Question-  Write about Bhattacharya's concept of Fiction.

Ans-    
Bhattacharya's Concept of Fiction:Bhattacharya is a realist with a social purpose. In his fiction, he has amply proved his ability to reconcile demands of art with his sense of social commitment. He is advocate of the idea of "art for life's sake" Any work without social purpose is thoroughly meaningless to him. He says:
"Art is not necessarily for art's sake
purposeless
art and literature which is much in vogue
does
not appear to me a sound judgement.
He maintains that creative literature should be intructive to the reader without being dedactic and pedantic. He thinks that a genuine work of literature deals with themes related to human miseries and predicament.
He opines that it is possible to produce a work of fiction based on the contemporary events and conditions, though it may appear to some that current happenings incapacitate the writer to adopt objective stance on account of their immediacy. He earnestly feels that such events alone can furnish the raw-material to create a work of art. The writer's sharp sensibility is more alive to them. He writes:
"It has been argued that the novelist
should not.
draw his material from contemporary reality,
since he is too close to it to be able to read its
meaning and assess its inward nature.
This is absurd."
This view about the viability of contemporary events as suitable material for fictional writing is again stated by him when he says. "The history need not wait for fifty years before it is declared suitable for fictional projection." He is not against the treatment of sex in fiction. He considers sex an inseparable part of life and since art is basically related to the revelation of the truth of life, its omission will tantamount to an incomplete partrayal of the realities of life. But, he is averse to direct treatment of sex in the novel. He wants it to be treated in a suggestive manner to acquire artistic value
This flow of cheap paperback, vulgar, low-
taste
books revelling in sex description cannot be welcomed. I have a revulsion for
Them. But look at Lawrence. He creates a whole world of this much tabooed feeling and yet the descriptions are most beautiful and excel in their lyrical quality.
Bhattacharya has liberal views about techniques employed in fiction. "As for as his art is concerned, it is fundamentally conventional in terms of techniques but he does not appose new techniques of fiction by other writers. According to him, a writer is free to choose any style that suits his theme and talents. With regard to language, he again gives full liberty to a writer to choose any medium of expression in which he is most comfortable. His views on the creative process are skin to those of the romantics. In his opinion, a work of art is spontaneous in nature, it is produced when a writer feels a strong creative urge. Often characters develop independent of the writer's preconceived design and this holds true for the entire plan of a work of art Bhattacharya says:
"But, when I start writing, it is not I, but characters and situations that compel
me to be
led by them. It is they who should decide the
way they should end. The end of the story in
my case, is never the one which I had in my mind in the beginning."
Place of Bhattacharya in Indo-Anglian Fiction: The international recognition accorded to Indo-Anglian literature is indictive of the success achieved by the Indian writers who have expressed Indian sensibilities in a medium foreign to the ethos of Indian soil. Though Bhattacharya is not among the foremost fiction writers, yet, he has made a distinct name in Indo-Anglian fiction for himself. He occupies an intermediate position between the Big Tree R.K. Narayan, Mulk Raj Anand and Raja Rao on the one hand, and Nayantara Sehgal, Anita Desai, Kamala Markandaya, Ruth Prawar Jhabvala on the other. Unlike many other writers of the 20th century, he is a socially committed artist. It accounts for his president concern with the themes of poverty, exploitation, hunger, suffering, casteism, East-West encounter, etc. He is a progressive writer who is keen on bringing about a change in the thinking and attitude of the people to help them face the challenge of the changing times.
Hunger has been a persistent thematic concern of Bhattacharya. He treats it in its multitudinous dimensions. No other Anglo-Indian writer has presented human tragedy on such a scale and with such an insignt as does Bhattacharya. Mulk Raj Anand and Kamala Markandaya deal with the theme of hunger in their novels like 'Coolie', 'Untouchable', Nector in a Sieve' and 'A Handful of Rice' but none of them can excel Bhattacharya's treatment of it in its varied aspects. His famous novel 'So Many Hungers' is a fine work of literature which bears the writer's deep observation of Indian society. In the novel, hunger is treated in its varied aspects of starvation of people, their hunger for money, their hunger for sex, their hunger for power, for recognition, for fame, wife's hunger for the love of her husband, women's hunger, social freedom, and so on.
Many Indo-Anglian novelists have portrayed life in Indian villages. They have set their novels in rural India for the simple reason that villages constitute more than seventy percent of Indian social life and can provide more meaningful view of India. K.S. Venkataraman's 'Kandan the Patriot' and Murgan the Tiller', Mulk Raj Anand's The Old Man and the Cow' and The Village' are some novels treating the lives of the poor villagers on a substantial scale. The novels of Bhattacharya are by and large set in different villages of Bengal and concerned with the clash of urban and rural values. The vision of the novelist finally emerging at the end is one of healthy synthesis between positive aspects of the urban and the rural. The Goddess Named Gold' is one of the finest novels on Indian village life to come in years.
The theme of conflict between tradition and modernity is another important thematic concern of Bhattacharya's fiction. His Music For Mohini' deals with this theme and finally presents a reconciliation between tradition and modernity.
The theme of Indian independence has always attracted Indo-Anglian writers. Khwaja Ahmad Abbas in 'Inqvilab', Khushwant Singh in Train to Pakistan' and 'I shall Not Hear The Nightingale' and Magaonkar's in 'A Bend in the Ganges' have treated the theme of Indian independence and the horrors of partition. But these novels do not explore the depth at human emotions as the way Bhattacharya's 'So Many Hungers !' and 'He Who Rides the Tiger' do.
He is a past master of the art of portraying human emotions to a nicety. Be it the anguish of a tormented soul, or a feeling at rootlessness, or an aspiration for country's freedom, or a sense of defeat or exultation, very few Indo-Anglian writers can hope to match Bhattacharya's penmanship in delineating them. In the progress of the action, Bhattacharya displays an uncarry mastery in fusing together intellectual dialectics and emotional depths. Bhattacharya is at home in painting every conceivable shade of human emotions. He superbly handles the romantic relationship between Sunita and Bhaskar, a wife's emotional starvation in Mohini's character, Kajoli's spirit of sacrifice, Meera's all consuming concern for the poor. Such varied tones of emotions are missing in Mulk Raj Anand or Khushwant Singh.
Bhattacharya is a realist and his characters and their situations are taken from life. He does not indulge in metaphysical abstractions like Raja Rao, nor does he exercise comic imagination of R.K. Narayan, nor does he dabble in pornographic descriptions like Khushwant Singh. He presents both the rural and the urban sides of India. His treatment of life is deep, with a measure of pathos reminding us of Charles Dickens. He draws his characters from different sections of society. An important fact about his novels is that he is concerned with an individual's possibility of success in life. His social commitment is not towards the economic well being of society alone, he is also keen to intellectually change the social structure.
Not with standing an indelible influence of Tagore, Bhattacharya's novels are quite different from the works of the great Bengali writer. A writer of Bhattacharya's vision is highly optimistic in striking contrast to Tagore. His novels envisage a bright future for India inspite of many contradictions in its social fabric.
Bhattacharya's world wide fame as a writer owes in a large measure to his style. His language is equally alive to the Indian ethos and responsive to stylistic expedients of English Language. Like many established Indo-Anglian writers he successfully exploits the language to serve his artistic requirements. His language carries a distinctive flavour of Indianess. R.K. Narayan writes in a very simple English and does not experiments with style, Raja Rao breaks the English syntax to adapt it to his requirements, and Bhattacharya coins new words and translates Indian phrases, proverbs, idioms into English to express Indian sensibility. Bhattacharya employ them in the dialogues. He, comes out successful in conveying the real spirit of the Indian society through a foreign medium. He is a master of simple and smooth style without any pretensions to sublimity. He is capable of expressing what he wants to. He says:
"Indian writing in English has been a decisive factor in redressing false presentation by foreign story tellers who, with their limited possibilities of true experience, have seen only the surface of our way of like, failing to reach deeper into our spirit."
Bhattacharya's plots are well constructed in most of the novels. This he One accomplishes despise being tentative in planning his novels. characteristic feature of his plots is that they observes time space relationship and proceed in a logical sequence.
His art of female characterization scores over that of male characterization. His female characters, generally speaking, though idealistically drawn, appear convincing in many respects. They occupy major options in the plots of the novels. Their appeal lies in their individuality and they also attain symbolic significance. They act and behave not as automator but as thinking individuals who can comprehend the demands of their situation.

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