Khol Do - Manto's Work

1171 Words5 Pages
“Khol Do” is one of the most famous and controversial stories of Manto. It is one of the masterpieces on violence against women and depicts the effects of violence during the partition of India. But unlike many others, Manto does not see the perpetrators as Hindu or Muslim, Hindustanis or Pakistanis, he just sees and depicts them as human beings with all their wilderness and barbarity. “Khol Do” is basically a story of a father ‘Sirajuddin’ who had to leave India during the partition. Story starts with Sirajuddin finding himself on the railway platform of Mughalpura, Lahore. After the dreadful journey from Amritsar to Lahore in which hundreds were killed and injured and lost and raped, he just remained on the platform of Mughalpura for hours. He wakes up from his unconsciousness only to find that his wife and daughter are not with him. As he is still in daze, the image of his wife on her death withripped open guts flashes in front of his eyes, just telling him to leave her alone and run away with Sakina, his daughter. And then suddenly he realizes that Sakina is not with him, nowhere. Father experiences fear for the first time, when he regained consciousness ‘He was in shock, suspended, at it were, over a bottomless pit’ tries to find out where he was. After finding himself in midst of screaming men, women and children he starts searching for his wife and his daughter sakina. A fear of not knowing where are they whether they exist or not. He recollects that where did he separate from them. The dead body of his wife came to him in a flash. She’d dies in front of his eyes ‘ an image that won’t go away.’ In riot-ravaged Lahore, Sirajuddin, fleeing a trail of arson and fire, is forced to leave his wife — lying dead with her stomach ripped open — to save Sakina. She’d asked him to take care of their daughter. But he can’t find sakina anywhere. He felt a fear of
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