Saadat Manto - My Name Is Radha

After introducing me, he turned to Babu Gopinath, who appeared to be quite overwhelmed. ‘And this is Babu Gopinath, the home-wrecker — his home, of course — come to Bombay from Lahore, fooling around all the way, a Kashmiri kabutri in tow.’

Babu Gopinath smiled faintly.

Thinking he hadn’t done justice to the introduction, Sando added, ‘World’s number one gullible fool, if ever there was one. People butter him up and cheat him out of his money. I squeeze two boxes of Polson’s butter out of him every day just by talking. He’s a very antiphilogistine type of person, Manto Sahib. Do come to his flat this evening.’

Babu Gopinath, whose mind seemed to be elsewhere, started and said, ‘Yes, yes, Manto Sahib, you must come.’ Then he asked Sando, ‘Does Manto Sahib enjoy. . You know. .?’

Sando exploded into laughter. ‘Are you kidding? He enjoys everything, not just that! Manto Sahib, you must come this evening. I’ve started drinking too, because it’s free.’

Sando gave me the address. I arrived there at about six as promised. It was a neat and tidy three-room flat boasting brand new furniture. Apart from Sando and Babu Gopinath, two other men and two women were in the living room. Sando introduced them to me.

One of the men was Ghaffar Sain, the perfect image of a Punjabi peasant. He was clad in a sarong and had a string of large beads around his neck. ‘Babu Gopinath’s legal adviser. You know what I mean?’ said Sando, introducing the man. ‘Any lunatic with a runny nose and a drooling mouth becomes a man of God in Punjab. This one’s also a man of God, or is getting there. He tagged along with Babu Gopinath from Lahore because he had no hope of ever finding another sucker in that land. Now he guzzles Scotch, smokes Craven A cigarettes and prays for Babu Gopinath’s well-being.’

Throughout this introduction Ghaffar Sain kept smiling.

The other man, tall and athletic with a pockmarked face, was called Ghulam Ali. Sando introduced him as: ‘My acolyte. He’s following precisely in the footsteps of his guru. The unmarried daughter of a well-known Lahore prostitute went bonkers over him. She brought all kinds of kuntiniutlian into motion to trap him, but he said, “Do or die, I’m not about to drop my pants.” He ran into Babu Gopinath at some shrine and has stuck to him ever since. He gets his meals and a tin of Craven A every day.’

Ghulam Ali also kept smiling through this parsing of his person.

There was also a fair-skinned, rosy-cheeked Kashmiri kabutri in the room. As soon as we walked in I concluded that she was the same Kashmiri kabutri Sando had alluded to in the office. A neat-looking young woman with short hair that gave the impression of just having been cut though it actually hadn’t been. Her eyes were clear and gleaming. Her features betrayed a coltishness and a lack of worldly experience. Sando introduced her thus: ‘Zeenat Begum, or Zeeno for short, as Babu Sahib calls her lovingly. This apple, plucked from Kashmir, was brought to Lahore by a seasoned madam. Babu Gopinath found out about her through his secret network and made off with her one night. A lot of legal wrangling ensued. For two whole months the police had a good time. At Babu Sahib’s expense, of course, but in the end, he won the court case and brought her here. . dharan takhta !’

The other woman, who sat quietly smoking a cigarette, was dark-complexioned and her red-streaked eyes oozed considerable brashness. Babu Gopinath pointed to her and said to Sando, ‘Say something about her too.’

Slapping her on the thigh, Sando proclaimed, ‘And this, gentlemen, is teen patoti fulful boti , Mrs Abdur Rahim “Sando”, otherwise known as Sardar Begum. She too is a product of Lahore. Fell in love with me in 1936 and made a dharan takhta of me in two years flat. I fled Lahore. What do you know? Babu Gopinath sent for her to keep me amused. She too gets a daily ration of a tin of Craven A. She takes a morphine shot every evening, which costs two and a half rupees. Don’t let her dark complexion deceive you; she’s a real tit for tat woman.’

‘Don’t talk gibberish!’ Sardar only said this much, though not without a certain air — the feigned air of a seasoned professional.

After introducing everyone, Sando began another round of my praises.

‘Enough, yaar,’ I said, ‘let’s talk about something else.’

‘Boy!’ he shouted with gusto. ‘Some whisky and soda,’ and then looking at the host, said, ‘Babu Gopinath, out with the green.’

Babu Gopinath stuck his hand into his pocket, yanked out a wad of hundred-rupee bills and gave one to Sando. Sando stared at it with reverence, brandished it and said, ‘Oh God! My Rabbul Alameen, *would that a day might come when I too can lick my thumb and peel off note after note! On your feet, Ghulam Ali! Bring two bottles of Johnnie Walker Still-Going-Strong.’

The bottles arrived in no time and we all began to drink. The evening lasted a good three hours, during which Abdur Rahim, as usual, talked the most. He downed the first glass in a single gulp and shouted, ‘ Dharan takhta , Manto Sahib, now this is what I call perfect whisky. The second it goes blazing down my throat it inscribes “Long Live the Revolution!” inside my guts. Long Live Babu Gopinath!’

Poor Babu Gopinath, he remained perfectly silent, though now and then he did chime in with Sando. I couldn’t help thinking that the man had no opinion of his own and went along with whatever anyone else said. Ghaffar Sain — whom Sando had anointed as Babu Gopinath’s ‘legal adviser’, which only meant Babu had faith in him — was the greatest proof of Babu’s gullibility. Then too, I gathered from the conversation that Babu had spent a good part of his time in Lahore in the company of fakirs and dervishes. There was an air of absent-mindedness in him, as if he was perpetually lost in distant thoughts, so I asked him at one point, ‘Babu Gopinath, what are you thinking about?’

Startled, he said with a smile, ‘Me. . nothing. . nothing at all.’ Then glancing at Zeenat with a look full of tender love he exclaimed, ‘Just about these beauties. What else is there?’

‘He is a formidable home-wrecker, Manto Sahib, really formidable. You won’t find a single prostitute in all of Lahore who hasn’t had kuntinutely with him.’

At this Babu Gopinath exclaimed with awkward modesty, ‘I don’t have it in me any more, Manto Sahib!’

Soon the conversation veered towards smutty talk: a discussion of all the popular families of Lahore prostitutes, who among them was well to do, who a nautch-girl, who an employee of a bawd, how much did Babu Gopinath pay for the ritual deflowering of a girl. Only Sardar, Sando, Ghaffar Sain and Ghulam Ali participated in the conversation, using the typical jargon of Lahore’s bordellos. I understood most of it, though certain terms eluded me completely.

All the while Zeenat remained absolutely silent. She only smiled occasionally when some remark or other caught her fancy. It seemed she had no interest in this sort of gossip. She didn’t drink any whisky either, not even watered down. And when she smoked, she didn’t evince any liking for either tobacco or smoke, though, strangely, she went through more cigarettes than anyone else. Nothing she did gave any clue as to whether she had any feelings for Babu Gopinath, though the latter’s considerable concern for her was quite evident. He had provided her with every item necessary for her comfort. Yet I sensed a certain tension between the two; instead of being close, they seemed somewhat distant.

At about eight in the evening Sardar left to get her morphine shot at Dr Majeed’s. After three glasses of whisky, Ghaffar Sain picked up his rosary and dozed off on the carpet. Ghulam Ali was charged with bringing food from the restaurant. After Sando put the brakes on his interesting chatter, Babu Gopinath, fairly drunk by this time, shot the same loving glance at Zeenat and asked me, ‘Manto Sahib, what do you think about my Zeenat?’