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Partition Literature: A Study of Intiār Ḥusain

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 November 2008

Muhammad Umar Memon
Muhammad Umar Memon
Affiliation:
University of Wisconsin-Madison
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Extract

In an interview given in July 1974, Intiār Ḥusain, one of the most perceptive creative writers of Pakistan, had this to say about the experience of migration that was the direct outcome of the Partition of India in 1947:

A decade ago when I was talking about the experience of migration and the articles I wrote concerning it, I was in a state of great hope and optimism. It was then my feeling that in the process of the Partition we had sudenly, almost by accident, regained a lost, great experience—namely, the experience of migration, hijrat, which has a place all its own in the history of the Muslims—and that it will give us a lot. But today, after our political ups and downs, I find myself in a different mood. Now I feel that sometimes a great experience comes to be lost to a nation; often nations forget their history. I do not mean that a nation does, or has to, keep its history alive in its memory in every period. There also comes a time when a nation completely forgets its past. So, that experience, I mean the experience of migration, is unfortunately lost to us and on us. And the great expectation that we had of making something out of it at a creative level and of exploiting it in developing a new consciousness and sensibility—that bright expectation has now faded and gone.

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Articles
Information
Modern Asian Studies , Volume 14 , Issue 3 , July 1980 , pp. 377 - 410
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1980

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References

An earlier version of this paper was read at the conference Historical Interaction Between Hinduism and Islam in South Asia held under the auspices of University of Minnesota at Minneapolis on May 21 and 22, 1976. The research for this paper was supported by a summer grant by the Graduate School, University of Wisconsin, Madison.

Urdu consonants ṭē, ē, żᾱl, ṛē, ṣuᾱd, ẓuᾱd, ō'ē, and ō'ē have been transliterated in this paper as ṭ, , ż, ṛ, ṣ, ẓ, , and ; transliteration of other Urdu letters will be found self-explanatory.

1 This was given to the present writer at Lahor, Pakistan. The text has appeared in India in the literary journal Shab-khūn, Vol. 8, No. 96 (07–09 1975),Google Scholar under the title, ‘Inti ār Ḣusain aur Muḥammad ‘Umar Maiman kē darmiyān ēk bāt-chīt.’ An English translation of this interview by Pray, Bruce R., along with other writings of Intiār Ḥusain, will appear in a special issue of the Journal of South Asian Literature, being currently put together by the present writer.Google Scholar

2 E.g., ‘Hamārē ‘ahd kā adab,’ in Savērā, No. 31, pp. 8–17.Google Scholar

3 ‘Interview,’ Shab-khūn, Vol. 8, No. 96, p. 19.Google Scholar

4 As far as I am aware, Ḥusain is the only Muslim writer who has given this experience a dimension both in time and space.

5 Cf. ‘Hamārē ‘ahd kā adab,’ Savērā, No. 31, p. 9.Google Scholar

6 Ibid.

7 Ibid.

8 The Progressive writers were particularly fond of playing down the role of past societies and cultures.

9 The revival of the ghazal itself may be viewed as an effort to define one's cultural personality; hence its predominance among the Urdu poets of Pakistan. The Progressive poets, on the other hand, generally preferred the na m.

10 A similar view has been expressed by Ramesh Mathur in regard to Hindi, for which see Mathur, Ramesh and Kulasrestha, M., Writings on India's Partition (Calcutta: Simant Publications India, 1976), p. 17.Google Scholar

11 A representative work on this theme is Qudratu 'l-Lāh Shahāb's novelette Yākhudā.

12 Mathur, and Kulasrestha, , Writings on India's Partition, p. 16.Google Scholar

13 As quoted in Shiriñ, Mumtāz, ‘Pākistānī adab kē chār sāl,’ in her Mi'yār (Lahore: Nayā Idārah, 1963), p. 171.Google Scholar

14 On this Movement, see Khalilu ’r-Raḥmān A'ami, Urdū mēñ taraqqi-pasand taḥrīk (Aligarh: Anjuman-e-Taraqqi-e-Urdū, 1972);Google ScholarCoppola, Carlo, ‘Urdu Poetry, 1935–1970: The Progressive Episode’ (unpublished Ph. D. dissertation, Chicago University, 1975);Google ScholarMalik, Hafeez, ‘Marxist Literary Movement in India and Pakistan,’ Journal of Asian Studies, Vol. 26, No. 4 (08 1967), pp. 649–64;CrossRefGoogle ScholarMittal, Gōpāl, Adab mēñ taraqqi-pasandi (Delhi: National Academy, 1958);Google ScholarShiriñ, Mumtāz, ‘Taraqqīpasand adab,’ ‘Pākistāni adab kē chār sāl,’ and ‘Fasādāt par hamārē afsānē,’ in her Mi'yār (Lahore: Nayā Idārah, 1963), pp. 139–47, 171–98, and 199–228;Google ScholarSajjād ahir, Rōshnā'ī (Delhi: Āzād Kitāb-ghar, 1959).Google Scholar

15 Indeed, it is revealing to note that much of the scathing criticism of Rabindra Nath Tagore by Akhtar Ḥusain Rā'ēpūri (on him see Coppola, , ‘Urdu Poetry, 1935–1970,’ n. 10 on p. 109) stems from the former's love of the past. Thus, Rā'ēpūri writes, ‘None of Tagore's literary achievements are free of this conflict of past and present. He has a great, extreme hatred for the present…. Not that life has expanded to infinity; rather, instead of expanding into eternity, it has shrunk into an instant of “today” and now’Google Scholar (as quoted in ibid., p. 121).

16 To quote selectively from the London version of the Manifesto: ‘…Indian literature, since the breakdown of classical literature, has had the fatal tendency to escape from the actualities of life. It has tried to find refuge from reality in spiritualism and idealism… Witness the mystical devotional obsession of our literature, its furtive and sentimental attitude towards sex,…its almost total lack of rationality.…It is the object of our association to rescue literature and other arts from the priestly, academic and decadent classes in whose hands they have degenerated so long; to bring the arts into the closest touch with the people; and to make them the vital organ which will register the activities of life, as well as lead us to the future…We believe that the new literature of India must deal with the basic problems of our existence to-day–the problems of hunger and poverty, social backwardness and political subjugation….’ (as quoted in ibid., pp. 63–4; for the full text of the Manifesto and its different versions, see pp. 63–6 and 161–4).Google Scholar

17 Cf. ‘Mahfil interviews Rajinder Singh Bedi,’ Mahfil, Vol. 8, Nos 2–3 (Summer–Fall 1972), p. 147.Google Scholar

18 Mathur, , Writings on India's Partition, p. 16.Google Scholar

19 Cf. Malik, Fateḥ Muḥammad, Ta'aṣṣsubāt (Lahore: Maktaba-e-Funūn, 1973), p. 77.Google Scholar Malik quotes similar views of Majnūñ Gōrakhpūri (ibid., pp. 76–7) and Firāq Gōrakhpūri (ibid., p. 77). See also Coppola, Carlo, ‘Iqbal and the Progressive Movement.’ Journal of South Asian and Middle Eastern Studies, Vol. I, No. 2 (1977), pp. 49–57.Google Scholar

20 Ibid., p. 81.

21 See his welcome address to the first conference of the All Pakistan Progressive Writers' Association (Lahore, November, 1949) in Savērā, Nos 7–8, pp. 17–23.Google Scholar

22 See his ‘Adab wa tahżib kā mustaqbil,’ Savērā, No. 3, pp. 85–8.Google Scholar

23 See Malik, , Ta'aṣṣubāt, pp. 49–50.Google Scholar

24 See ibid., pp. 51–2.

25 Pp. 41–52. Urdū Adab was edited by ‘Askari, along with Mantō.Google Scholar

26 After their arrival in Pakistan Shiriñ and her husband Ṣamad continued to publish the periodical Nayā Daur they had started in Bangalore, India.

27 Cf. Malik, , Ta'aṣṣubāt, p. 48.Google Scholar

28 As quoted in ibid., pp. 48–9.

29 Savērā, No. 4, p. 193.Google Scholar

30 Cf. Malik, , Ta'aṣṣubāt, p. 79. Qāsmi's statement appeared in January 1949 in the newspaper Imrōz.Google Scholar

31 For which, see Savērā, No. 4, p. 12.Google Scholar

32 Ibid., Nos 7–8, p. 107.

33 Ibid.

34 Ibid., pp. 109–10.

35 Younger brother of Naẓīr Chaudhri; he later broke away from Savērā and started his own periodical, Nuṣrat. During the Bhutto régime he entered politics and became Chief Minister of Punjab; he was subsequently imprisoned.

36 ‘and Culture’ with Issue 22. All these were dropped with Issue 44. Savērā now publishes hymns to God, articles on Ṣūfism, besides the regular secular prose and poetry.

37 For a balanced evaluation of the literary worth of the Progressives, and for a critique of their literary ideas, see Rāhid, N. M., ‘Interview,’ Mahfil, Vol. 7, Nos. 1–2 (Spring–Summer 1971), pp. 1–20.Google Scholar

38 The break with the past, the radical split between the inner and the outer implicit in the Progressive Manifesto could not remain hidden for long from the more perceptive writers. Sooner or later they managed to extricate themselves from its stultifying embrace. But some were less fortunate. The saddest casualty was, perhaps, Krishan Chandr who, according to his friend and contemporary Bēdi, ‘was completely destroyed; he became a slogan-monger. He no longer makes distinctions between soul and body; he talks only of the body, of bad people, of absolutes. What happens inside a man he never considers’ (cf. Mahfil, Vol. 8, Nos 2–3 (Summer–Fall 1972), p. 151).Google Scholar N. M. Rāshid credits the Progressives with having promoted a sense of social awareness among Indian writers, but criticizes them for putting literature in the service of a particular ideology and group. ‘I have no quarrel with the Progressives,’ he writes, ‘in so far as they believe that literature should reflect a social consciousness, but I do differ with them when this social awareness in their view must be completely impersonal. This is indeed the denial of the whole creative process and of the raison d'être of all creative activity’ (cf. Mahfil, Vol. 7, Nos. 1–2 (Spring–Summer 1971), p. 7).Google Scholar

39 ‘The two extremes of human nature, the highest and the lowest, are generally reflected in the writing on communal riots’ (Shiriñ, Mumtāz, ‘Pākistāni adab kē chār sāl,’ in Mi'yār, p. 174).Google Scholar

40 Mostly and generally; there are, however, some exceptions, for instance his famous short story ‘Kafan’ (The Shroud).

41 As quoted in Sadiq, Mohammed, Twentieth-Century Urdu Literature (Baroda: Padmaja Publications, 1947), p. 61.Google Scholar

42 ‘All the prominent writers of Urdu,’ remarks Bēdi, ‘have at one time or another been Progressive writers. The best of them have felt the stultifying atmosphere of the Movement and have come out to breathe a freer air’ (cf. ‘Interview,’ Mahfil, Vol. 8, Nos 2–3 (Summer–Fall 1972), p. 148).Google Scholar Intiār Ḥusain, too, seems to have been under their pervasive influence but only in the initial stage of his career as a writer. He himself remarks that there was a time when he used to read the Progressive writers avidily and there were some of them whom he even idealized (cf. ‘Interview,’ Shabkhūn, Vol. 8, No. 96 (07–09 1975) p. 11).Google Scholar

43 The Progressives vociferously decried the creation of Pakistan for it could be justified only on religious grounds, while religion was something which they had, as Shiriñ points out, excluded from the more important agents and manifestations of collective life (cf. Mi'yār, p. 197).Google Scholar In support of her argument she quotes Muḥammad Ḥasan ‘Askari, ‘It was not out of some ill will on their part that the Progressives decried the creation of Pakistan but because of the blow they thought it administered to their ideology [of unity and nationalism]’ (cf. ibid.).

44 Minor only in the larger historico-cultural context; in humanitarian terms, it was indeed a great tragedy.

45 This is perhaps the reason why most of the Progressive stories on the theme of Partition and the communal riots lack depth and conviction. The conscious, and thus perhaps artificial, effort to appear impartial, drove the bulk of the Progressive writers, as Shiriñ has aptly observed, ‘farther away from the reality’ and rendered their writing quite ‘lifeless’ (Mi'yār, p. 172).Google Scholar

46 English translation in Mathur, , and Kulasrestha, , Writings on India's Partition, pp. 220–3.Google Scholar

47 Ibid., pp. 224–7.

48 Ṭhanḍā gōsht, Lahore: Maktaba-e-Shi'r-o-Adab [19?];Google ScholarEnglish translation by Naim, C. M. and Schmidt, Ruth L., Mahfil, Vol. I, No. 1 (1963), pp. 14–19.Google Scholar

49 Lucknow: Kitābi Dunyā [1947 or 1948].Google Scholar

50 English translation in Mathur, , Writings on India's Partition, pp. 64–8.Google Scholar

51 Cf. Shiriñ, , Mi'yār, p. 212.Google Scholar

52 Ibid., p. 206.

53 Ibid.

54 ‘Hindi Literature,’ in Contemporary Indian Literature, A Symposium (New Delhi: Sahitya Akademi, 1957), p. 79.Google Scholar

55 English translation by Singh, Khushwant in Mathur, , Writings on India's Partition, pp. 126–35.Google Scholar

56 See note 48, above.

57 This story appears in his collection Namrūd ki khudā'i (Lahore: Nayā Idārah, 1950);Google Scholar English translation, ‘Open Up,’ by Flemming, Leslie A. and Narang, G. C., in Journal of South Asian Literature, Vol. 13, Nos 1–4 (1977–1978), pp. 157–9.Google Scholar

58 For the story, see his collection Phundnē (Lahore: Maktaba-e-Jadid, 1955);Google Scholar for English translation, Haldane, Robert B., Mahfil, Vol. 6, Nos 2–3 (1970), pp. 19–25.Google Scholar

59 ‘Riots and Refugees: The Post-Partition Stories of Saadat Hasan Manto,’ Journal of South Asian Literature, Vol. 13, Nos 1–4 (1977–1978), p. 105.Google Scholar

60 Mi'yār, p. 205.Google Scholar

61 On his life and works, see Flemming, Leslie A., Another Lonely Voice: The Urdu Short Stories of Saadat Hasan Manto (Berkeley: University of California, Research Monograph Series of the Center for South and Southeast Asia Area Studies, 1980).Google Scholar

62 Here I might be inadvertently implying that Husain was against the Progressives and their particular ideology right from the very start of his career as a writer. Such, however, was not the case. He started out admiring the Progressive writing but the break came quite early (see above, note 42); indeed it came precisely because of the peculiar attitude of the Progressives vis-à-vis the creation of Pakistan (cf. reference in ibid.).

63 ‘Interview,’ Shab-khūn, Vol. 8, No. 96 (07–09 1975), p. 31.Google Scholar

64 This comes out quite clearly at many points in the interview he gave me.

65 Cf. ‘Interview,’ Shab-khūn, Vol. 8, No. 96 (07–09 1975), pp. 8–10.Google Scholar

66 On the day of creation God asked man Alastu bi-Rabbikum? (Am I not your Lord?), and the latter replied Balā (Yes). This episode is recorded in the Qur'ān (see 7:71). Alast is part of the Muslim mystical (ṣūfi) vocabulary and underscores the basic doctrine of Islam, namely, at-Tauḥid (the perfect transcendental Unity of God). ‘Song of Alast’ would thus mean ‘the song acknowledging the Unity of God,’ which remains the cherished and ultimate goal of the mystic.

67 Pray's, Bruce R. translation (unpublished).Google Scholar For the original, see ‘Interview,’ Shab-khūn, Vol. 8, No. 96 (07–09 1975), pp. 20–1.Google Scholar

68 ‘Hamārē ‘ahd kā adab,’ Savērā, No. 31, p. 17.Google Scholar

69 Others, in a somewhat less extravagant vein, reduce his stories to mere ‘elegies on the fading culture of the Muslim nobility of Utter Pradesh.’ The reason: ‘because he is in search of “things that are lost”‘ (Narang, G. C., ‘Major Trends in the Urdu Short Story,’ Indian LIterature, Vol. 16, Nos. 1–2 (1973), p. 132).Google Scholar Needless to say such sweeping criticism accomplishes very little. By telling how Husain's stories read like (i.e., as ‘elegies’), but failing to identify the purpose, if any, of those ‘elegies,’ the critic misses their true significance. Unless one is willing to probe into the motivations of Husain, his purpose and his vision, one is indeed liable to think of his stories as little more than mere ‘elegies,’ thus conveying the incorrect impression that his entire creative endeavour is devoted only to lamenting the past. This criticism may be met by the testimony to the contrary of the writer himself, for which see notes 71 and 75 below.

Here it would be pertinent to mention also the fact that many people share Narang's view. Although superficially true, this view is severely limited by its inability to either recognize and understand or account for Husain's intimate knowledge of Hindu culture in its broadest sense possible, a knowledge which finds reflection in his writings. Ḥusain insists on Muslim culture, quite true, but one which is sufficiently mediated and mellowed by the incorporation of elements of the native Hindu culture in the Subcontinent, and not the inflexible, puritanical Muslim culture from beyond India.

70 ‘Mas'alē kā mas’ ala,' Funūn, Vol. 12, Nos. 2–3 (December–January 1970–1971), p. 236.Google Scholar

71 ‘Ijtimā’i tahżib aur afsāna,’ Nayā Daur, Nos. 15–18, p. 64.Google Scholar

72 The famous woman saint-singer of North India who composed her devotional poems to Lord Krishna in a mixture of Braj Bhāshā and Māṛwāri. She died in 1547.

73 Mīr Muḥammad Taqī Mīr, a famous Urdu poet who died in 1810.

74 Wali Muḥammad Nair Akbarābādi; one of the two Urdu poets, the other being Muḥammad Quli Qu b Shāh of Deccan, whose poetry may be regarded as genuinely and totally Indian in spirit. Understandably, therefore, Ḥusain offers him unqualified praise and considers himself a true follower of Nair in outlook and mentality (cf. Żulfiqār Aḥmad Tābish, ‘Intiār Ḥusain sē ēk intarwiyū,’ Kitāb, Vol. 7, No. 4 (January 1973), p. 8, especially pp. 10–11).Google Scholar Nair died in 1830.

75 ‘Khushbū kī hijrat (Shaikh Ṣalāḥu ’d-Din, Inti ār Ḥusain, Nāṣir Kā mi, aur Ḥanif Rām¯ kē darmiyān ēk mukālimah)’, Savērā, Nos. 17–18, p. 221.Google Scholar

76 In Gali kūchē (Lahore: Maktaba-e-Kārwāñ [19], pp. 13–35.Google Scholar

77 Ibid., pp. 259–82.

78 Most of these are available in his Kañkari (Lahore: Maktaba-e-Jadid, 1955),Google ScholarĀkhri ādmi (Lahore: Kitābiyāt, 1967),Google Scholar and Shahr-e-afsōs (Lahore: Maktaba-eKārwāñ [19?]).Google Scholar

79 Shahr-e-afsōs, pp. 63–83;Google Scholar English translation by Memon, Muhammad Umar, ‘The Stairway,’ in Indian Literature, Vol. 19, No. 6 (11–12, 1976), pp. 87–102.Google Scholar

80 Ibid., pp. 190–206; English translation by Muhammad Umar Memon, forthcoming in Journal of South Asian Literature.

81 Ibid., pp. 9–28; English translation by Memon, Muhammad Umar, forthcoming in Journal of South Asian Literature.Google Scholar

82 Ibid., pp. 249–70; English translation, ‘The City of Sorrows,’ by Rahman, Muhammad Salimur, in Azim, S. Viqar (ed.), Modern Urdu Short Stories from Pakistan (Islamabad: Pakistan Branch, R.C.D. Cultural Institute, 1977), pp. 128–45.Google Scholar

83 Ākhri ādmi (Lahore: Kitābiyāt, 1967), pp. 1–13;Google ScholarEnglish translation by Flemming, Leslie A., forthcoming in Journal of South Asian Literature.Google Scholar

84 Ibid., pp. 14–36; English translation by Rahbar, Daud, forthcoming in Journal of South Asian Literature.Google Scholar

85 Ibid., pp. 93–105.

86 For a fuller discussion and analysis of these stories, see Memon, Muhammad Umar, Ḥāf ē ki bāzyāft, zawāl aur shakhḀṣyat kī maut (Inti ār Ḥusain kē chand afsānōñ kā tajziyah),’ Savērā, Nos 50–52 (May 1976), pp. 43–68;Google Scholar or Shab-khūn, Vol. 9, No. 100 (August–September 1976), pp. 3–15.

87 Galī Kūchē, pp. 193–224;Google ScholarEnglish translation by Flemming, Leslie A., forthcoming in Journal of South Asian Literature.Google Scholar

88 As far as I am aware, Shiriñ is the first critic to have noticed the merit of this story and drawn attention to it. She discusses it at some length in two of her articles, for which see Mi'yār, pp. 171–98 and 199–228. My own discussion and analysis of this story draws heavily upon her work.Google Scholar

89 A further telling example: A truly epic personality rises above events and objects; rather than allow itself to be used by them, it, instead, influences and moulds them to underscore what is unique in and about itself. Not only did Pachhwā not allowencroachment of art by purposiveness, he also spurned the idea of modifying his club in any way, even for greater effectiveness. When his companions attached spearheads to their clubs, Pachhwā shunned the innovation/modification altogether, preferring to oil his instead. For adding spearheads changed the character of the club, its clubness, while oiling it did not (see pp. 198–9).

90 But even here, perhaps, considerably tempered by his own vision of it.

91 Or like Arshad and Na'īm in the story ‘Andhī galī’ (Shahr-e-afsōs, pp. 227–48).Google Scholar