Revisiting Partition through Madness: Humanity, Trauma, and Resistance in Manto’s “Toba Tek Singh”

Abstract

This paper revisits the Partition of India through the symbolic and narrative framework of madness in Saadat Hasan Manto’s seminal short story “Toba Tek Singh”, arguing that insanity functions not merely as a psychological condition but as a profound ethical and political commentary on history. Set in a Lahore mental asylum during the post-Partition exchange of inmates between India and Pakistan, the story foregrounds the absurdity of newly drawn borders by placing them in dialogue with the fractured yet deeply humane consciousness of the so-called mad. The paper contends that Manto deliberately collapses the distinction between sanity and madness to expose the deeper irrationality embedded in nationalist politics, administrative logic, and the violent reordering of human lives.

By focusing on characters who are unable—or unwilling—to comprehend the logic of Partition, the narrative reveals how trauma disrupts language, memory, and identity. Bishan Singh’s persistent questioning about the location of “Toba Tek Singh” and his eventual refusal to choose between India and Pakistan are read as expressions of existential trauma and moral resistance. His final act of lying down in the no-man’s-land is interpreted as a powerful symbolic gesture that rejects imposed national identities and asserts a liminal space of humanity beyond borders. The paper further examines how Manto uses dark humour, irony, and fragmented speech to articulate the inexpressible violence of Partition, suggesting that madness becomes the only truthful response to an insane historical moment.

Ultimately, this study positions “Toba Tek Singh” as a critique of modern nationhood and bureaucratic rationality, demonstrating how Manto reclaims ethical clarity through the voices of the marginalized. Madness, in this reading, emerges as a site of resistance and human truth, allowing the narrative to mourn loss, register trauma, and affirm dignity in the face of one of the subcontinent’s most devastating historical ruptures.