Toba Tek Singh - Sadat Hasan Manto

“Toba Tek Singh” was written in Urdu, Pakistan’s national language, by Sadat Hasan Manto, a Kashmiri who left his home in the month January 1948 and moved to Karachi, Pakistan’s capital. The story recounts the effects of partition on a very particular portion of the population.

The protagonist of the story is a Sikh inmate named Bishan Singh who, fifteen years earlier, had gone mad and was committed by his family. Everyone in the asylum calls him Toba Tek Singh, the name of his village. Almost bald, his legs swollen because he seemed to be standing all the time, he also has the habit of speaking this nonsensical phrase, “Upri gur gur di annexe di be-dhiyana o di mung di daal of di lalteen.”

Family members, who used to visit him, now no longer come. He repeatedly asks his fellow inmates whether Toba Tek Singh, his old town, is in India or Pakistan, but nobody seems to know. One day Fazaludin, an old Muslim friend from his village, visits Bishan Singh, who doesn’t recognize the man. Fazaudin brings word that Singh’s family has safely gone to India. Fazaludin speaks of the water buffalos left behind and the calves they have produced. Singh asks him, “Where is Toba Tek Singh?” To which his old friend replies, “In India … no, in Pakistan.”

The transfer of inmates takes place on a cold winter evening. Hindu and Sikh lunatics are placed on buses and taken to the border. When Bishan Singh steps from the bus and is asked to register, he asks the official, “Where is Toba Tek Singh? In India or Pakistan?” The official tells him it is in Pakistan, the place Singh is leaving. “Bishan Singh tried to run, but was overpowered by the Pakistani guards who tried to push him across the dividing line towards India. However, he wouldn’t move.”

The story concludes as follows:

                “After fifteen years on his feet, he was lying face down on the ground. India was on one side behind a barbed wire fence. Pakistan was another side behind another barbed fence. Toba tek Singh lay in the middle, on a piece of land that had no name.”

In the story there were five lunatic types which stood out:

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1.

“There was one Muslim lunatic who had read the fire eating Newspaper…”

When asked where Pakistan was, he said “It’s a place in India where they make cut throat razors.” This is a pretty stereotypical Pakistani description considering it’s taken as a place which makes blades. Here ‘cut throat’ is used carefully suggesting murder, and shedding light on death. This can be interpreted as the way the people already saw Pakistan as a place where they would make equipment of murder.

2.

                “One lunatic got so involved in this India/Pakistan question …..Told him to come down, he climbed higher.”

               

                This lunatic here symbolizes the wish the people had during this partition. Many people didn’t want the partition to happen and during the partition the society was so tensed that they would feel not like being part of any country and just sit on a tree for the rest of the life.

3.

                “One man held an MS Degree and had been a radio engineer. He kept apart from…. All over the grounds”

               

                This lunatic is a symbol mirroring all the educated people who are brilliant and have received really good education and are still insane. Their acts are disapproved at time but they are left to their own demise as they are considered educated and the know all.

4.

                “In the European Ward there were two Anglo Indian lunatics… Indian chapattis instead of bread? “

               

                This paragraph recites to us the condition of the English lunatics in the ward. They were worried to hear that the English had granted independence and left the country, now they would have to eat bloody Indian chapattis. This tells us that the English people in India hated the country and the food here. Just like the probable disappearance of the European ward, it was thought that India would now have no ties with the Britain anymore after all this. Contrasting that India is still part of the common wealth.

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The theme of lunatics in this story is a predominant one. How everyone else but the lunatics are insane is pointed out here. During this partition process almost no one seems to have an idea of where India is and where Pakistan is. The lunatics being lunatic know that this shouldn’t have happened and opposed this even if they had selfish reasons of not moving to some other place. The story portrays lunatics as psychological elements in human minds. Even after the lunatic transfer it has been shown that nothing has changed and everything is still the same. Humans who are supposed to be sane are acting up against each other like lunatics. The lunatics seemed to have a better idea of what is going on and if we were to follow the lunatics instead of the ‘sane’ humans the product would have been different of course, even slightly better.

The last line of the story brings out the essence of the partition within.

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References:
http://www.choices.edu/resources/documents/Partition_literature.pdf

Songs of the Ganga - Arvind Krishna Mehrotra

Songs of the Ganga by Arvind Mehrotra personifies the Ganga into different things and also uses it as a symbol for life. The Ganga rises in the Western Himalayas in the Indian state of Uttarakhand, and flows south and east through the Gangetic Plain of North India into Bangladesh, where it empties into the Bay of Bengal.(…)This river is precious as a religious entity and also acts as a lifeline for millions of people who use the water from Ganga. Considering this, the river Ganga is a very good symbol for life and the poem bring it out beautifully with vivid descriptions.

1.

I am Ganga Snow from the mountains. The keeper of water. 

I am the plains I am the foothills I carry wishes of my streams, to the sea.

I am both man and woman.

I am paper boats for children. I am habits for fishermen. I am a cloud for shaven monks. I reflect all movements.

I am the bridge. I am the fort and the archer taking aim. I am the great dissolver of men 

I give life and I take it back. 

·         The first line of the stanza is Ganga describing itself and its point of origin, i.e. the Ganga is formed from the snow of the Himalaya. By the keeper of water it says that it isn’t water but an entity which carries water, like the goddess Ganga.(…)

·         The second line suggests the path that the river treads, it travels the plains as well as the foothills after descending from a mountain. The wishes here mean the baths that people take to wash away their sins are taken from the streams to the Bay of Bengal. Desires of my streams can also mean the natural force of gravity which carves way for the river.

·         The third line says that it is middle way, neither man nor woman. This suggests that the Ganga doesn’t differentiate between man and woman. And there is also a Hindu concept having to do with seeing through or resolving opposites.

·         The fourth line basically says that it contains everything that a human may need. May it be fun, fish, inspiration etc. (respectively).

·         The fifth line. I am the bridge is a symbolic element here suggesting the bridge between life and death, from material existence to spiritual existence, as the ashes of most dead Hindus are given back to the Ganga as it is said to be the source of life. The Ganga has enough power to guard an area (fort) with its tides and still enough power to destroy it too (archer). It dissolves the ashes of the dead (Great dissolver).

·         The sixth line. As Ganga is the bridge connecting material existence and spiritual existence it says that it gives life and takes it back. Putting it in a rational context this could mean that the water from the Ganga helps millions of people to survive, and when the Ganga gets flooded it could take all the life back.

2. 

I go out into the world, I am the world, I am nations, cities, people I am the pages of an unbound book.

My room is the air around me.

I am dressed in water, I am naked as water, I am clarity.

A friend comes along offers me a flag and says a government has toppled.

I’m going to catch rain, I say and spread out a net .

I am poison.

·         The first line here shows how Ganga spans along a wide area and is a part of people’s life. It is an unbound book as there is no telling how the Ganga may grow what would happen next with the Ganga, will it flood? Would it not? Etc.

·         The second line just says that the only thing that’s around Ganga is the air around it. This line is kind of important as air is seen as a free element of nature, but thinking about it closely, so is water. Water is just more disciplined than air and is also very free.

·         The third line. The waters of the Ganga are clean and clear. You could see through them. By clarity it means that it can give you the answer to all questions. This is religious symbolism considering all travellers in search for enlightenment visit the Ganga River at least once in their lives.

·         The fourth line. This line suggests independence and the fall of the British Government.

·         The fifth line. As it is going to rain, the river Ganga spreads out a net and increases in volume.

·         The sixth line in relationship with the fifth line can be used to trace out an aspect of death. This suggests that the fifth line could mean that the Ganga is going to flood now.

3. 

Billy goats, come down from the mountain. Without finding solitude, camels return from the desert. 

I make two lines in the sand, and say they are unbreakable walls. 

I make the four directions one, I know the secret of walking. 

I am the death of fire.

·         The first line. Goats come down from the mountains to quench their thirsts and camels return from the desert for the same.

·         The second line. A small stream of water can turn into a canyon over years of erosion forming structures similar to huge unbreakable walls.

·         The third line. The Ganga washes away four directions and makes it one. Contrasting this statement the secret of walking states that the Ganga understands all kinds of movements. The arrogance in the last statement is balanced with the humility of this one.

·         The fourth line. This line is self-explanatory.

4. 

From smoke I learn disappearance from the ocean unprejudiced 

From birds How to find a rest-house in the storm 

From the leopard How to cover the sun with spots 

In summer I tend watermelons and in flood I stay near the postman’s house 

I am a beggar I am a clown and I am shadow less.

·         The first line talks about the evaporation of sea water and romanticizes with the subject. The ocean is unprejudiced as it does not distinguish between man and animal and devours them both at point.(Life of Pi Reference)

·         The second and the third line tells us about the things that the Ganga has learned from the animals. (More romanticization.)

·         The fourth line. In summer watermelons which grow in the waters of the Ganga are eaten by us, hinting us that in one way or other the Ganga has given water to us all. The postman’s house is usually located in the most suitable location which is easily accessible.

·         The fifth line. Here beggar, and clown are used in a very random sense suggesting that the Ganga can be anything and is everything. I am shadow less means that, the Ganga does not have an end nor do people know where it properly starts (until recently).

This stanza tells us of the experiences the river Ganga has had. And how instead of us learning from it al the time it learns from us too. Us meaning everyone else other than itself as it is non prejudiced it takes humans and animals and birds as one.

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References:

https://www.englishforums.com/English/HelpMeWithThePoemGanga/wcch/post.htm

Nani - Kamala Das

Nani, by Kamala Das is a poem symbolic in itself of the problem risen due to Castism and nonchalance towards the woman figure. Nani, is a maid who worked for Kamala Das’s family at the time when she was a kid. One day suddenly she hangs herself to death in the privy. Thinking of this as a game that Nani might be on, Kamala Das who was a little girl that time thought that Nani was just trying to amuse them. The fact that Nani was there hanging for three hours is morbid indeed. When Kamala Das asked her Grandmother of the Nani, she refused to have any memory of someone like her. And after that lines of logical and philosophical introspection are laid out unto such truths of life.

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“Nani, the pregnant maid hanged herself

In the privy one day.”

These opening lines of the poem tell us that Nani hung herself with a baby in her womb. Considering that she was a working Dalit class woman, the burden of having a child would’ve made her do so as she wouldn’t have been able to provide for the child. From other sources this also suggests that the maid would’ve gotten pregnant from sexual abuse by her master.

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“…a clumsy puppet, and when the wind blew

Turning her gently on the rope, it seemed

To us who were children then, that Nani

Was doing, to delight us, a comic dance…”

The poetess being a child at the time could not understand what happened here, so she assumed that Nani was playing a puppet game of some sort. This is symbolism to Nani’s job as Nani was only a puppet to the family she worked for, and her life was getting worse and worse day by day.

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“The shrubs grew fast. Before the summer’s end…

…doorway and the walls”

This set of lines suggest the passing away of time without notice. This is very contrasting as someone’s death usually makes the environment a bit gloomy, dull and eerie. Here Nani’s death didn’t have any effect on the people, just as if she wasn’t even a person and all her life was in vain. This makes us question humanity and the caste system which has made people heartless.

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“The privy, so abandoned,

Became an altar then, a sunny shrine,

For a goddess who was dead.”

The above tells us that Nani was a Goddess. This must mean that Nani must’ve been a really good and caring person. So humane that she was eligible for the title of Goddess. It’s in the humanity that we find God, and not in the heavens.

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“Another year or two, and I asked my Grandmother one day,

Don’t you remember Nani, the dark plump one?

Who bathed me near the well…?

Grandmother shifted her reading glasses on her nose, and stared at me.

Nani, she asked, who is she?

With that question ended Nani.

Each truth ends with thus a query.”

The poetess asks of her Grandmother about Nani, but the grandma refuses to have any memory of her. It is heart breaking to know that a person can forget about such an incident that happened in their own house, where a kid remembers it and you can’t. Well it is justifiable that the lady is old and maybe can barely remember anything. But this is just one perspective to these lines. The last three lines in the above excerpt suggest that the grandma might’ve done it willingly so that her granddaughter doesn’t have to remember a death from her childhood. The last three lines tell us how with one sentence how a person’s memory can be erased from existence, how truths can be manipulated to look like nothing with constant unreasonable questions and questioning.

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“It is this designed deafness,

That turns mortality into immortality,

The definite into the soft indefinite.

They are lucky, who ask questions,

And move on before the answers come.”

From here the poetess writes about the ethical aspect of the poem. The designed deafness meaning, the way people selectively ignore something instead of listening to the point and analyzing it. This turns mortality to immortality because if something is questioned and the answer received is very appropriate, it would replace the original truth in context with a new truth. This makes the truth before mortal as it is no more and hence this designed deafness helps retain immortality in ideas.

Those who do not question these truths are happy as they have something that is very constant and they believe that it would be constant hence they do not have to deal with the soft indefinite. Whereas, the ones who keep asking questions have nothing constant in their life in terms of truth, their idea of truth keeps changing and so does their mind.

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“Like music in the Koel’s egg,

Like lust in the blood,

Or Like sap in a tree”

This is the end of the poem and symbolises human nature in 3 contexts. All humans are the same. All of them have lust in the blood just like the Koel who would break the egg and grow to sing, and sap in a tree which can’t be seen but is there.

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Nani is a complete poem in the sense of bringing out the inhumanity in us and showing us the way to retain our own true nature or will by following what is given unto us and respect it.

A London Cab Horse - Anna Sewell

A London Cab Horse is an extract from Black Beauty, written by Anna Sewell. In it, the author narrates from the point of view of the horse. Throughout the extract, the author focuses primarily on the pleasures the horse derives from the kindness of its owners, its fellow horses, and its experiences in the city as a cab horse.

The passage begins with the horse’s introduction of his new master and the latter’s family. She speaks briefly of the wife, children, and the other horse of the master; an old stallion who used to belong to an officer in the Crimean war. She goes on to describe the next morning and the process of readying and grooming her. In the afternoon she is put into the cab (tethered to the carriage), and sets off to the cabstand.

At the cabstand sundry other cab drivers gather around her, passing remarks. After some time, a senior cabbie driver by the name of Grey Grant comes up to her, and compliments her owner on his choice.  He is portrayed as a kindly trusting and optimistic person.

The narrator then proceeds to describe the frightening noise and bustle of the jostling city, but how her fears were abated owing to the masterful skill of her driver. She continues to compliment him for the rest of the story; speaking of how he never took to the whip but guided with gentle whispers, and how he gave them (the horses) sufficient food and water, with ample living space.

The primary theme in this piece would be a rather subliminal message of human-animal equality. The author’s choice to write from the perspective of the horse, rather than the perspective of a human, serves this purpose greatly. It is already established that Anna Sewell’s intent behind the writing of this book was to induce a kindness and sympathy in those that owned and reared horses.

Another aspect, from more of a historical basis as opposed to a literary one, is that most horse owners, cab drivers in particular, tended to mistreat their horses. In attempts to cut costs and maximize profits, many chose to keep their horses tethered outdoors, and never bothered to supply them with fresh water. The optimistic trajectory of the story line in the passage is indicative of the author’s mentality. By combining the aspect of the perfectly functioning give and take relationship between the horse and its owner, and the optimistic path of the story line, the writer seems to be appealing to the reader’s humanity; inducing the thought that properly caring for the horse would not be a lost investment, rather, the horse would be more cheerful and obedient if it were treated such. 

Boundless Boon - Esparlee Khongriah

A middle aged woman, approaching her 40s, works hard to make ends meet. She is unmarried and has a day job to support her family. Children call her ‘Auntie’ because of her appearance. She has lived a very monotonous life which has made her work hard since her teenage years. Her parents were travelling and they got into a car accident. In this incident her father died and her mother suffered serious injuries and withdrew into paralysis. Her mother was bedridden and required constant care at the hospital.

After working hard for 15 years she had lost all hope and had given up on life. Every night was haunted by nightmares which made her sweat during her sleep. Her mother used to comfort her after each one of them, consoling her and telling her that everything was alright. She used to see her father in her dreams and also dreams of her being old and wrinkled which made more conscious of her age. Her days were ruled by hard work and pain and her nights by churning stomachs and nightmares.

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One day her boss calls her to his cabin approaches her and asks her to marry him. She got offended by this and had tears in her eyes thinking that her boss thought of her as a spinster or something. She was hurt by this and was shouting at her boss for long. This was only before her boss made it clear that he was a divorcee. After this she sat down and they talked for hours. According to her they lost the track of time in their conversation. Which might indicate that she also got quite interested in him during the little chat they had.

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“My boss was a controlled human computer, cold and calculating. He seldom smiled at the employees….Moni, I always thought of you. I’ve observed you. You have a lot of problems. Don’t you.”

In the above line we come to know that Mr. Sundaram(the boss), might have taken this step very cautiously and he must’ve put a lot of thought into this considering this option that he had given unto himself. This also tells us that Mr. Sundaram knew about the lady’s life at least a bit to know that she was unmarried.

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“Our maidservant took a day off. So I came early. I heard a thud….was not the first time.”

In the above excerpt we can see that even Mr. Sundaram had his own problems regarding his family. His mother having a medical situation needs to be taken care of. Even if there is someone like a maid to take care of the old lady, she does need care and affection. Therefore, by this line we can see that asking Moni to marry Mr. Sundaram was a choice well made by him. Listening to this Moni drowns herself in tears. She really feels the pain and the agony that her boss is going through caused by having no wife and of those caused because of not being able to take care of his mother well.

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“On a cold winter day of late February 1988, a car deposited us outside the door of Hotel Paradise. The manager greeted us politely. ‘Good Morning, Mrs and Mr Sundaram!’ My pulses quickened. I looked at my wedding ring to make sure I was not dreaming.”

This excerpt tells us that the narrator, Moni, didn’t expect her life to take such a dramatic turn of events. After losing hope and trying to find comfort in nightmares and hunger, after 15 years of hard work and at a juncture where no one would step in to help, this was surely mind easing for her. But as we can see, for her this might take some time to get used to considering her past life and experiences. It’s almost like a new life for her.

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“I flung myself back on the pillow and saw another dream. This time…..I believed in and put my trust in God.”

This can be seen as a turning point in the story considering her chores in life before this and her boss’s proposal to her after this. This is one of the greater pictures which can be seen in the story. Here the author asks of us to place our faith in God and just go on about our day to day lives. Whatever happens in our life, it is surely not in vain. One day each one of us would attain happiness however bad the situation might get.

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Boundless Boon tries to show us that even with all the hardships in life a person can expect well in the end. Even though all hope is lost, life doesn’t lose hope in use, we must have faith and go on about our life without hesitation. The story also points out the outlook on women in the Indian Society which are pretty evident.

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