Ismat Chughtai > Quotes

“How as a young girl, Ismat Chugtai convinced her father to excuse her from learning how to cook, and give her instead the opportunity to go to school and get an education:

“Women cook food Ismat. When you go to your in-laws what will you feed them?” he asked gently after the crisis was explained to him.

“If my husband is poor, then we will make khichdi and eat it and if he is rich, we will hire a cook,” I answered.

My father realised his daughter was a terror and that there wasn’t a thing he could do about it.”
― Ismat Chughtai

“She sat quietly in one corner of the sofa, the end of her sari drawn modestly over her hair. Like the motionless illusion of a madly spinning top, she was staring vacantly into space.”
― Ismat Chughtai, The Quilt and Other Stories

“In winter when I put a quilt over myself its shadows on the wall seem to sway like an elephant.”
― Ismat Chugtai, लिहाफ

“Sindoor in our partings, bindis on our forehead and dupattas drawn over our faces we sat demurely in a corner. We stole glances at each other's face and were struck by our own beauty. This made us all the more bashful.”
― Ismat Chughtai, Lifting the Veil

“One did not know when Begum Jaan’s life began — whether it was when she committed the mistake of being born or when she came to the Nawab’s house as his bride, climbed the four-poster bed and started counting her days. Or was it when she watched through the drawing room door the increasing number of firm-calved, supple- waisted boys and delicacies begin to come for them from the kitchen! Begum Jaan would have glimpses of them in their perfumed, flimsy shirts and feel as though she was being raked over burning embers!”
― Ismat Chugtai, लिहाफ

“I felt that this Sethani was trying to please her customers with her attire and make up only for the sake of a living - I do the same: respectably dressed, mentally prepared I go to the court of my customers. The only difference is that all my wisdom and intellect are dried and sucked sugarcane — and the Sethani - a pitcher full of juice - I sell my brain, and the Sethani her body!”
― Ismat Chughtai, The Profession

“India was operated upon by such clumsy hands and blunt knives that thousands of arteries were left open.”
― Ismat Chughtai, The Quilt and Other Stories

“Moreover the name - Nigar-Malti- I never liked such motivation. What is this? Is this a symbol of Hindu - Muslim unity or an example of Hindu - Muslim friction? Renowned leaders had lost the battle to solve this problem and here was this lady whose so-called open mindedness had muddled all this Hindu-Muslim issue.”
― Ismat Chughtai, The Profession

“We are both sitting in the bazaar to sell our commodities. Different goods, but the goal is the same!”
― Ismat Chughtai, The Profession