Godaan by Premchand: Summary, Characters and Themes
گئودان
Updated
Godaan (گئودان, The Gift of a Cow), published in 1936, is Munshi Premchand's last completed novel and the great novel of village India. Its hero is Hori, a poor farmer with a few bighas of land and one modest dream: to have a cow tied at his door. Around that small hope Premchand builds a whole society, from the landlord's mansion to the moneylender's ledger to the drawing rooms of Lucknow.
You can read Godaan in Urdu with a facing English translation; the first two chapters are free.
Plot summary
The cow. Hori Mahto lives in the village of Belari with his wife Dhaniya, his son Gobar and his daughters Sona and Rupa. He persuades the cowherd Bhola to let him have a cow on credit. For a few days the family's pride is complete. Then Hori's jealous brother Hira poisons the cow and runs away. Hori, to protect his brother from the police, takes the blame and the expense on himself.
Gobar and Jhuniya. Gobar falls in love with Jhuniya, Bhola's widowed daughter. When she is pregnant he panics and flees to Lucknow, and Hori and Dhaniya take Jhuniya into their home. The village council, run by the priest Datadin and the other village elders, fines Hori heavily for breaking caste custom. He pays in grain and mortgages his future.
The city. Alongside the village runs a second story among the educated rich: Rai Sahib Amarpal Singh, the landlord, forever short of money; the mill-owner Khanna and his neglected wife Govindi; the editor Onkarnath; Mirza Khurshed; and above all Professor Mehta, a philosopher, and Malti, a doctor, whose long argument about love, duty and service slowly becomes a partnership.
Debt. Back in the village, every misfortune pushes Hori deeper into debt to the moneylenders. Gobar returns from the city changed, sharper and more independent, and quarrels with his father. To pay what he owes, Hori lets his younger daughter Rupa be married to an older man in exchange for money, a decision that shames him deeply.
The ending. Hori works as a labourer, digging gravel in the summer heat, to save for the cow he never stopped wanting. He collapses with heatstroke. As he dies, Datadin demands that the family perform godaan, the gift of a cow to a Brahmin that is supposed to ease a soul's passage. Dhaniya has no cow. She puts the few coins she earned that day into the priest's hand and says that this is her husband's godaan.
Main characters
Hori: an honest, patient farmer who believes in doing his duty and is exploited by everyone for it.
Dhaniya: Hori's wife, quick-tempered and fiercely loyal, often braver than her husband.
Gobar: their son, who leaves for the city and represents a new, less obedient generation.
Jhuniya: Bhola's widowed daughter, who becomes Gobar's wife.
Rai Sahib Amarpal Singh: the landlord, kindly in speech and caught in his own debts.
Professor Mehta and Malti: the novel's urban thinkers, through whom Premchand debates modern ideas about women, marriage and service.
Datadin, Pateshwari, Jhinguri Singh: the priest, the village accountant and the moneylender who live off Hori's labour.
Themes
The farmer's trap. Rent, interest, fines, bribes and religious dues take everything Hori grows. Premchand shows exploitation not as villainy but as a system everyone in the village takes for granted.
Village and city. The two plots mirror each other: the city's comfortable people talk about reform while the village lives the problems they discuss.
The meaning of the title. Godaan is a ritual gift meant to win merit. Hori spends his life trying to own a cow and dies without one; the gift made in his name is Dhaniya's handful of coins. The title is the novel's bitterest irony.
Urdu or Hindi?
Premchand wrote in Hindustani, the shared spoken language of north India, and published in both Urdu and Hindi script. Godaan first appeared in Hindi; it was published in Urdu as well, and Premchand is claimed with equal pride by both literatures. On this site you can switch between the Urdu text, Roman Urdu and Hindi script of every chapter. For more on the two scripts, see our guide to Urdu and Hindi.
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Questions and answers
What is the meaning of Godaan?
Godaan (go-daan) means the gift of a cow. It is a Hindu ritual in which a cow is given to a Brahmin, traditionally at the end of a person's life, to earn religious merit.
How does Godaan end?
Hori dies of heatstroke while labouring to buy a cow. When the priest asks for the ritual gift of a cow, his wife Dhaniya, who has none, gives him the few coins she earned that day.
When was Godaan written?
Godaan was published in 1936, the year Premchand died. It was his last completed novel.
Is Godaan available in English?
Yes. On this site every chapter has the Urdu text with a facing English translation, plus audio, Roman Urdu and Hindi script.
More guides
- Munshi Premchand: Life, Works and Where to Start · The life and books of the writer who brought the Indian village into fiction.
- Gaban by Premchand: Summary, Characters and Themes · A young husband's lie about money, and a wife who makes him face the truth.