his adversaries for taking a once-in-lifetime bribe and being jailed for that. Her prospective engagement was broken because her mother, now made a destitute with her daughters, failed to meet the demand of dowry from the bridegroom's family. Hapless and stranded, she. along with her mother and sibling sister, was under care of her maternal-uncle. gets married to a middle-aged pauper and pushed to life-long poverty. She failed to get what she had been dreaming for since her childhood. She fought continual battles between aspiration for a respected prosperous lifestyle, and the existing value system which forced her to live with poverty.


By the turns of events she ends up into a life of a tawaif, hatefully tries to come out of the nuisance but the irony of fate makes her the centre-point of all debates on how prostitutes could be rescued and rehabilitated. 'Sevasadan' exposes the time Premchand lived in. It also reflects how seriously the author had waged a battle, which is being fought in the Indian society even today.