Saadat Manto - My Name Is Radha

The alarming news that ‘monkey-ism’ was on the rise was trickling in from all parts of the country. The government turned a blind eye to it at first but when it noticed that the matter was threatening to become serious it immediately sprang into action.

It is appropriate that the reader should be told right in the beginning what ‘monkey-ism’ or ‘apishness’ stands for. Of course we can’t go into much detail here because it’s a fairly long story, but briefly, the apish movement was set in motion by none other than the monkeys themselves and was directed squarely against humans.

Their gripe was: ‘Now, when it’s an incontrovertible fact that humans are our descendants, why do they treat us so coldly, and not just coldly but entirely contrary to the manner of apes? They tie ropes around our necks and make us dance to the tune of their dugdugies *in every lane and by-lane while they stick their hands out to beg for money. . as though we’re humans. . Furthermore, while it is indisputable that we’re their ancestors and that our blood flows in their veins, it is pretty dubious to say that they have climbed the evolutionary ladder to become humans. If there is such a thing as evolutionary stages, then why didn’t we, billions of monkeys (you may call us a minority if you like, but if a census were ever taken, we would outnumber humans by far), go through them?’

The monkeys maintained: ‘Why should these evolutionary stages remain the exclusive prerogative of only certain monkeys? Evolution! Hah, it’s pure hogwash. Hell, they haven’t evolved at all; if anything, they’ve regressed. They failed to hold on to the status that was bestowed on them; they tumbled so far down from apishness that they became humans.

‘Their evolution is a sign of their downfall. We want these fallen monkeys to revert to their original apishness all over again. And we have started this movement to do just that: bring them back to the fold. We bear them no ill will or enmity; in fact, we consider them our siblings. The purpose of our movement is to compel these monkeys who strut around as humans nowadays, and who’ve grabbed power and influence because of our laxity, to recognize their true primary nature and return to our social habitat.’

Speeches were given publicly, out in the open, and in the privacy of homes, and sometimes even in clandestine meetings. In essence, they underscored the point that vigorous protests should be made against the tyranny and violence the monkeys had unleashed in the guise of man and that demonstrations should be staged in every part of the city, raising cries of Down with humanity! Long live apishness!

At first humans thought this was some kind of comedy show and had a hilarious time of it. Gradually, though, the monkeys’ speeches, their irrefutable arguments and their point of view began to find a place in the hearts of some humans. As a result, those in power discovered from the reports of the secret police that several humans had become the monkeys’ disciples, and, as trustworthy sources verified, thousands had renounced their humanity and returned to being apes; they had sprouted long tails and started walking on all fours.

High officials in the government dismissed this as pure nonsense. That a monkey can become human is an established fact, but how can a human become a monkey? Such reverse progression had never been seen or heard. So, after consulting their superiors, they countered the monkeys’ claims by unleashing an equally relentless propaganda campaign of their own: A human can never morph into a monkey.

There was no dearth of able and resourceful personalities among the monkeys. To squash the government propaganda their savants came up with the ingenious argument that if in this time man can be transformed into woman and woman into man, why not man into monkey, which is his true form.

Still man’s arguments didn’t entirely fail to have an effect on the monkeys. Those humans who hadn’t yet completely transformed found themselves hesitating about whether to complete the process of transformation or revert to being humans. But the monkeys’ powerful rejoinder sustained them in their wavering mental and physical state.

The monkeys’ propaganda secretary promptly mounted an especially vehement campaign. The one incontrovertible truth was: ‘Humans have come forth from us, and only because of some regrettable deviationist streak. Can they deny that they are a distorted form of us?’

In truth, humans had no answer to this crushing argument. But they kept babbling: ‘Well, no, we don’t deny that we were once monkeys. But we had to toil hard and go through difficult stages to achieve our status as humans. It was our granite willpower, our protracted effort, our spiritual awakening, our thought and action, our evolutionary struggle that has brought us to this sublime and lofty state. . a race that we won and others lost. The losers are still wallowing in their simian state. When these lower primates see us in our lofty state, they burn with jealousy. So let them stew. We’ll march ahead on our evolutionary path until one day, who knows, we might even become gods.’

Quick came the answer from the apes’ camp: ‘Brethren, what lofty state have you reached? As we see it, you’re plunging ever deeper into the depths of degradation. Evolution is something we don’t deny, but just tell us, where do you stand today after climbing so many steps of the evolutionary ladder and after centuries of setting up one society after another? Your entire history is filled with warfare and carnage, murder and bloodshed, with rape and the defilement of women’s honour, with ruling others and being subjugated by them.

‘On the other hand, look at our — your ancestors’—history. Can you cite one such dark episode in our history? Yes, we frisk about from one branch to another, but have we ever fought over them as our property? You, you humans, have been writing story after story about us in your books — including the well-known story of how we grabbed on to one another’s tails to build a bridge over the river. You too build bridges, so massive that your human brains are knocked out in astonishment. But then you blow them up. Whereas who can blow up the bridge we devised? Not a single monkey’s tail has behaved treacherously to this day, nor has a single monkey’s wife gotten into bed with another monkey. Our wives pick lice from our bodies and comb our hair daily, but they don’t forfeit their rights doing so; they continue to be the same as ours. You’re not unaware of the way your wives idle away their time, nor are your wives unaware of how you mess around. What you imply by calling us monkeys applies more appropriately to your own selves. Conversely, ‘human’ is an apt term for us considering the meaning you give it in describing yourselves. The plain fact is that you belong to our race. The same blood runs in our veins. No wonder if at times some resemblance should crop up and, equally, no wonder that it should result in the kind of row that has erupted between us now. We invite you to return to our fold. Come back to us, and raise the cry “ Down with humanity! Long live apishness! ” You’ll be the better for it.’

The retort from the human side came loud and clear: ‘These monkeys are shouting nonsense. They’re green with envy that we’ve reached such glorious heights. A single story written about them under God knows what perverse influence, and that too for our children, cannot be taken as the definitive word about them. Otherwise who isn’t aware of the kind of justice this monkey doled out to two cats regarding their quarrel over a piece of cheese? He weighed the piece on his scale and, little by little, gobbled it up himself.’

The monkeys rejoined: ‘Scales and weights are human inventions; we don’t use them at all, we don’t even know how to use them. Now, if you want the truth, it was no monkey who swindled the cats out of their cheese, it was a human. There’s no wonder that he would dupe the poor cats. We can show thousands of such cats whom these humans, once our brothers, are feeding lentils and cauliflower instead of their natural diet of sinews and membranes and thus, having already screwed up their own nature, are hell-bent on destroying that of others. Instead of ridiculing our sense of fairness, have a look at the institutions of justice you’ve created. Don’t your courts ride roughshod over any notion of justice every day by sending hundreds, indeed, thousands of people who have committed no crime to the gallows? We say again, they are our brothers who have somehow gone astray. Our arms are forever open to take them back, our prayers forever for them. We wish to take no revenge.’