R.K.

Narayan’s short story Another Community, published in his 1956 collection Lawley Road and
Other Stories, stands as a rare intervention by the author into explicitly political and communal
themes. At the heart of this seemingly simple narrative lies a title that is heavily ironic, layered
with political criticism, and steeped in postcolonial anxiety. Narayan’s decision to name his story
Another Community is both deliberate and subversive as India was torn apart by Partition of 1947
and communal riots. Through minimal action but powerful psychological insight, Narayan paints a
deeply disturbing picture of how quickly human beings can begin to see “another community” as
the enemy.

The first interpretation of the title Another Community is its deliberate neutrality. Narayan opens
the story with the line: “I am not going to mention caste or community in this story.” This faux-
objective disclaimer immediately alerts the reader to the opposite intention: the entire narrative
revolves around communal identity. The title mimics the bureaucratic language of newspapers
and state reports, where communal groups are referred to as “One Community” and “Another
Community” to avoid religious specificity. But as Cruz Bonilla notes in her paper Reasons for
Violence, this avoidance is itself a rhetorical strategy: “It is precisely in denying these conflictive
categories that the author establishes the scope and parameters of the thematic structure of his
narrative” (Bonilla, 2016: 21).Thus, the title’s supposed neutrality becomes a mask for
complicity. It reveals how linguistic erasure of community names enables violence to flourish in
abstraction.

The word another in the title isn’t merely numerical—it implies alterity, exclusion, and
difference. Narayan’s protagonist starts out as someone who does not differentiate between
people: “He had not bothered about their category all these days; they were just friends- people
who smiled, obliged and spoke agreeably.” But as fear and suspicion build, even his postman and
colleague become members of “another community.” The title thus underscores how communal
identity is not inherent but constructed through fear. Amartya Sen argues in Identity and
Violence that communal violence begins when individuals are reduced to a singular identity:
“The reduction of human beings to one affiliation—religious, ethnic, or national—makes it easier
to demonize and eliminate them” (Sen, 2006: xv). Narayan’s title highlights this very danger. By
not naming the community, he shows how any community can be another—it’s a mirror to our
own prejudice.

The title also functions as satire. Narayan’s prose is often gentle and humorous, but in this story,
his irony turns dark. While the story never names Hindu or Muslim, the reader is fully aware of the
Partition backdrop and the real communal groups involved. As Bonilla writes: “The place
operates as embodying a ‘coextensive’ geography… any local crisis might provoke a sudden
spread of violence” (Bonilla, 2016: 22). The vagueness of the title mimics this universality—it
could be any town, any religion, and any community. This open-endedness allows the story to
be timeless and placeless, but it also critiques how euphemism sanitizes brutality.

The title also represents a mental shift. The protagonist undergoes a psychological transformation,
even his inner monologue begins to distinguish between him and “his men” where the “other
community” begins to invade his dreams, his fears, and ultimately, his identity. The paranoia
culminates in him viewing all others as threats: “Everyone seemed to him a potential assassin.”
The term “another community” thus transforms from an external label to an internalised anxiety,
echoing Frantz Fanon’s observations in Black Skin, White Masks—how identities imposed from
the outside become internal prisons. The sensitive, helpless narrator—a family man with no
political bias—understands that violence, if it erupts, will not only destroy the “other” community
but everyone, including himself, his wife, and his children. Narayan portrays communal violence
as madness where people, driven by revenge, attack even those they had once trusted.

Partha Chatterjee, in The Nation and Its Fragments, argues that the postcolonial state inherits the
fragmentation of identity from colonial rule. Narayan’s title aligns with this idea—it reflects the
legacy of “divide and rule,” now internalised by Indians themselves. The "push-button" metaphor
becomes central—it shows how violence is premeditated, as if mechanically waiting for a signal.
The uncle’s words, “We will clean up this town,” represent the hyper-nationalist appropriation
of Dharma—where the purity of one group is maintained through the erasure of another. Like
Saadat Hasan Manto’s Toba Tek Singh, this story deals with the absurdity of communal identity in
times of Partition. The line “we will speak to them in the only language they will understand”
echoes colonial rhetoric, where violence is justified as a “civilising” mission.

Most chillingly, the title itself—Another Community—is not just a description, but the cause of the
story’s tragedy. The mob does not react to facts, but to the idea of an enemy. The violence occurs
not because of what happened, but because of what was imagined to have happened. The
individual actions of two strangers- the protagonist and a cyclist are misinterpreted as an act of
aggression by the “other community” In this sense, the title is the true antagonist of the story. The
communal labels trigger the violence not just the individuals. The protagonist is beaten senseless.
But even in his last moments, he chooses not to report the truth. He wants to save the city with a
lie: “I will never, never tell my uncle what has happened… I’ll tell my uncle that I fell down the
office staircase and hurt myself… He must not press the button.” But the tragic irony is that truth
cannot save lives, while a lie might have- underlines the moral complexity of the story.

Narayan builds the entire narrative around the implications of the title. His prose in this story is
more serious and restrained than usual. There is no comic relief, only irony and quiet horror. In
literature nameless characters are often used to emphasise the universality of their experiences.
Just as Gregor Samsa in Kafka’s The Metamorphosis symbolises the alienation of modern man.
The Another Community symbolises the plight of ordinary individuals who become victims of
circumstances beyond their control. He never reveals the identity of the hero or the attacker. Even
the death of the protagonist becomes a blank slate, “His body was found by the police… and
identified through the kerosene ration coupon.”

In the end, his body, like the title, becomes anonymous and symbolic. It is filled with meaning
by others: to some, a martyr; to others, a threat. The short paragraphs, often ending with reflective
statements, create a rhythm of rising tension: “The cries of a distant dog sounded so sinister that he
got up to see if any flames appeared over the skies far off.” The third-person limited narration
immerses the reader in the protagonist’s private fears while maintaining enough distance to reflect
on the social implications.

In conclusion, R.K. Narayan’s Another Community is a deceptively simple title that carries within it layers of
critique, irony, and political insight. It invites readers not just to understand who “another community” is—
but to reflect on why we feel the need to call anyone the other. In that sense, the title is both mirror and
accusation, showing us the role language plays in manufacturing hatred.