KARACHI: The dramatic reading of two short stories by Ismat Chughtai – Ghoonghat and Bacho Phuppi – along with an essay on the writer by Sadat Hasan Manto proved to be a decent effort at T2F on Friday. The performance was directed by Asma Mundrawala. Saife Hasan set the tone of the programme by reading out, initially, a small part of Manto’s piece on Ismat Chughtai. Manto’s tribute to the writer brimmed with respect for her. It was also tinged with delectable humour. His claim that people were curious why he and Ismat didn’t get married was put in a witty manner using fluid Urdu, and then followed it up with a fine description of the first meeting between the two greats of Urdu literature. Saife’s reading captured the mood of the piece to a reasonable extent.

Then the first story, Ghoonghat, was presented by Asma Mundrawala and Mahvash Farooqui.

The tale is about a fair girl who gets married to a dark-skinned man. At the wedding night, after the nikah, the man runs away from the bride leaving her untouched, because she doesn’t comply with his demand for lifting the ghoonghat. He returns after seven years, and again the same thing happens; she, despite being a 21-year-old young woman, doesn’t muster the courage to lift the ghoonghat and he goes away, only to come back after 20 years, emaciated and about to breathe his last. Just when she gets herself to do as he wants, he dies.

The story had a psychological subtext, delineating the man’s inferiority complex and the woman’s unfulfilled desires, which Asma Mundrawala and Mahvash Farooqui did well to put across. The music that preceded the readings to give a dramatic effect was a little disconcerting, if not distracting, and the effort could’ve been better without it.

After that Saife Hasan resumed Manto’s essay on Ismat. Manto demonstrated his genius in that part of the tribute by pointing out the normal, feminine side to Ismat Chughtai. He talked about Ismat’s famous story Lihaf that got published in the journal Adab-i-Lateef and about which he wanted to have a discussion with the writer. When he raised an objection to Ismat about the last sentence of Lihaf, according to him, she went red in the face. Manto concluded, “ye kambakht to aurat nikli,” but took it in an understanding manner. It was a remarkable piece of writing and Saife Hasan this time round didn’t do complete justice to it as during the reading his voice went a notch up, failing to grab hold of the tenderness between the lines, perhaps because of the influence of the dramatic reading of Ghoonghat. Still, Saife’s comprehension of the Urdu language is quite good.

The second and final story was Bacho Phuppi, again read out by Asma Mundrawala and Mahvash Farooqui.

It revolves around a foul-mouthed old woman, Badshahi Khanum, who has three brothers. She doesn’t get along with her husband for valid reasons and has a bitter outlook on life. Among other things, the story in an intelligent way, underlines the convoluted wheels-within-wheels of relations in a family, and the tussle between the maternal and paternal sides of the narrator of whom Bacho is an aunt. Bacho has three brothers and is always found at daggers drawn with the middle sibling, the narrator’s father. But what the writer has tried to show is the sensitive creature underneath the tough exterior of a bitter woman. Because when her brother suffers from a lethal stroke of paralysis he calls her and requests her to curse him the way she’s accustomed to. All she’s able to utter is a prayer asking God to make her brother live longer. When he passes away, Ismat Chughtai makes Bacho Phuppi say a poignant line, “Wo us bachey ki tarha roeen jisey sabaq yaad na ho.”

Asma Mundrawala and Mahvash Farooqui did a good job and read their lines with literary acumen, that is, without being theatrical.