This Is Not That Dawn: Jhootha Sach (86 page)

Kanak breathed a sigh of relief. She climbed into the taxi. The driver slid into the traffic and asked, ‘Where to?’

‘Faiz Bazaar,’ replied Kanak, thinking of another problem. She remembered that there were only ten annas in her handbag. What things have come to? she thought sadly. Ten or twenty rupees used to mean nothing to her. What could she do?

Kanak asked the driver to stop on Sir Syed Ahmed Road, beside the post office in Faiz Bazaar. He checked the meter and said, ‘One rupee and two annas.’

‘Bhai, I completely forgot. I’ve spent all the money in my purse. Wait here for two minutes, I’ll bring you your fare,’ she said helplessly.

‘Wah, wah,’ the driver replied in a loud voice, ‘such a big handbag, and it’s empty. You want me to wait here? Every minute costs me money. Why didn’t you check your purse before getting into my taxi?’

‘I’ll pay for the time you wait. It’s my fault, I admit.’

‘You are trying to pull one on me? I’m from Delhi, too. I could wait here till morning, and you wouldn’t come back,’ he spoke louder than before.

‘Come with me to my house if you don’t trust me,’ Kanak felt humiliated, but what else could she do?

The driver continued to shout. He directed his complaints to a shopkeeper nearby, ‘Just see how these ladies carry on! They go about with handbags as big as a postman’s sack, but don’t have even eighteen annas in it. And she wanted to ride in a taxi!’

Naseeb Rai, another shopkeeper at the corner of the gali, came over to investigate. Kanak was petrified with embarrassment at the driver’s rudeness. She tried to explain, ‘I’m not saying I won’t pay. I just forgot that I had no cash left in my purse. I’ll go and get the money. I’ll pay for the waiting time. If he doesn’t trust me, he can come with me.’

Naseeb Rai scolded the driver, ‘Watch your mouth, my good man.’ He knew both Panditji and Kanak. ‘Don’t you see whom you’re speaking to? Is that the way to speak to a lady? Take your fare and get lost. How much is it? Speak up.’

‘Go home, daughter. There’s no hurry to send back the money,’ Naseeb Rai said reassuringly.

Kanak tried to pull herself together, so as not to upset her father, as she walked back home. The moment she reached the house, she said, ‘Pitaji, give me some money. I got into a bit of a jam today.’ ‘Why, what happened, beti?’ Panditji wanted to know.

‘I got on the wrong bus at Tees Hazari, which took me to Sadar. The bus conductor told me to catch the bus for Connaught Place, and then take the bus to Faiz Bazaar. When I reached Connaught Place I found that I had no money left in my purse. Had to take a taxi. Borrowed money from the shopkeeper at the corner of the gali to pay the taxi. So give me eighteen annas. I want to pay him back.’

Panditji said by way of assurance, ‘Must be Nasseb Rai. You relax, I’ll pay him back tomorrow.’

Kanak did not want Naseeb Rai to tell her father about the taxi driver’s impertinence. Taking Kanchan with her, she went back and gave the shopkeeper his money.

Nayyar arrived two days later. Although he had seen the documents for the sale and exchange of properties when he had come down from
Nainital, he and Panditji examined them again. Nayyar pointed out that the deed of sale had not been signed in the presence of any witnesses. Panditji explained the situation to two of his trusted neighbours, Jawahar Singh and Gur Dittan Mull. Both insisted on adding their signatures, and entered the date as 8 September 1947.

Kanak told Nayyar about her differences of opinion with the editor of
Sardar,
and said that she had no hope of finding work with a Delhi newspaper. She wanted to go to Lucknow to take advantage of the opportunity available there, she said.

Nayyar disagreed, ‘Whatever your outlook, if you want to succeed in a profession, be faithful to its code. Do it as your obligation to your employer. Once we take on a client, whoever or whatever he might be, we put his interest first.’

‘Yes, then you admit that you play the hypocrite, by being honest within your dishonesty. I can’t condone any wrongdoing just for the sake of earning a living. That means I should steal if the need arises? There are others who give up their jobs for the sake of their principles.’ She said, thinking of Puri.

‘If you want to behave that way, be a Gandhi. Then people would accept your ideas just because of who you are. Don’t you know that those who don’t care for their job may find that their job doesn’t care for them?’ After matching Kanak’s hard words with his own, Nayyar changed the subject, ‘Well, whatever happened, I think if Aseer is willing to help you, you should take advantage of his offer.’

‘Nothing is possible there. He’s a despicable person. I don’t want to see him ever again,’ Kanak said, her head lowered, and described the events of that evening.

Nayyar thought that she was not blameless. ‘Why did you accept the drink? I didn’t expect that kind of behaviour from you. You yourself behaved appallingly.’

‘How did I behave appallingly? Don’t you drink yourself? You’ve told me many times that there’s no harm in it if you have only a small one. You yourself have given drinks to Bahinji.’

‘There’s a time and place for everything. It depends where you are, and with whom.’

‘Achcha, it was all my fault. Still I don’t think I did anything improper. But I’ll never work for Aseer.’

‘What if something untoward happens in Lucknow?’

‘Why should it happen? And if it does, can’t I handle it as I did here in Delhi? Tell Pitaji to lock me up in some box.’ She burst into tears.

Nayyar was forced to agree with her.

A TEEMING MULTITUDE OF HARRIED HINDUS, DRIVEN OUT OF THEIR
homeland, was winding its way towards East Punjab in search of refuge. They travelled in vehicles and on foot, escorted by Indian soldiers. One such convoy arrived at a refugee camp in Amritsar. The passengers began to unload whatever little they had been able to carry with them. At the head of the convoy was a truckload of armed soldiers, and just behind it, a station wagon with the women rescued from Shaikhupura. These women had nothing to unload; all they had were the clothes on their backs. Led by Kaushalya Devi, this group was the first to enter the camp through a gate in the boundary wall.

The brightly lit compound echoed with the sound of human voices. Tents and bivouacs dotted the yard around a central building. People walked around busily and purposefully. Kaushalya Devi, with her group of women in tow, was heading towards a veranda at the front of the building when they heard a woman keening.

Under the electric light in the veranda a young woman sat sobbing loudly, her head and face shrouded in a soiled, torn dupatta. Two other young women sat next to her in mournful silence; under their dupattas, their faces expressed dejection and pain. Their dirty ragged clothes and their black dupattas were in the Muslim style, but were worn in a way that revealed that they were Hindu.

Recognizing the silent women, Kaushalya Devi pointed at the one who was wailing, ‘Isn’t that Chinti?’

One woman nodded. Kaushalya Devi was surprised, and said, ‘Hai, why? Didn’t they find the address of her family at the Loha Garh camp?’

The woman who had answered sighed deeply, ‘Her parents refused to take her back. We got her married off, they said, now she’s her in-laws’ problem. The parents are right,’ she sighed again slowly, ‘they had got rid of her as a burden.’

The women from Shaikhupura heard that. The woman’s reply upset them so much that they felt the ground shift under their feet. They lowered their heads. This was their first experience of how people greeted returning lost ones in the new country.

Kaushalya Devi busied herself with rewrapping her dupatta as she turned away from the sobbing woman, and said to the ones in her group, ‘Wait here, all of you.’ She hurried to a tent across from the veranda.

She returned as quickly and asked the two women, ‘Where has everybody gone?’

The women gave her no answer. Holding one corner of her dupatta between her fingers Kaushalya Devi went off again, brisk and businesslike, towards the right.

Men and women from the convoy, with children in their arms or on their shoulders, pulling along or carrying their belongings, began to enter through the gate. Their expensive-looking clothes were now crumpled and soiled. Exhausted middle-aged women, girls of tender age and soft-skinned young women came, hugging or holding sleeping or weeping children with one hand and balancing heavy bundles and baskets with the other. When they rested their burdens on the ground to catch their breath, they held on to them; they were precious even if heavy or troublesome.

‘My brothers and sisters,’ a white-bearded, middle-aged man wearing a white pugaree, white kurta and long white drawers stood near the gate and appealed with joined hands to those walking in. ‘All of you my brothers, mothers and sisters should first check in at that tent over there. All of you will be given a space. Please go only to whatever place is allotted to you.’

‘Come this way, come over here,’ a burly man called out, as he walked into the tent.

‘Please come in, in ones or twos,’ a young man instructed from inside the tent. A crowd of men, women and children quickly formed in front of the tent.

The women from Shaikhupura were still waiting in the veranda. Bisni, unable to stay on her feet any longer, sat down first, followed by the others. Tara sat with her chin resting on her knee. She could not bear to look at the wailing woman. What she had heard echoed in her ears, ‘… her in-laws’ problem. The parents got rid of her as a burden.’ Had they all been brought here to face a similar fate?

As the crowd outside the tent grew bigger, a voice from the crowd suggested, ‘Just one person from each family can give the names and the address. No need for others to clog up the place.’

Another voice said, ‘Everyone’s exhausted. Let’s find a place to rest first, then we’ll come and give all the information.’

Kaushalya Devi returned grumbling and sounding irritated. ‘Come on everyone, follow me,’ she told the women under her charge to go into the tent.

The white-bearded man now stood by the tent appealing with his hands together, ‘The business of registration will go quicker if my brothers, mothers and sisters would just form a queue. Thanks be to Satguru, there’s no need for anxiety.’

Unable to get through the jostling crowd, Kaushalya Devi spoke irritably to the man, ‘Nattha Singhji, this is very unfair. No one was here when we arrived. The officials doing the registration were away. How long can I wait? I left my home yesterday morning. I too have a family. Left my daughter alone. We give up our time to help others; we shouldn’t be pestered as a result.’

‘All right, bahinji, don’t be upset. No need to get upset.’ Nattha Singh joined his hands in appeal before Kaushalya Devi, ‘Go on and look after your family, your young ones. Don’t worry, I’ll get these sisters and daughters of mine registered. Did they get a drink of water, or anything to eat?’

When he heard they had not, Nattha Singh said in a tone of pity, ‘Waheguru, Waheguru! Satnaam, satnaam! That should have been seen to first of all.’

Pointing to the women, Kaushalya Devi counted them aloud. Then she left.

Nattha Singh said to Chinti, who sat slumped against the wall, crying bitterly, ‘Beti, have faith in Waheguru kartaar. You shouldn’t bother about those bad-minded people in your family. They’re paying for their sins, but still go on in their evil ways. Satnaam, satnaam! … Come, my dears, let’s have some prasad,’ he said to the others.

The women did not feel like eating anything when they heard the reason for Chinti’s lamentations. But they had eaten only two handfuls of roasted gram since the morning, and Nattha Singh’s affectionate invitation stimulated their hunger. They got up and followed him.

The large yard at the back of the building was full of tents and a large canopied structure. Under the canopy, groups of women were making chapattis on stoves covered with large griddles. Two women kneaded dough as they bent over a large tray. Behind the stoves stood vats of daal. The women cooking food were not downcast, but full of sympathy, encouragement and energy. In one corner was a water tap, the ground around it wet and muddy. In another, a pile of used leaf plates and clay
tumblers. Tara and her companions washed their hands and faces at the faucet and wiped them dry with their dupattas.

Tara and her group sat down on one of the runners of jute matting. A woman volunteer placed leaf plates and clay tumblers in front of them, as they were served with chapattis and daal. After a month of dry, stale chapattis, this food tasted like an exquisite meal to Tara. As she ate, Chinti’s plaintive cry came back to her.

Nattha Singh came in and said with joined hands to the women cooking food, ‘My dear sisters and daughters, your spirit of service is nothing less than saintly. I’m sorry to trouble you, but by the grace of Satguru maharaj two hundred and fifty more brothers and sisters have arrived. There might be about fifty extra mouths to feed. If all sisters and daughters knead dough from eight or ten seers of flour, we won’t have to bother you again all night.’

‘Oh!’ exclaimed a young woman, her mouth widening as she gaped in surprise. Then she laughed. Another young woman began opening the sack of flour that lay next to the stove, and said, ‘No problem, we’ll handle it. We’ll prepare the dough. This chance to serve people is our reward for good deeds in the past.’

Tara looked at her, then at her plate.

The woman making chapattis over the stove told the woman preparing to knead the dough to stop. She pointed at a large tray covered with a cloth, ‘There’s no need. The sisters from Khooh Sunarian have sent ten seers of dough. Let’s use that first.’

There were only a handful of people waiting in line when Nattha Singh came back to the tent with the women from Shaikhupura. When their turn came, Nattha Singh asked with his hands together, ‘Dear daughters and sisters, get your names and the addresses of your parents and in-laws registered. If anyone from your family has been at this camp, we’ll be able to tell where they are now. We’ll also try to inform them about you. Your addresses and whereabouts will be broadcast over the radio so that they know where to come to get you or where you might be sent on.’

The women with Tara looked at her in embarrassment at speaking the names of their husbands before strangers. They knew Tara could do this for them; she was a city girl, she could speak and understand English, Farsi and Hindi.

To get the Hindu women to give the names of their husbands or the men from their family was no easy matter. Tara faced the same problem
that Kaushalya Devi had faced at the DAV College camp. Amar Kaur and Satwant Kaur knew about each other’s family. Amaro mentioned the names of Satwant’s husband and his father, and Satwant did the same for Amaro. With great reluctance Banti told the name of her husband and his elder brother. Bisni said shyly, ‘He has the same name as that green-feathered bird, that chants gangaram and eats chooree.’ Tara realized that her husband was called Tota Ram.

They asked Tara about her own family. She replied without meeting their eyes, ‘I don’t want anyone to know where I am. Just give me something to do, here or somewhere else. I’ll be content with that.’

Those writing down the names spoke with each other in English, ‘She probably heard that unfortunate women like her are neither accepted by their parents, nor by their in-laws.’

Tara lifted her eyes and looked at them. They guessed that she understood English. One young man spoke in English, so that she could hear, ‘You can do as you wish. Yes, there are some heartless souls like that, but not everyone is that cruel. It’s not your fault what you’ve been through. We’ve a lot of sympathy and respect for you. Give at least your name so that the head count tallies.’

Another man led them to a large room. Chinti and the other two women sat with their backs to one wall. The floor was covered with dhurrie. Moths circled the light bulb on the wall. As he was leaving, the young man said to Tara, ‘You may switch off the light and shut the door. Turn the fan on if you feel hot.’

It was stuffy and hot in the room. Tara reached for the regulator on the wall and turned the fan on.

Bisni and Kesari were gaping at the light bulb. Hearing the fan rotate and feeling the breeze, they arched their heads and began to gape at the fan. They could hardly contain their amazement.

People passed by their open door in the veranda. ‘Let’s shut the door so that we can sleep undisturbed,’ Banti suggested to Tara. When Tara agreed, she got up and bolted the door.

Shielded from the eyes of men, the women rolled up their dupattas, and using them as pillows, lay down on the dhurrie. Bisni’s eyes were still fixed on the fan.

The moths circling the light were swept on to the women’s bodies by the breeze from the fan. Tara found the bright light unnecessary and
uncomfortable. She asked Banti and Satwant, ‘Do we need the light? Shall I turn it off?’

‘Yes, sister. Do if you know how to. We’ve no idea.’

Bisni was still staring at the fan. Without asking her, Tara switched off the light.

‘Hai!’ Bisni screamed in her Punjabi dialect of Jhang.

Tara’s hand was still on the switch. She switched the light on. Bisni was both frightened and amazed.

Satwant said, ‘She’s from up-country. Never saw electric light before. We’ve been to the town several times, and we’ve seen it all.’ She asked Bisni, ‘Have you ever been on a train, sister?’

‘Never rode on it,’ replied Bisni, ‘but saw it. Whenever we went to Bhakha from our village, we used to cross iron lines.’

Satwant spoke like a deep thinker, ‘All this is a blessing of Maharaj-ji. Towns are full of His miracles. Flick with your finger, and water gushes out. Where we had our meal, water flowed non-stop from an iron rod.’

Tara smiled slowly. She worked the switch and explained, ‘Don’t be alarmed. The light goes off if you press it like this, and comes on if you press it again.’

She lay with her eyes closed in the darkened room, but could not sleep. Now was the time to think.

Next day, late in the morning, Banti said to Tara, ‘My dear, let’s go out and ask around by ourselves. May be we can find something about Jaggi’s dad and the rest of the family.’

Banti’s husband and his elder brother used to go to Amritsar to buy their stock of cloth once or twice every year. They dealt through an agent in the city. After her marriage, Banti had once gone to Amritsar with her husband and mother-in-law, to visit Durgiyana and the shrine of Darbar Sahib.

Tara thought that, just like Lahore, Amritsar too would have scores of schools for girls. She hoped to find work somewhere, even at a modest salary. She went to the tent to inquire about the address of some schools for girls.

A young man asked Tara why she wanted that information. He noticed the state of her clothes and her pale drawn face, and said sympathetically, ‘Bahinji, all the schools have been closed to provide accommodation for the refugees. If you want to go anywhere in particular, I can come along to show you the way. My name is Dev. I am a student of the Dharm Samaj College.’

Dev got his bicycle and went out with Tara and Banti. As they came out of the gate, he called a tonga for the women. Banti was uneasy. She whispered into Tara’s ear, ‘Hai, but do we have enough money for this?’

‘Never mind. Just get in,’ Tara said.

From her experience of modern, educated people in Lahore, Tara knew that it was a woman’s privilege to accept such gestures of help and courtesy. How could Banti, who spent all her life in a village, know that? Dev rode on his bicycle.

Dev and Tara took Banti to several camps in search of her family. Together they checked the records of people who had arrived as refugees and those who were still there. Dev felt sympathy for the women who had suffered through no fault of their own, and was willing to do anything he could to help them. He retained the tonga for them until the evening.