CC - III: Briefly comment on the role of Dr. Biswas in Anita Desai's novel Clear Light of Day./ Bim-Dr. Biswas relationship

 Dr. Biswas has a functional role to play in Anita Desai's novel "Clear Light of Day". He is the doctor sent by Mr. Das' firm to treat Raja's tuberculosis. Later, he also treats Mira Masi's alcoholism. He gradually becomes like a family doctor to the Das'. The first mention of a doctor is made in part II of the novel when he comes to examine Raja who had fallen ill. A more detailed description of the Doctor is given when he makes his next visit-we learn that he was a "soft-spoken and awkward young Bengali, sent by their father's partner". 

             Dr. Biswas, though a minor character in the novel, his sporadic presence is used very effectively by Desai. For one he gives us an outsiders view point of Bim. During one of his visits to the Das home, when Bim asks him about Raja's recovery period, he says -"I see, I see it all,... there are great problems. Your father - the house-the family -Raja's illness-it is all too much for a young lady. Raja must recover, he must take his father's place this throws light on Bim and the circumstances within which she is situated.

                                 Interestingly, Desai's plays upon the Bim/Biswas relationship in the novel. she makes the readers believe that something may develop between them. That Dr. Biswas is interested in Bim is evident from the way he responds to her. He feels shy and nervous to play the violin in her presence. Later, when he takes her to the concert by the Delhi Music Society, he reveals details about his background. His mother, he says, was an "old-fashioned Bengali lady" who loved "Tagore songs". Both mother and son lived in a flat in Daryaganj. His sister was married and settled in Calcutta. We also come to know of his stint in Germany for higher studies and how "the whole world of music unfolded" to him there. Along with medicine he also learns the violin there. Whereas Dr. Biswas is "all admiration" for Bim, she does not view him the same way; she gets increasingly bored by him. In the last part  of the novel when Tara, feeling very upset for Bim (as being caught in a trap in the Das household) asks her -"Oh, and Bim, do you ever see Dr.- Dr.-what was his name? and Bim tells her flatty- "Dr. Biswas-No, I haven't seen him since Mira Masi died". 

                               Thus, the relationship between Dr. Biswas and  Bim may not develop in the novel, but he does, have an impact on her. She acts on a hint thrown by him about helping in a clinic for women in Kingsway camp for refugees. It is again through Dr. Biswas that we hear of Gandhi's murder, thereby adding to the political dimension of the novel.

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