In 1930, Demathi Dei Sabar, a tribal girl in Nuapada district in Odisha, was only 16 years old when she heard that her father was wounded by a gun shot in the village Saliha. She was out on the fields, working with 40 other tribal women. The British police had cracked down on the village.
When Demathi saw that her father was bleeding, she “lost her temper”, writes P Sainath in his intensive series ‘Foot Soldiers of Freedom’ in his People’s Archive of Rural India. Demathi lashed out at the policeman, and the other women who accompanied her followed. The startled man retreated, narrates Sainath, who met Demathi Sabar in 2015. She was 90 years old then.
Demathi features in Sainath’s book, The Last Heroes: Foot soldiers of Indian Freedom, a compilation of stories on unsung freedom fighters from rural India, published by Penguin in 2022.
Freedom fighter Baji Mohammad, from Nabarangpur, Odisha | Photo Credit: Special Arrangement
Demathi’s story of courage does not stop there. It is now depicted in a graphic story format in Tulika Graphix’s adaptation of Sainath’s book. Unknown Heroes of India’s Freedom Struggle is a unique collection of graphic narratives by illustrators from across the country. The stories honour forgotten freedom fighters and give glimpses into their lives filled with ideals, fervour and courage. “We decided to go in for a graphic novel format so as to make it accessible to young readers. When we thought of how to make it appealing to a younger demographic, we felt they would respond to a format like this,” says Radhika Menon, founder of Tulika Books.
Tulika launched Tulika Graphix a year ago, a new imprint of illustrated titles aimed at enabling readers to navigate complex narratives. Under the Graphix series, it has non-fiction and fiction, poetry and verse, memoirs and biographies.
Freedom fighter Nallakannu | Photo Credit: Special Arrangement
“When we started working with the freedom struggle stories, we did encounter challenges – adapting stories that were not written for the graphic story format, to begin with,” adds Radhika. The collection, however, came together as a cohesive visual document combining narrative text and pictures. “This was a new way to start conversations around the freedom struggle or history itself,” says Radhika.
The book contains 16 stories illustrated by 16 illustrators – Aindri C, Allen Shaw, Antara Raman, Anthoni Guruz, Bao, Ikroop Sandhu, Kavitha Balakrishnan, Kripa, Madhuja Mukherjee, Niveditha Subramaniam, Priya Kuriyan, Priyankar Gupta, Rajiv Eipe, Sagar Kolwankar, Satwik Gade, Siddhesh Gautam – each with their own distinctive styles.
Unknown Heroes of India’s Freedom Struggle will be available for sale on August 25 and it can be pre-ordered on tulikabooks.com
