The Home and the World

The photograph that Bimala keeps of her husband Nikhil symbolizes Bimala’s journey toward becoming a more modern woman, which mirrors the changes in British India as a whole. Initially, Bimala treats the photo of Nikhil like an object of religious devotion, keeping it in a special niche and laying flowers on it regularly. Because Nikhil himself is embarrassed by Bimala’s worship, Bimala instead uses the photograph as an outlet for her devotion. The photograph shows how in pre-modern times, women were subservient to husbands, having to treat them almost like gods, and Bimala’s devotion to the photograph shows how she continues to hold onto these views even after Nikhil tries to convince her to engage more with the wider world.

As it turns out, what gets Bimala to stop praising the photograph is not Nikhil but Sandip, a charismatic man who stays with Nikhil and preaches nationalism. Bimala seems to be infatuated with Sandip, not just as a thinker but as a person, perhaps in part because he is eager to praise her. She eventually keeps a secret portrait of Sandip, representing how she has secretly begun to worship Sandip as much as she once did her husband. Nikhil himself notices this change when he happens to walk into Bimala’s room and sees the dead flowers by his photograph. This helps him accept that he has lost Bimala, at least for the moment, to Sandip, although Bimala will eventually come to realize that Sandip is not the virtuous, godlike being he seems to be in his portrait. The photograph of Nikhil thus represents the central role that husbands used to play in traditional Bengali households as well as Bimala’s changing relationship to the modern world and what it means to be a wife.