Mohammed Hanif's brilliant tribute: Our case against Manto

By Dilip -



Manto with his wife Safia and sister-in-law Zakia. Photo courtesy Manto family archive.


"Not only had you no respect for people who called themselves Maulanas, you didn’t even learn the basic fact that in Lahore you can only misbehave if you are rich or if your wife is not around. Everyone was relieved that your wife was present at the occasion and dragged you away.

"And then you sound puzzled when my fellow judges decided to put you on trial for your shocker Khol Do. We were thinking what kind of impact it will have on our new nation’s moral fibre when they read Khol Do...A person no less than Justice Javed Iqbal, son of your fellow Kashmiri poet Sir Allama Mohammed Iqbal (the alleged dreamer of the dream we all live in), wrote that if people read Khol Do, they might be tempted to become rapists too. Now you get the point? You might have written a story about the trauma and tribulations of a woman. Some of us read it as a rape manual. We, sir, have become a rape-positive republic.

"We can live happily ever after with cuddly revolutionaries...You, on the other hand, cannot be trusted to behave in decent company even after you have been dead for more than half century...

"When we ordered a raid on your house in Lakshmi Mansions Lahore, you wondered what the police were looking for. No sir, they were not looking for a wireless set or some anti-state propaganda. They were looking for that mysterious machine that constantly manufactured ‘doubt’. Because you, sir, were sowing doubts in people’s minds about their own humanity; you were holding them from the scruff of their necks and making them smell their own filth...

"In your last days you said iss zillat ki zindagi ko ab khatm ho jana chahiye (this miserable life should end now). You should see us now. Your casual moan has become our national anthem. And we are not sitting there waiting for it to end; we have become very proactive.

"You should really see us now. Everyone walks around with a dagger stuck in their back. As a storyteller we wish you were here, as a citizen we are glad you are gone. In our desolate morning we sit and stare across the railway tracks, we watch the engines bellowing and smoke rises towards the sky 'like fat men floating up.'.."

Read the full essay: http://herald.dawn.com/2012/05/10/our-case-against-manto-2.html

See also: He wrote what he saw – and took no sides - by Ayesha Jalal
Manto documented the multifaceted Partition miseries that have eluded professional historians due to the methodological limitations of their craft. Unencumbered by the statist narratives of two rival post-colonial states projecting their clashing national ideologies, he pierced the souls of the perpetrators and victims of violence without compromising his sense of humanity and reasonableness. Was Manto a better historian then, if by that term means someone with the ability to narrate the past in a manner that withstands the test of time? And did he realise that he was playing the role of both witness and maker of history? “I rebelled against the great upheaval that the Partition of the country caused,” Manto confessed, and “I still feel the same way”. But rather than wallow in despair, he came to terms with “this monstrous reality”. Falsely accused of being intemperate in his treatment of sensitive social issues, all he did was to plunge himself in the sea of blood to find “a few pearls of regret at what human beings had done to human beings … to draw the last drop of blood from their brothers’ veins.” He had “gathered the tears that some men had shed because they had been unable to kill their humanity entirely”.. http://herald.dawn.com/2012/05/10/he-wrote-what-he-saw-and-took-no-sides.html

And : संघर्ष और सचाई से भरा सआदत का जीवन
And the incomparable short story of 1947: टोबा टेक सिंह

More links - In Search of Manto: 
http://dilipsimeon.blogspot.in/2012/04/in-search-of-saadat-hasan-manto.html

Remembering Saadat Hasan Manto (1912-1955) by Tariq Ali:
http://dilipsimeon.blogspot.in/2012/01/remembering-saadat-hasan-manto-1912.html

Censorship in Pakistani Urdu Textbooks : Ajmal Kamal
http://dilipsimeon.blogspot.in/2011/10/censorship-in-pakistani-urdu-textbooks.html

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