Thus reads the editorial in IE, but it should be ‘The Ultimate Storyteller’! Why? Let’s find out. Mannu Bhandari who we lost recently was one of the post-independence writers who portrayed women under a new light. She looked at them as independent & intellectual individuals. Mark those three words which speak volumes.
She highlighted the struggles & difficulties women constantly encounter. Her novel “Aapka Bunty” dealt with an adult theme like divorce through the eyes of a child. Indian society then & now frowns on the woman who breaks free. But no one can really know of her situation. Only the wearer knows where the shoe pinches. A woman writer herself, who had gone through the trauma knew the right way to put forth.
She was best known for her two Hindi novels, Aapka Bunty & Mahabhoj. She is often credited as one of the pioneers of the Nayi kahani Movement. It included Nirmal Verma, Rajendra Yadav,Bhisham Sahni, Kamleshwar & others. Her writer husband Rajendra Yadav, a critic & editor, was a contrast to her. Her dedication to him remained but they decided to part ways later in life.
A Basu Chatterjee directed movie ‘Rajanigandha’ is based on her short story Yahi Sach hai. The film was a hit. In ‘Stree Subodhini’ has a married woman warning other young women against the danger of falling for married men, who cheat, excite & finally return to the comforts of male tradition, all passion spent.
As Mrinal Pande rightly says, even her photograph as an ageing woman, accompanying many of her obituaries seems to say, what the actress Anna Magnani once said so beautifully, “Please don’t touch my wrinkles. It took me so long to earn them.”
Asian Entertainment 