Bengali folk tales frequently feature rakkhoshis (alternatively spelt, rakshasi, raksasi) who are shapeshifting, man-eating monsters, adept in magic. The origin of the rakkhoshi can be traced back to the figures of the rakshasi (female) and rakshasa (male) in folklore and mythological literature of ancient India. Here is a list of creatures like rakshasi in Hindu mythology that you might find interesting. If you are interested in learning specifically about how the rakshasas came to be, follow this link. Unlike the rakkhoshes, the khokkoshes are not a part of the larger Indic mythological traditions. They are found solely in Bengali folklore and literature. In Dakshinaranjan Mitra-Majumder’s version of the folktale, “Neelkamal ar Lalkamal” (Neelkamal and Lalkamal), the variant that this lesson is based on, khokkoshes are grotesque man-eating monsters who appear dwarfish, hairy and foolish. However, in some variants, they are meta-fictional monsters who are supposedly superior to the rakkhoshes, who may not really exist. For example, in a variant of “Neelkamal and Lalkamal” called “Rakkhosh and Khokkosh,” taken from Nanur Golper Jhuli (Grandpa’s Bag of Tales), the heroes use their wit and pretend to be a pair of khokkoshes (something that the rakkhoshes had never heard of) to scare them away.

The folktale “Neelkamal ar Lalkamal” first appeared in print in 1907 in Dakshinaranjan Mitra Majumder’s Thakurmar Jhuli (grandmother’s bag), a collection of Bengali folk tales retrieved from oral traditions. Dakshinaranjan Mitra Majumder is often compared to the Grimm brothers from Germany whose Kinder-und Hausmärchen (Children’s and Household Tales) played a crucial role in unifying the German speaking people under a shared cultural umbrella. Mitra Majumder’s Thakurmar Jhuli played a similar role in Bengal strengthening the rise of cultural nationalism in the region. The volume came out when the Swadeshi (“of one’s own country”) Movement in Bengal had reached its zenith. The movement started in 1905 in response to the British government’s decision to break the province of Bengal situated in Eastern India into two administrative parts. The Bengali intelligentsia rose up against this divisive stance and inspired mass participation in the movement to keep Bengal united. Art and Literature of the time strengthened the sentiment of nationalism and urged the masses to unite and fight back.

In this backdrop, stories like “Neelkamal ar Lalkamal” came out with renewed cultural significance bolstering the struggle for independence to resist colonial oppression. The princes, Neelkamal and Lalkamal became symbolic metaphors for national heroes who defeat foreign monsters to restore the county’s freedom and glory. The rakkhoshi queen in the story came to stand for the British queen whose tyrant officials occupied and exploited India. However, it is worth noting here that according to an earlier theory (long discarded), rakshasis were believed to be the aboriginal tribes of India whom the Aryan settlers overthrew upon arrival. But, at the wake of anti-colonial resistance, the rakkhoshi got reinterpreted as the colonizer who had to be defeated to liberate the swadesh (one’s own, free country). 

Rabindranath Tagore, the renowned Nobel laureate, introduced the folk tales in Thakurmar Jhuli as the most quintessentially swadeshi cultural object of Bengal. It was important to reclaim swadeshi cultural elements at the time for one of the key moves of the Swadeshi movement was boycotting foreign products. It was also implied that foreign pedagogy that produced mechanical clerks (slaves to colonial masters) should be boycotted in favor of an alternative pedagogy instrumentalizing storytelling to recognize swadeshi cultural values found in folklore and folklife. 

The story of “Neelkamal ar Lalkamal” exists in multiple variants today. If you want to read the full story in English, check out Sukhendu Ray’s translation, Tales from Thakurmar Jhuli: Twelve Stories from Bengal (2012). An older and abridged translation of the story was published in Bengal Fairy Tales (1920) edited by Francis Bradley-Birt and illustrated by Abanindranath Tagore. If you know Bengali, you might also want to take a look at this musical adaptation (1970), and this TV series (2019), both called Thakurmar Jhuli. To explore many more Bengali folktales in English, check out Lal Behari Day’s collection Folktales of Bengal (1883) which came out with colorful illustrations by Warwick Goble in 1912. For a broader understanding of Bengali folklore, in general, Dinesh Chandra Sen’s Folk Literature of Bengal (1920) would be a good start. And if you want to learn further about how folktales like this shaped the inner world of its readers in Bengal, do give this article a read.

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