Saadat Manto - My Name Is Radha

MAJEED: Not as simple as you think, Bhaijan.

AMJAD ( still smiling ): All right, then, it isn’t. It’s a formidable task. . Anyway, come and sit beside me. We’ve got to think about Saeeda’s birthday gift. Sit!

MAJEED ( sitting down in a chair beside AMJAD): So think!

AMJAD ( sighing ): I’m thinking, I’m thinking! What else is there to do? But you have to think, too. ( Both of them lapse into deep thought. )

( Curtain ) ACT VII

The garden adjacent to Nigar Villa. Evening. The water coming out of the fountain has stopped, as though it has bubbled itself out. In the background, the sombre grey hills are trying to hide their formidable height in the evening mist. The grass appears to be heavily trampled. To the right, away from the fountain and behind the dense shrubbery, sits AMJAD in his wheelchair. ASGHARI is standing behind him holding the handles of the chair. Presently she begins to push it.

AMJAD: No, Asghari, wait a bit.

ASGHARI ( stops ): But Amjad Mian. .

AMJAD: I want to receive the last wound of my life tonight.

ASGHARI: If receive it you must, why not in your imagination? But. . but haven’t you been dealt that wound already? Why must you insist on reopening it?

AMJAD ( attempting to smile ): There’s no limit to the stupidity of a man in my condition. . He rips open the stitches of his wounds to probe inside; feels the stab of pain and considers himself the greatest martyr there ever was. ( Laughs ) Asghari, you’ve never had something of yours destroyed. How can you ever know the misery of people who having sunk into the depths of despair try to mould anew the debris, the rubble of their destruction into tall, imposing structures.

ASGHARI ( smiling ): I’ve gone beyond even that, Amjad Mian. . I’ve built those tall, gigantic structures and then torn them down with my own hands. . and in the process, calluses have formed in my heart.

AMJAD ( shudders ): Asghari, you frighten me. Yes, you really do.

ASGHARI ( laughs ): I’m a wasteland. Every wasteland is frightening, though it shouldn’t be. It doesn’t have the time to mourn itself, much less frighten others. It just cowers. . timidly.

AMJAD: Have you also had some misfortune or other in your life then?

ASGHARI: NO! What misfortune can possibly befall a person who is herself a misfortune!

AMJAD: You sound as though you’ve been singed.

ASGHARI: Only because now you can sense the burning.

AMJAD: You mean this sense was asleep before?

ASGHARI: Yes. . sound asleep.

AMJAD: What woke it up?

ASGHARI: The train that went off the track.

AMJAD ( muttering ): The train. . that went off the track . . ( A little louder ) Will it derail again?

ASGHARI: Whatever God wishes will come to pass.

AMJAD: Don’t mention God. . He and I are no longer friends.

ASGHARI: No, Amjad Mian. Miserable as we are, our bond with Him is never severed. . However much and however often we may break it, it just mends itself again.

AMJAD: That’s nonsense.

( Suddenly they are startled by the sound of approaching feet. MAJEED and SAEEDA appear, both out of breath. SAEEDA , who looks extremely fatigued, sits down on the rim of the fountain while MAJEED remains standing. )

SAEEDA: I really am tired today.

MAJEED: Even though we didn’t walk very far.

SAEEDA: That’s true.

MAJEED ( after a pause ): It would’ve been infinitely better if I had left for Karachi.

SAEEDA: I guess so.

MAJEED: I’m caught in a strange dilemma. I could have gone to Karachi. . but the question is: Would I have succeeded in bringing my boat ashore through this maelstrom?. . No, I would never have made it.

SAEEDA: I know.

MAJEED: You know. . and I know. . Just about everyone but Bhaijan knows. And that’s the most agonizing part of the story.

SAEEDA: I’ve often thought of telling him, but ( rising abruptly ) I’m afraid the shock will kill him.

MAJEED: Exactly. That’s what I fear most, too. The doctors are unanimous that he has, at the most, a year to live. . It would be downright cruel to snatch even this bit from the poor man.

( Behind the cover of the shrubbery AMJAD suddenly clenches his teeth. ASGHARI firmly grasps his shoulder. )

SAEEDA: We must try to keep him happy as long as he lives. His feelings are sensitive to the lightest touch. We have to be careful.

MAJEED: What if one of our own blisters bursts in the process. .

SAEEDA ( almost screaming ): That would be disastrous!

MAJEED: All the more reason why I should go away. . Until Bhaijan. .

SAEEDA ( cutting him short ): Don’t talk like that, Majeed. . don’t be so cruel.

(AMJAD trembles in his wheelchair . ASGHARI clutches his other shoulder firmly as well. )

MAJEED: Love is always cruel and selfish, Saeeda. It’s not even ashamed of dancing for joy on another man’s grave.

SAEEDA: We mustn’t think such things.

MAJEED: You’re right, but what if such thoughts drift in on their own?

SAEEDA: What can we do?. . Let’s go in.

(SAEEDA starts off towards the villa. MAJEED follows with a soft, slow stride. Behind the bushes AMJAD sits in his wheelchair with his head hung low. ASGHARI stands directly behind him, immobile like a statue. )

ASGHARI: Should we go in now?

AMJAD ( his head still hung low ): No, not now. . I’m thinking.

ASGHARI: About what?

AMJAD: I don’t know. Maybe I’m thinking about what I should be thinking.

ASGHARI: That’s useless thinking.

AMJAD ( lifting his head ): Don’t I know that? What else can I do? ( After a pause ) You’re even more cruel than they are. You won’t even let me think. You’re really cruel, Asghari.

ASGHARI ( smiles ): Love is cruel and selfish, Amjad Mian. It doesn’t even hesitate to dance at its own death.

AMJAD: Come in front of me. (ASGHARI goes over in front of AMJAD , who looks into her eyes, thinks of something, and then mutters ) Where was this book all this time?

ASGHARI: Somewhere in the wastebasket. . where it properly belongs.

AMJAD: Let’s go. Take me inside.

(ASGHARI begins to push the wheelchair towards the house. )

( Curtain ) ACT VIII

The same room as in Acts I, II and IV. It is night. An emerald-green light filters down from the ceiling giving everything in the room a sickly hue. The bed is empty — as if it had never been occupied. ASGHARI wheels AMJAD into the room.

ASGHARI: What made Dulhan Begum move out into Begum Sahib’s room?

AMJAD: She was afraid.

ASGHARI: Of you?

AMJAD ( smiling ruefully ): Who’d be afraid of me?. . She was afraid of herself.

ASGHARI: She isn’t all that vulnerable, Amjad Mian.

AMJAD: Time eats even the biggest mountains hollow. She’s just a young woman.

ASGHARI ( after a pause ): Do you want to sleep now?

AMJAD: Sleep? ( Laughs ) Don’t mock me, Asghari. Don’t disgrace my misery. . my burning wounds.

ASGHARI ( after another pause ): Do you love Saeeda?

AMJAD: NO!

ASGHARI: Then why the burning wounds?

AMJAD: Let me think. . Will you let me think?

ASGHARI: Go right ahead.

AMJAD ( after a protracted pause during which he remains totally immersed in thought ): I don’t love Saeeda. . I certainly don’t. Just as one picks the nicest thing from the market, I picked Saeeda from among countless other women to be my wife. I was proud of my choice and rightly so. She is beautiful beyond all comparison. The only right I have over her is that I chose her and made her my mate for life. . the same life which now lies in a crumpled heap in this wheelchair and can’t move without someone’s help. . The doctors have given me a year to live at most. . I can’t understand why I want to keep her shackled in chains whose every link is as uncertain as my life. . I don’t understand it at all. . ( He thinks for a while. ) There can only be one reason for it: her youth and beauty ( with a start ), of course! This has to be the only reason! ( Feeling a stab of pain ) Oh! Oh! That vision. . I can never forget it. . She. . beauty itself. . lying in this canopied bed, in all her breathtaking youth, her ardour, her tenderness. . putting the choicest silks of the world to shame. . this vision clings to me. . No, rather, I have clung to it. . ( After a pause ) Asghari!