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Anita Agnihotris The Sickle is a reminder of the possibilities of fiction. Through the lives of farmers, migrant labourers and activists in Marathwada and western Maharashtra, Agnihotri illuminates, with shocking clarity, a series of intersecting and overlapping crises: female foeticide, sexual assault, the violence of caste, feudal labour relations, farmers suicides and climate change in all its manifestations. She infuses a gripping fictional narrative with anthropology, geography and political economy, remaking the form of the novel as a way to bear witness. From Vaishali, trying to rebuild her life after her husbands suicide, to Yashwant, a dhaba owner driven to activism by his mothers murder, Agnihotris indictment of Indian society is grounded in individual lives. Formally radical, incendiary and deeply humane, this novel tells the darkest truths about contemporary India.
