14) MANTO'S LEGACY REMAINS ALIVE
By Gurpreet Singh
The legacy of Saadat Hasan Manto, a progressive Urdu writer, remains alive as secularists around the world celebrate his birth centenary this year.
A prominent Pakistani author, Manto was born on May 11, 1912 in an undivided India. He grew up and studied in Punjab and ended up becoming a professional film script writer in Bombay. However, he gained much prominence as a fiction writer who authored over 200 short stories. His first collection was published in 1936. His first story, Tamaasha (Show) was about the 1919 massacre of supporters of the passive resistance movement by British troops in Amritsar, Punjab.
The partition of India on religious lines in 1947 became a major turning point both in Manto's personal life and work. The division came along with independence from the British occupation. A theocratic Muslim state called Pakistan came into being, whereas India chose to become a secular republic. The partition sparked sectarian violence - innocent Muslims were murdered on the Indian side and Hindus and Sikhs were massacred on the Pakistani side.
Manto, who lived in Bombay, migrated to Pakistan in 1948. This migration came as a rude shock to Manto, who admitted his disappointment in one of his essays, revealing his pain over the partition. He made Pakistan his home out of family compulsions, but remained an ardent opponent of theocracy. His anguish towards religious fanaticism and autocracy are also explicit in his stories. Those depicting the goriness and pains of partition became most read. Among them were Thanda Gosht (Cold Flesh), Khol Do (Open It) and Nangi Awaazein (Naked Voices).
He was charged and tried for spreading obscenity and promoting sexuality in Thanda Ghost. The story is about a Sikh man who tries to rape a dead Muslim woman during riots. The incident renders the Sikh impotent. Though Manto was repeatedly charged for such offences, he was never convicted. Both Thanda Gosht and Khol Do reveal sexual violence against women during riots.
These stories are still relevant as India and Pakistan continue to witness religious and sectarian bloodshed. The history of massacres has been repeated in a free and secular India a number of times, most notably the anti-Sikh pogrom of 1984 and anti-Muslim violence of 2002. Women belonging to these minority groups became a target of sexual abuse by the mobs during these massacres. Likewise, minorities continue to be persecuted in Pakistan. So much so, Shia and Sunni Muslims continue to fight in a Muslim state.
Nangi Awazein is another of Manto's stories relevant today. The story is about the frustration of a newly married couple in a refugee camp, who fail to make love because of lack of privacy. Years later, when Hindus were forced to flee the Indian side of Kashmir due to threats from Islamic militants and live in a tent city in Delhi, it was reported that the population growth came to halt in the refugee camps.
Manto has left a legacy that can help in bridging the cultural gap between India and Pakistan, but also bring awakening against forces inimical to people's unity and peace anywhere in the world.
(The above article is from the June 1-15, 2012, issue of People's Voice, Canada's leading communist newspaper. Articles can be reprinted free if the source is credited. Subscription rates in Canada: $30/year, or $15 low income rate; for U.S. readers - $45 US per year; other overseas readers - $45 US or $50 CDN per year. Send to People's Voice, c/o PV Business Manager, 706 Clark Drive, Vancouver, BC, V5L 3J1.)