Saadat Manto - My Name Is Radha

‘Mohan, why don’t you ask me for my name?’ she asked him one day.

He smiled, ‘For me, your name is your voice.’

‘Which is very musical.’

‘No doubt about it.’

Another day she threw a very abstruse question at him, ‘Mohan, have you ever been in love with a woman?’

‘No.’

‘Why not?’

A sudden despondency came over him. ‘This is not a question I can answer in a few words. I’ll have to sift through the entire rubble of my life. And if I still can’t get an answer, it would irritate me very much.’

‘Then let’s drop it.’

Their telephonic contact had now endured for almost a month. She called him twice every day without fail. Meanwhile, a letter arrived from his friend, the owner of the office — he had managed to get the desired credit and would be back in Bombay in a week’s time. A feeling of gloom washed over Manmohan.

When she next rang him up, Manmohan said, ‘My kingdom is about to end.’

‘Why?’

‘My friend has succeeded in getting the loan. The office will become functional very soon.’

‘But one of your friends must surely have a telephone?’

‘Several of them do, but I can’t give you their numbers.’

‘Why not?’

‘I don’t want anyone to hear your beautiful voice.’

‘But why?’

‘I’m very jealous.’

She smiled and said, ‘This is going to be a big fiasco.’

‘Can’t be helped.’

‘Well then, on your kingdom’s last day I’ll give you my phone number.’

‘That’s better.’

That feeling of gloom disappeared in an instant and he started waiting anxiously for the day when his dominion over the office would end. He again tried to imagine what she must look like. He conjured up several images. None satisfied him. Well — he told himself — it’s now only a matter of a few days. Since she was willing to give her phone number, he could be reasonably sure that he would also be able to see her in person. And that thought left his mind in a daze. What a day that would be when he would see her!

The next time she called him, he said to her, ‘I’m dying to see you.’

‘Why?’

‘You said you’ll give me your phone number on the last day of my dominion here.’

‘Yes, I did.’

‘It’s reasonable to expect that you’ll also give me your address and I’ll be able to see you.’

‘You can see me whenever you want. Even today.’

‘No, no. Not today. I want to see you in proper clothes; I mean respectable clothes. I’ll ask a friend; he’ll order me a new suit.’

She laughed suddenly. ‘You absolutely behave like a kid. Listen, I’ll give you a present when we meet.’

Manmohan became emotional. ‘There could be no greater present than meeting you!’

‘I’ve bought an Exacta camera for you.’

‘Oh!’

‘I’ll give it to you, but on one condition: that you’ll take my picture.’

He smiled. ‘I’ll decide about that after we meet.’

They talked for a while longer. ‘Listen,’ she said, ‘I won’t be able to call you tomorrow or the day after.’

‘Why?’ he asked, feeling quite anxious.

‘I’m going away with my relatives. Just for two days. You’ll forgive me, won’t you?’

He stayed inside the office for the rest of that day. When he woke up the next morning his body was unusually warm. Oh, it’s nothing— just a slight depression brought on by the thought that she won’t be calling today — he concluded. But by afternoon he was running a high temperature and his body was on fire. His eyes were burning. He lay back down on the desk. He felt terribly thirsty, which obliged him to get up repeatedly and drink from the faucet. By evening his chest felt as though it was thoroughly congested, and by the next day he was totally run down. His chest pains had become unbearable.

In his delirium he talked to his beloved’s voice over the phone for hours. His condition had deteriorated badly by evening. He looked at the wall clock through blurry eyes. His ears were buzzing with strange sounds, as if countless phones were ringing all at once, and his chest was wheezing without letting up. He was engulfed in a sea of noises, so when the phone did ring, the sound failed to reach his ears. It kept ringing for a long time. He came to with a start and rushed to the phone. Holding himself steady against the wall he picked up the receiver with a trembling hand, ran his stiff tongue over his parched lips and said, ‘Hello!’

‘Hello, Mohan!’ the woman spoke from the other end.

‘Yes, it is Mohan,’ his voice faltered.

‘Speak a bit louder.’

He opened his mouth to say something but the words caught in his dried-up throat.

‘I returned early,’ she said. ‘I’ve been calling you for quite a while. Where were you?’

His head started to spin.

‘What’s happening to you?’

With great difficulty he could only say, ‘My kingdom ended — today.’

Blood spilled from his mouth and trickled down his neck, leaving a long, thin streak.

‘Take down my number: 50314, repeat 50314. Call me tomorrow.’ She hung up.

Manmohan fell over the phone face down. Bubbles of blood began to spurt from his mouth.

It was the same season, the sky was as washed and clear a blue as his eyes, just like today. The sunlight had the comforting warmth of pleasant dreams. The smell of the earth was the same as it is now, crowding my senses. Lying down as I am today, I offered my throbbing soul to him.

‘Believe me, my life was bereft of moments like the ones you’ve given me,’ he said. ‘All the empty spaces of my being that you’ve filled today are grateful to you. Had you not come into my life, perhaps it would have remained incomplete. I’m at a loss; what more can I say. I feel complete, indeed so complete that I don’t think I need you any more.’

And he walked away, never to return.

My eyes shed tears and my heart cried. I begged him. I asked him over and over again: ‘Why — why don’t you need me any more, now when my need for you, with all its tumultuous passion, has only just begun. . after those very moments which, as you say, filled the empty spaces of your being.’

‘These moments have bestowed on me, one by one, whatever atoms of your being I needed to make myself whole,’ he said. ‘Now that my life’s goal has been accomplished, our relationship naturally comes to an end.’

Oh the wounding cruelty of those words! I couldn’t bear their onslaught. I screamed in pain, which left him unmoved. I told him, ‘These atoms that perfected you were part of my being. Don’t they bear some relationship to me? Could the rest of me ever disown them? Your fruition comes at the cost of leaving me severed in two. Did I make you my lord for this?’

‘Bees suck the nectar of flowers and buds to make honey, but they’re never so much as allowed to taste it, not even its dregs. God demands worship, but doesn’t worship Himself. He spent a few moments in seclusion with Non-Being and brought forth Being. Where is Non-Being now? Does existence need it any more? It was the mother that died giving birth to Being.’

‘All a woman can do is cry,’ I said to him. ‘She can’t argue. Her most potent argument is the teardrop that falls from her eye. Look at me — I’m crying, shedding continuous tears. If you must leave me, at least gather a few of them in the shroud of your handkerchief. I’ll be crying for the rest of my life, but at least I’ll cherish the memory that you too participated in the funeral rites of a few of my tears. . if only to make me happy.’

‘I’ve already made you happy. I’ve made you experience the tangible happiness you saw only as a distant mirage. Can you not live by the memory of the bliss, the exhilaration of those moments? You say that my fruition has left you incomplete. Isn’t this incompletion enough to keep your life dynamic? I’m a man. Today you’ve brought me fruition, tomorrow someone else will. My being is fashioned from such a substance that there will be many moments when I will experience this feeling of incompletion and many women like you will enter my life to fill the void created by those moments.’