Saadat Manto - My Name Is Radha

Zohra stepped into the room and sat down on the cot. ‘I’m yours,’ she said, ‘and always will be.’

She kept her word. After she and Naim moved to Delhi, married and set themselves up in a small house, the Dipty Sahib came looking for them. As Naim had already found work, he wasn’t home. The Dipty Sahib scolded Zohra, accusing her of sacrificing her honour. He wanted her to leave Naim and put all that had happened behind her. He was even willing to pay Naim as much as two or three thousand rupees. But Zohra wasn’t ready to leave her husband, no matter what. She said to her father, ‘Daddy! I’m truly happy with Naim. You could never have found a better husband for me. We don’t ask you for anything. But if you can, give us your blessing; we’ll be grateful for that.’

The Dipty Sahib became very angry when he heard these words. He threatened to have Naim arrested. Zohra, however, asked him matter-of-factly, ‘But Daddy! What is Naim’s crime? The truth is we’re both innocent. We love each other and he’s my husband. This isn’t a crime. And I’m no longer a minor.’

The Dipty Sahib was a shrewd man. He quickly realized that he wouldn’t be able to prove Naim guilty when his own daughter was a willing partner. He left Zohra forever. Later on he tried to put pressure on Naim indirectly through other people and even tried to buy him off, but failed in that as well.

Zohra and Naim were living happily, even though Naim’s salary was dreadfully small and Zohra, who’d been brought up in great comfort and luxury, now had to be content with wearing homely clothes and doing all the household chores on her own. But she was happy and found herself in a new world where she continually discovered fresh dimensions of Naim’s love. She was pleased, very pleased, and so was Naim. But one day, as God had willed it, Zohra felt a severe pain in her chest and before Naim could do anything about it, she passed away, leaving his world dark forever.

It took him four hours to recount this story. He had spoken haltingly, as if relishing every word he uttered. By the time he finished, his face no longer looked pale. It was flushed, as though blood had been injected into him slowly, but his eyes had tears in them and his throat was dry.

His tale told, he got up quickly, as if in a terrible hurry, and said, ‘I made a big mistake. I shouldn’t have told you the story of my love. I made a terrible mistake. All this about Zohra should have remained sealed inside my heart, but. .’ His voice became hoarse. ‘I’m alive and she. . she. .’ He couldn’t say anything more. He shook my hand quickly and left the room.

I never saw him again. Many times I went to Apollo Bunder with the express purpose of looking for him, but I never found him there. I did receive a letter from him six or seven months later in which he wrote:

Sir!

You will recall that I told you the story of my love at your place. It was only a story, an untrue story, for there’s no Zohra, nor is there a Naim. Although I do exist, I’m not the same Naim who was in love with Zohra. One day you said there were people who were truly barren of love. I am one of them, someone who has spent his entire life merely deluding his heart. Naim’s love for Zohra was a distraction and Zohra’s death — I still don’t understand why I killed her — it’s quite possible that that too had something to do with my inner darkness.

I don’t know if you believed my story to be true, but let me tell you something very strange. I, the creator of that story, believed it to be true, to be based completely on reality. I believed that I had really loved Zohra and she had really died. It might surprise you even more to hear that the story became increasingly real to me as time passed. I could clearly hear Zohra’s voice, even her laughter, ring in my ears, and I could feel her warm breath on my body. Every little detail of the story came to life and so, in a manner of speaking, I dug my grave with my own hands.

Even if Zohra isn’t fiction, I am. She’s dead, so I must die too. This letter will reach you after my death. Farewell. I will find Zohra, I’m sure. But where? Of that I’m not so sure.

The only reason I’ve scribbled these lines to you is that you’re a writer. If you can turn all of this into a story you may be able to sell it for seven or eight rupees, since you once said you can make that much from a story. That will be my gift to you. Goodbye.

Your acquaintance,

Naim

Naim created Zohra for himself and died. I created a story for myself and lived. It’s not fair.

Co-translated with Moazzam Sheikh

As far as I’m concerned, it isn’t necessary for me to tell you or for you to ask what city it was. Let’s just say that this story is set in the suburbs of Peshawar, close to the border, where she lived in something like a mud hut behind a dense thicket of reeds. The reeds, located some distance from the cottage, more or less hid the sparse dwelling and anyone passing by on the dirt road in front could hardly see it.

The reeds were dried up, but they had burrowed into the ground in such a way that they formed a thick screen. God knows whether the woman had stuck them there herself or whether they’d been there all along. Whatever, at least they worked like an iron curtain.

Call it what you will, a house or a hut — it was just a cluster of three small but very immaculate and tidy rooms, with few furnishings to speak of. The room at the back had a niwari palang . *In a tiny niche above it, a small earthen lamp, its cotton wick dipped in mustard oil, burned all night long. The niche, too, looked quite clean and tidy, as did the oil lamp. It was given a new wick and filled with fresh oil every day.

Shall I tell you her name now, the one who lived in this little place behind the reeds with her young daughter?

All manner of rumours circulated about the girl. According to some she wasn’t the woman’s own daughter but rather an orphan the woman had adopted and brought up as her own. Others thought the girl was a child born out of wedlock, and still others claimed that she was, in fact, the woman’s own flesh and blood. Whatever the truth may be, one cannot be certain about it. Anyway, you’ll have formed some opinion yourself by the time you’re done reading this story.

Ah, yes, I forgot to tell you the woman’s name. Actually, the name isn’t important. You may call her by any name, Sakina, Mahtab, Gulshan, or whatever. What’s in a name? However, for your convenience, let me call her Sardar.

Sardar was middle-aged. She must have been quite beautiful in her youth. Although her healthy-looking, rosy cheeks had become a bit marred by wrinkles now, she still looked several years younger than her age. But we shouldn’t be concerned with her cheeks, should we?

Her daughter — never mind whether she actually was or wasn’t her daughter — was a breathtaking specimen of blossoming youth. There was absolutely nothing in her features that betrayed, even faintly, any suggestion that she was a trollop, but the fact is her mother had set her up as a prostitute and was making good money. And Navab — again for your ease, let me give her this name — wasn’t averse to her profession.

Because of her upbringing in a fairly secluded area, tucked far away from the nearest habitation, the girl had no inkling of the true joys of conjugal life. When Sardar introduced Navab’s first man to her — on that very palang, of all places — the girl perhaps thought this was how all young women were initiated into their youth, so she became accustomed to her prostitute’s existence and believed that her life’s ultimate purpose lay in sleeping with men who came to visit her from far away.