Reading Manto

After a lot of time i am writing or rather just typing anything. The person I am, I thought it to be waste of time to sit and then do anything when you can live without doing it. But some how from past few days I felt like talking about what I am reading currently- Datsavez Saddat Hasan Manto.
When I started i felt that he is pervert and all that he writes about is women, their assets and sex. like in one short story, Shaadi, he introduces the character of women secretary wiith the lines- ek khush shakl anloindian ladki jiski chhatiyaan gair mamuli tour par numanya thi ( a pleasant looking angloindian girl whose breasts were oddly placed). Being a it challenged my notion of modesty and respect towards womanhood. But to think pragmatically, isn't it what all men notice when they see a women for the first time. Maybe Manto is honest enough to accept and write about perversity inherent in human beings.
When i delved further in the world of Manto , I realised each character is not really a representative of something in society neither is he right or wrong. He is just there as an character. Its totally up to the reader to interpret it and what traits does he want to attribute to it. Manto has devoid his characters of too much of emotions and thoughts. these have been left for the reader to find.
i am neither a great reader nor someone who takes his readings seriously. But with Manto's short stories, which by the way I started reading a little too reluctantly for i had nothing else to read and pass time, I am somehow developing a strange affinity. Maybe because he talks of a time of a period I long to belong to. The Indian society as we know it today is just coming up. Maybe because his stories are most situated in a region where I could have belonged to had i had place to belong to.