Anjali's Home

Anjali’s home, described as a compound, is where the majority of the novel takes place, and helps to represent the motif of Toilets, and the theme of Change is Possible. Anjali lives there with Ma, Baba, Chachaji, and Nandini. Mohan is their toilet cleaner (and a Dalit) who comes every day to clean, and Jamuna is the family’s cook and house cleaner. She describes it in Chapter 2, with a wall surrounding it, then a “concrete porch” around a “large pastel yellow one-story bungalow” (17). Nandini lives in the attached shed. She describes it as “her private zoo” where “families of monkeys would jump from tree to tree” on the “mango tree” (17).

The novel starts with home as a safe place, where Anjali and her family listen to updates on the freedom movement on their radio. Her mother then transforms it to a place of self-sacrifice and...