ABSTRACT
Akhila Nayak’s Bheda1 has the distinction of being the first Odia Dalit novel. The fact that Umesh Chandra Sarkar’s Padmamali (1888) is considered to be the first Odia novel, the immediate question comes to our mind is: why did it take so long for a Dalit in Odisha to write a novel? The answer to the question lies, perhaps, in the structural problem of Odia/ Indian caste society, which discriminates against Adivasis, Dalits and women. The main theme of Bheda is caste violence. Thus, the primary focus of this essay is to study closely the nature of caste violence depicted in the novel, which speaks eloquently of how the Dalits in Odisha have been the victims of caste atrocities. Odia society has witnessed several social protest movements in different periods of time. This essay will attempt to bring a contextual relevance to the Dalit movement, and the
emergence of Dalit literature in Odisha. However, before addressing the caste questions in the novel, the idea of how caste operates in Odia civil society needs to be examined.
