Ludhiana to Lahore – The Partition

Resting Time

“He’s not dead, there is still life left in him.” “I can’t. I am really exhausted.”
Saadat Hasan Manto

Seeing the Channel 4 documentary on the 60th anniversary of the partition of India and the creation of Pakistan revealed once again the travesty and tragedy of an act which served only the privileged on either side. It is extraordinary how the partition has affected generations thereafter. My grandfather searched for my aunt who was separated during the partition and their long walk from Ludhiana to Lahore to a refugee camp. They eventually settled in Toba Tek Singh, not far from Layallpur (now Faisalabad). His relentless faith in searching for her remained steadfast until he found her in 1975 and she immediately recognised him. The reconciliation was joyous and painful “as if my heart had found my body again” is how my grandfather described it.

Compared to my mother’s life, married at age 13 and travelled to Kenya to be with my father, my aunt’s experience of survival and a troubled initial integration back into the family often brought the partition back into sharp focus for her. She grew up in an orphanage and trained as a nurse. She met and married a man of her own choice. She eventually left Pakistan with her husband and settled in Germany. She seldom wants to talk about her experience preferring to forget about it – her life is still hard but it’s full of joy and love. When my grandmother was alive and I visited Pakistan, she would insist that we go to the border and see the lowering of the flag ceremony and exchange of guards. “The Peacocks are at it again” would be her comment. She always had a special place to sit where tea would be brought over and sweetmeat shared between the Pakistani and Indian officials which we would also share. Following the ritual with her, we would then go and find a spot where we could be in close proximity of the Indian side and the people. She would then start her exchange: “There is no difference between us – we look the same and we are from the same earth” and the Indian side would respond likewise. The chat would turn into an hour, then two, she had more strength then I although she was nearing her mid-70’s. She would end her conversation with “Jinnah and Nehru did nothing for us, all they wanted was power.” Her dreams of unity were only dreams and she knew that. In the end, her desire was for absolute peace where the two countries could live side by side “like intelligent adults and not insane carnivorous children”.

How strange 60 years later, the events of August 1947 resonates amongst us outside of the Indian sub-continent. I am grateful to her and my mother for giving me such a rich education into our history, literature and poetry. Something that is so sadly lacking in the younger generations here, who know very little about the history of England let alone the Indian sub-continent and are hell bent on seeing it through ethnic and religious differences.

Seeing the documentary brought my mother and grandmother back to me. I hadn’t thought of my aunt for sometime and I fell asleep with her in mind, imagery of the partition came from the documentary kept on conjuring up passages from Manto’s various writings. The partition of India is so well documented, and for me the work of Manto is so revelatory that it leaves you speechless. I have a deep admiration for his work and also because my family settled in Toba Tek Singh, a place he made famous with a short story about a mental institution and it’s predicament due to the line drawn through Panjab. Manto was important then and he is still relevant today. I would like to share another short sketch by Manto with you, brilliant and succinct; the sketch reveals a particular character trait with a pure genius of observation that Manto possessed.

The Benefit of Ignorance

The trigger was pressed and the bullet spun out ill-temperedly. The man leaning through the window doubled over without making a sound. The trigger was pressed a second time. The bullet swished through the air, puncturing the water-carrier’s goatskin. He fell on his face and his blood, mixing with water, began to flow across the road. The trigger was pressed a third time. The bullet missed, embedding itself into a mud wall. The fourth felled an old woman. She did not even scream. The fifth and sixth were wasted. Nobody got killed and nobody got wounded. The marksman looked frustrated, when suddenly a running child appeared on the road. He raised his gun and took aim.

“What are you doing?” his companion asked.

“Why?”

“You are out of bullets.”

“You keep quiet. What does a little child know?”

Saadat Hasan Manto

Both sketches appear in “Partition – Sketches and Stories by Saadat Hasan Manto”. Translated from the Urdu by Khalid Hasan and published by Viking Penguin Books India 1991.

Originally published on AboutFilm on 31^st March 2007

Shakila’s About Film is an amalgamation of art and activism. Drawing on historical and current events, this blog aimed to provide an alternative discourse to creative and political viewpoints. About Film also incorporated into this endeavour an attempt at a perspective on ways of seeing; from Film, Culture, Art, Literature, Gender through to Politics, welcoming debate and discourse. About Film – created in 2007 – offered views, critiques, and opinions that were distinctive, creating a dynamic and powerful place for discussion. With topics as diverse as the partition of the Indian sub-continent through to the Cinema of Pasolini, About Film brought an original point of view inviting readers to be a part of this vibrant arena and add to its promising and thought-provoking content.

The Incident of the Shaving of the Moustache that Changed the Political Face of Pakistan and Benazir’s Destiny

Picture a very Shakespearean drama and then place the Bhutto family as its main players. It surpasses all expectations of a volatile story full of greed, power hungry and manipulative individuals.

Benazir Bhutto’s brother, Murtaza Bhutto’s assassination comes to mind. A brutal killing by any measure, one that was pre-meditated and meticulously planned when a brother did not see eye to eye with his sister and brother-in-law, who happened to be the Prime Minister and the Minister for Industry respectively. Zardari along with Benazir has been accused of siphoning public and private monies out of Pakistan and into Swiss accounts. Anyhow, we all know that story.

Murtaza Bhutto was a radical leftist who was being supported by the Soviet Union at the time of his assassination. He had been in exile in Afghanistan but decided to return to Pakistan in the mid ’90s to be part of the political milieu and to partake in the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP).

Critical of Asif Ali Zardari, Murtaza lost ground with Benazir which in turn made him a strong and vocal critic of the PPP. Murtaza felt that the arguments were getting out of hand and decided to have a private meeting with Zardari which ended badly.

After a heated discussion, Murtaza and Zardari resorted to fisticuffs during which Murtaza managed to somehow shave off half of Zardari’s moustache. A deeply humiliated Zardari set about his revenge.

In a staged shoot out on September 20^th 1996, outside Murtaza’s home in Karachi, a gang of armed police officers hid in strategic places. As Murtaza’s car pulled up, he along with seven other members of his entourage got out. Murtaza was immediately felled by a sniper, who managed to shoot him through the neck as well as in several other parts of his body.

Murtaza and his companions were fatally wounded and were left to bleed for over two hours before they were taken to separate hospitals. Murtaza of course died soon after, along with his supporters.

No one has been arrested or charged with the killing of Murtaza Bhutto.

Image copyright: Abbas Ali Collection/historyofpia.com

Originally published on AboutFilm on 27^th January 2008

Shakila’s About Film is an amalgamation of art and activism. Drawing on historical and current events, this blog aimed to provide an alternative discourse to creative and political viewpoints. About Film also incorporated into this endeavour an attempt at a perspective on ways of seeing; from Film, Culture, Art, Literature, Gender through to Politics, welcoming debate and discourse. About Film – created in 2007 – offered views, critiques, and opinions that were distinctive, creating a dynamic and powerful place for discussion. With topics as diverse as the partition of the Indian sub-continent through to the Cinema of Pasolini, About Film brought an original point of view inviting readers to be a part of this vibrant arena and add to its promising and thought-provoking content.

Romila Thapar – A History of India and the Absence of Satan

Romila Thapar’s ‘A history of India Volume 1’ is worth every re-visit. I had the good fortune of coming across is some years ago, prior to that, I had very little knowledge of the historical make-up of the modern India, although her work stops at the arrivals of the Europeans in the sixteenth century.

Published by Pelican, the book ‘traces the evolution of India before contact with modern Europe was established in the sixteenth century. Professor Thapar’s account of the development of India’s social and economic structure is arranged within a framework of the principal political and dynastic events. Her narrative covers some 2,500 years of India’s history, from the establishment of Aryan culture in about 1000 B.C. to the coming of the Mughals in A.D. 1520 and the first appearance of European trading companies. In particular she deals interestingly with the many manifestations of Indian culture, as seen in religion, art, and literature, in ideas and institutions.

Thapar states that ‘the history of India in the first volume begins with the culture of the Indo-Aryans and not with the prehistoric cultures of India.’ She further says that ‘1526 marks the arrivals of the Mughals in northern India and they were (amongst other things) actively involved in the future of Europe in India.’

In her chapter ‘The Antecedents’, Romila Thapar says ‘wealth in India, as in every other ancient culture, was limited to the few. Mystical activities were also the preoccupation of but a handful of people. It is true, however, that acceptance of such activities was characteristic of the majority… whereas in some other cultures the rope-trick would have been ascribed to the promptings of the devil and reference to it suppressed, in India it was regarded with amused benevolence. The fundamental sanity of Indian civilization has been due to an absence of Satan.’

Originally published on AboutFilm on 15^th May 2008

Shakila’s About Film is an amalgamation of art and activism. Drawing on historical and current events, this blog aimed to provide an alternative discourse to creative and political viewpoints. About Film also incorporated into this endeavour an attempt at a perspective on ways of seeing; from Film, Culture, Art, Literature, Gender through to Politics, welcoming debate and discourse. About Film – created in 2007 – offered views, critiques, and opinions that were distinctive, creating a dynamic and powerful place for discussion. With topics as diverse as the partition of the Indian sub-continent through to the Cinema of Pasolini, About Film brought an original point of view inviting readers to be a part of this vibrant arena and add to its promising and thought-provoking content.