Culture & Society

Eastwood's 'American Sniper' is one big historically dishonest action flick

January 21, 2015 by Nasheman

The film piles on Bush-era propaganda and sharp-shoots the facts.

by Alex von Tunzelmann, The Guardian

American Sniper (2014)
Director: Clint Eastwood
Entertainment grade: D+
History grade: D-

Chris Kyle, known as “Legend”, was a US Navy Seal who served in Iraq in the early 2000s. He is considered the deadliest sniper in US history, with a recorded 160 confirmed kills out of 255 probable kills. He later served as a bodyguard for Sarah Palin.

The opening sequence of the movie, also featured in a trailer, depicts Chris Kyle (Bradley Cooper) with his sights trained on a street in Iraq ahead of a marine convoy. A woman comes out of a house and hands a Russian-made RKG-3 anti-tank grenade to a young boy. She sends the child running towards the convoy. Should Kyle shoot? It’s a tense moment, and the same incident the real Kyle used to open his memoir, American Sniper, on which this film is based. But it has been heightened for the screen. In real life, there was no child, only an adult woman –the film makes her extra-evil by having her send a child to his death. The real Kyle wrote that she had a Chinese grenade. It may have been a smaller hand grenade rather than an anti-tank weapon, which is bigger and easier to see. It was, he wrote, “the first time in Iraq – and the only time – I killed anyone other than a male combatant.” At least, as far as he knew.

Director Clint Eastwood – last seen at the Republican national convention in 2012, telling off an empty chair for invading Afghanistan – reduces everything here to primary colours and simple shapes. Kyle joins the Seals after he watches the 1998 US embassy bombings on TV (in real life, these had nothing to do with his decision). When he gets to the frontline, all Iraqis resisting the US occupation are unquestionably identified as AQI (al-Qaida in Iraq), making them legitimate targets. In the script they’re referred to, without irony, as “savages”, as they are throughout Kyle’s book.

In case you don’t believe they’re savages, the main Iraqi characters – who have virtually no lines– are clearly very bad guys. There is a mostly fictional sniper named Mustafa (Sammy Sheik), a former Olympic marksman, who is mentioned in one paragraph of Kyle’s book but in the film becomes his sharp-shooting, marine-murdering nemesis. In real life, Kyle wrote of Mustafa: “I never saw him, but other snipers later killed an Iraqi sniper we think was him.” In the film, Kyle and Mustafa battle to the death.

Then there’s a fictional terrorist called the Butcher (Mido Hamada), who wears a long black coat and attacks small children with electric drills. The Butcher may be loosely based on Ismail Hafidh al-Lami, known as Abu Deraa, blamed for thousands of deaths in the mid-2000s. The main point is that he’s horrible. In fact, everyone Kyle kills is horrible. The war is a lot easier to support when no Americans ever make a mistake and everyone who opposes them is obviously horrible. You’re either with us or against us. We’re spreading freedom and democracy with guns and drones. God bless America.

Good guys

Every kill Kyle makes, even with shots taken after split-second decisions, is 100% righteous and saves American lives. The skull logo of Marvel’s murderous vigilante the Punisher is on his vest and his armoured vehicle, yet nobody asks whether that sort of symbolism is going to help win Iraqi hearts and minds. He is a true patriotic American, with a whacking great tattoo of a Jerusalem cross on his arm. That bit is true: “I had it put in in red, for blood,” he wrote. “I hated the damn savages I’d been fighting. I always will. They’ve taken so much from me.”

Kyle suffers after his tours of duty, but only, he says, because he wanted to kill more bad guys to save more marines. He develops a thousand-yard stare, and attacks his own dog at a barbecue. The message of American Sniper is that Kyle is the real victim of the war. The Iraqis he shot deserved it, because – as it has established to its own satisfaction – they were savages. As for non-savage Iraqis who may have reasonable grounds to complain about what happened to their country following the invasion, they must be in some other movie.

Sources

This film alters Kyle’s book significantly, but the reliability of his account may also be open to question. In 2014, wrestler-turned-politician Jesse Ventura won over $1.8m (£1.2m) in damages from Kyle’s estate after a jury decided he had been defamed. Kyle claimed he had punched Ventura in a bar after Ventura said navy Seals “deserved to lose some” for their actions in Iraq. Ventura said he had never even met Kyle. In a separate case, Kyle told a writer he had shot and killed two armed men who attempted to carjack him in Dallas. Reporters were unable to confirm this with county sheriffs and medical examiners, all of whom insisted no such incident had ever taken place. Kyle further claimed that he and another sniper had sat on top of the Superdome in New Orleans during the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, and killed 30 armed civilians he thought were making trouble. Again, this story could not be confirmed by any of the relevant authorities.

One investigating journalist wrote in the New Yorker that these tales “portray Kyle as if he really were the Punisher, dispensing justice by his own rules. It was possible to see these stories as evidence of vainglory; it was also possible to see them as attempts by a struggling man to maintain an invincible persona.” Maybe some of these brags were true, and maybe they weren’t. A lot of this film certainly isn’t – and all the complicated questions it leaves out would have made it a much more interesting story than the Bush-era propaganda it shovels in.

Verdict

Clint Eastwood’s movie slathers myths on top of Legend’s own legends. Audiences would be well advised to take American Sniper’s version of the war in Iraq with a very, very large pinch of salt.

Book Excerpt: The Red Sari

January 17, 2015 by Nasheman

A dramatised excerpt from the story of the day Sonia Gandhi prepared to turn down the post of Prime Minister of India in 2004.

by Javier Moro

In the afternoon of 15 May, after having been elected unanimously as the leader of the Parliamentary Party, Sonia Gandhi addresses her MPs. “Here I stand in the place occupied by my great masters, Nehruji, Indiraji, and Rajivji. Their lives have guided my path. Their courage and devotion to India have given me the strength to continue along their path years after their martyrdom. Soon we will have here, in the central government, a coalition led by the Congress party. We have triumphed in the face of all the forecasts. We have overcome in spite of the ill-omened predictions. In the name of all of you, I want to express with all my heart my gratitude to the people of India. Thank you.”

The hall bursts into an enthusiastic ovation and then the MPs prepare to congratulate her personally. They all want to get close to the architect of so much joy and expectation, the person who holds the key to power. In that hall, which has been witness to so many national dramas, so many bitter arguments – a festive atmosphere now reigns. Sonia is radiant. There is so much commotion that the MPs have to stand in line to shake her hand or, even better, to exchange a witty comment… Among the last waiting his turn is a young man, dressed in a white kurta and pyjama, her son, Rahul.

However, the veterans and those closest to Sonia are worried because in her speech, there was not a single word about her role in the new coalition. When they suggest that she should go to the president the next day to formally request permission to form a government, Sonia wriggles out of it by saying that the Left has still not confirmed its support, which is really just an excuse. The fact is that she wants to use all the time available to think about it.

After spending a whole day at home with her children weighing the pros and cons of the situation, she meets her closest allies. She has something important to say to them. They can see it coming: “I think I should not accept the position of prime minister.” She does not say it categorically, as though her decision was firm, she says it as if she wanted to judge the reaction. “I do not want to be the cause of division within the country,” she adds, leaving them all uncomfortable and disconcerted. And she goes on to suggest a Solomon-like solution, which causes some annoyance: her suggestion is that she should continue as president of the party… and that Manmohan Singh should be prime minister. It is a revolutionary idea because it means a two- pronged leadership, an experiment in governance.

A deep silence greets her words. Sonia goes on, “He is honourable, he has an excellent reputation as an economist, and he has experience in administration… I am convinced he will be a great prime minister.” But the suggestion leaves them cold. It is well-known that Manmohan Singh has no charisma. He is a serious man, a technocrat, not a politician. “It’s like saying this victory has served for nothing. The coalition will not hold together without a Gandhi,” says one of the Congress leaders. Neither does the idea dazzle the more veteran leaders, some of whom have been members of the party for fifty years. Manmohan Singh is a relative newcomer.

But above all, it is the reality of not having a Gandhi in the key position what worries her people. At this point, the mystique of the name counts for more than anything else. “It will be the most short-lived government in history,” some predict. Even the two party members who complained in private of having “an uneducated Italian housewife” as leader beg her to agree to be prime minister. In one week, she has gone from being a plain “housewife” to being “a friend, a guide, the nation’s saviour”.

In the afternoon, Manmohan Singh arrives at number 10, Janpath. It is hard for him to make his way through the crowd of MPs and followers who block the entrance. There are so many people that they do not fit inside the house. They wait in the garden or on the street, in the blazing summer sun, for their leader to make a decision. For Sonia, the situation is familiar; she has the impression of having lived through this already, when they were trying to convince her to accept the presidency of the party. However much she tries to argue, they do not accept her decision. They do not understand how she can refuse the position with the most power, which is the dream of all politicians. It is unacceptable to them, in spite of knowing that for Sonia, power has never been a goal in itself. They know that she is in politics out of a personal commitment, because fate wanted it to be that way. “It would be a disaster for the party, for the coalition, for the country…” they say again and again. “Sonia, don’t abandon us.”

One of the congress leaders, Era Anbarasu threatens to set himself on fire if she turns down the job. Sonia becomes alarmed and capitulates. Two hours after having suggested that perhaps she would not accept the role of prime minister, Manmohan Singh comes out into the garden and announces in his gentle voice: “Mrs Gandhi has agreed to meet with the president tomorrow morning.” A murmur of approval sweeps through the crowd. The announcement relaxes things. Those who begin to leave do so convinced that the pressure has worked. In the end, the leader has agreed to take on her responsibility. The Congress party will be in power again, under the leadership of a Gandhi.

For Sonia, the problem is how to get those who venerate her and all those who expect everything of her to swallow the bitter pill. How to get them to see reason? How can they think that she can govern this country on her own? The Opposition will give her no refuge: every day they will throw the matter of her origins in her face. Some madman will end up killing her; she is convinced of it. Besides, she does not have much experience.

What she needs is to be alone. In her room, she opens the windows before she goes to bed. She breathes the hot air in deeply. All her childhood, she slept with the windows wide open, in spite of the cold. Today, she again feels that old distress. It is a feeling of drowning that comes back every time she has to take an important decision. Every time she feels unbearable pressure mounting.

She turns off the air-conditioning and leaves the window open. The warm breeze, brings no relief. Finally, it all goes quiet, just the way she likes it. In these last few days, her home has been like a madhouse. All that noise has prevented her from hearing her inner voice. She needs silence to get in touch with herself, to listen to herself. To know what to do tomorrow. Or rather, how to do it.

Excerpted with permission from The Red Sari: A Dramatized Biography of Sonia Gandhi, Javier Moro, translated by Peter J. Hearn, Roli Books.

Bad Muslim: A Poem

January 14, 2015 by Nasheman

Do not project your fear

onto my body

I will not hold your hand

and reassure you

I have no intention of killing you

I will not coddle your

fear or accept guilt

by association

I have no interest in

reassuring you

not all of us are like that

I will not apologize

for your parochialism

your provincialism

or your ignorance

for your inability to

perceive

violence unless

a tv box or a hashtag

numbs your mind with it
I will not mourn with you

because you don’t even

know

how to acknowledge

my many deaths

I will not affirm

that your grief

and your loss

is more painful

or more significant

or more terrifying

than the grievances you

have never even heard of

than the grievances you refuse

to recognize as grievances

I will tell you instead

what it feels like

to watch your

Pundits and your Experts

extoll the virtues of

Killing All Muslims

of deporting everyone on

security lists with names

like mine

I will tell you

how much terror

your vaunted fear

births

how it pierces my skin

coils around my cranium

burrows under my parietal

bones makes it difficult

to breathe

to think

to wake up

in the morning

how it grows inside me

this infinite terror

because you think

your fear is

so special

so singular

so unique

it justifies the

rivers of blood

in places

you still don’t know

how to find on a map

I will not apologize

until every single european

apologizes for the massacres

holocausts genocides famines

committed in your names

until you personally apologize

for palestine kashmir algeria the

congo

for drawing lines

in the sand

that still fester

like bloody wounds

will refuse to apologize

until every single american

personally apologizes for discovering

this continent

by washing it in the

blood

of it’s original inhabitants

for slavery the kkk

plantations japanese internment

camps the trail of tears

for the burnings

hangings lynchings

of Black bodies

for policemen

who still don’t know

innocence and Blackness

can exist

in the same body

for rectal feedings and

unaccountable disappearances

abu ghraib and fallujah

for torture that still doesn’t

count

as torture for terror that rises and

rises and rises

infinitely
I will not apologize

because nothing I can say

will ever suffice for you

because you have already

proven your inability

to hear my many

apologies

because even

my 1,600,000,000 deaths

won’t quench your fear

I’m a bad Muslim

and I will never again

apologize

for the bitter taste of

your fear in my mouth

Asam Ahmad is a writer who still has a hard time trusting words. He coordinates the It Gets Fatter project and lives in Toronto. He is a contributor to Killing Trayvons: an Anthology of American Violence.

At Home in India highlights role of Muslims in modern India

January 5, 2015 by Nasheman

Salman Khurshid. Photo: Priyanka Parashar/Mint

by K Natwar Singh

Even his critics concede that is difficult to dislike Salman Khurshid. I would go along with that assessment. His pedigree is impeccable. His grandfather, Dr Zakir Hussain; father, Khurshid Alam Khan, MP, Minister of State, Governor of Goa and Karnataka. Salman himself has not done badly, ending up as an External Affairs Minister. A secular Muslim liberal, he is endowed with an effervescent personality. An intellectual, who often strikes the right note. This embarrassment of riches can become a peril unless one is also level headed.

I have read this absorbing book with great interest. Also with disquiet. Islam is passing through a difficult time. The Peshawar killings tore into the psyche of Muslims. The Taliban discredit a great religion and get away with it. The terrible Sunni-Shia differences are responsible for the bloodletting in Iraq. I could go on, but that would give no comfort.

The author has addressed devilishly complex issues with candour and clarity. The disturbing upheavals in the Aligarh Muslim University (some decades ago, the hot heads all but killed the Vice-Chancellor, Ali Yavar Jung) and the Jamia Milia Islamia from where they hounded historian Mushirul Hassan mishandling the Ramjanambhoomi-Babri Masjid dispute, the never ending arguments over the Uniform Civil Code, and much else.

The author raises fundamental issues such as Islam and modernity. He maintains that even after ten centuries, Muslims are not getting a fair deal. This could be disputed because a majority of the community has to jettison its inferiority complex and ghetto mentality. In this book, Salman Khurshid tackles this hot potato head-on. “The theme of helplessness, poverty and insecurity is writ large upon the leaderless community. And by their nature, the Muslims cannot do without a leader…… the complete leadership vacuum, is a very serious matter.” The last great Indian Muslim leader was Dr. Zakir Hussain. He died on 3rd May 1969. We do not see the likes of Maulana Azad, Rafi Ahmed Kidwai, Sheikh Abdullah, Humayun or Kabir.

At Home in India: The Muslim Saga/ Salman Khurshid/ Hay House India 426, PP392

Strangely, the author writes about a “very promising new leadership in Karnataka, Delhi, Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh. What are their names? Ghulam Nabi Azad, Ahmed Patel, Mohsina Kidwai, Saifuddin, Farooq Abdullah are all in their late sixties and early seventies. All very worthy and immensely likeable individuals, but their best is behind them. Even Mufti sahib is not young!

Salman Khurshid has no time for the Baigs, the Shahbuddins, Arif Khans, MJ Akbars, Arun Shouries, the Mullahs and the Maulvis. He does refer to the positive role played by the Deobandis in the freedom movement though.

One area in which Muslims are the heroes is Bollywood. The three (or is it four?) Khans have won the hearts of hundreds of millions of their compatriots. That is secularism for you.

The melancholy fact is that after a thousand years, no genuine assimilation between Hindus and Muslims has occurred. How many Hindus marry Muslim girls? How many Muslims marry Hindu girls? How many Hindus have read the Koran? How many Muslims have read the Gita? Not one in a million.

Salman Khurshid quotes a few lines MA Jinnah’s August 11, 1947 speech at the Constitutional Assembly of Pakistan, Karachi, but not from the memorable and brilliant speech of Maulana Azad at the AICC (All India Congress Committee) session at Ramgarh in 1940.

Here is a gem from the speech: “I feel proud that I am an Indian. I am a part of the indivisible united nationality of India. I am an important element in this united nationality. Without me, the temple of its greatness remains incomplete. I am an essential factor in the structure, a calm which I can under no circumstances abandon.”

This timely book needs to be read by all those who wish to keep India a secular democracy.

K Natwar Singh is a senior politician and former union minister. He is the author of One Life is Not Enough (2014). This book review originally appeared in Hindustan Times.

Book Excerpt: The history of December 6, 1992: How Rama appeared inside the Babri Masjid

December 6, 2014 by Nasheman

On December 23, 1949,the Ayodhya Police filed an FIR following the planting of the idol of Rama in Babri Masjid the night before. It named Abhiram Das as the prime accused. The secret story of what happened.

by Krishna Jha and Dhirendra K. Jha

11 pm, 22 December 1949. Moments before Abhiram Das stood at the threshold of the temple at Ramghat, Ayodhya slept in peace. Although it was barely eleven in the night, the township, located at the edge of Faizabad, had passed into deep slumber. The night was cold, and a layer of still air covered Ayodhya like a blanket. Feeble strains of Ramakatha wafted in from the Ramachabutara. Perhaps the devotees keeping the story of Lord Rama alive were getting tired and sleepy. The sweet murmur of the Sarayu added to the deceptive calm.

The temple at Ramghat on the northern edge of Ayodhya was not very old. The initiative to erect it had been taken just a decade ago. But the enthusiasm did not appear to have persisted, and the construction had been halted halfway. The structure remained small in size and the absence of the desperately required final touches made it look crude but for the grand, projecting front facade and the rooms on both sides of the garbhagriha. In the backyard was a mango grove, unkempt, untended. About a kilometre away, River Sarayu, the lifeline of Ayodhya, flowed along with sandy stretches on both sides of its shoreline.

Abhiram Das stumbled as he climbed the half-built brick steps, lost in the shadows of the dimly lit lamp hanging on the wall, but recovered and entered the side room of the temple. The Ramghat temple was the prized possession of Abhiram Das, who himself lived a kilometre away in a one-room tenement that formed part of the complex of Hanumangarhi, a fortress-like structure in the heart of Ayodhya. Within the precincts of its imposing walls, there was an old, magnificent temple dedicated to Lord Hanuman. The circular bastions on each of the four corners of Hanumangarhi enhanced its structural elegance and artistic grandeur. Around the fortress and as part of the complex, there were rooms for sadhus, a Sanskrit pathshala and a huge, narrow stretch, where there was a gaushala, beside which Abhiram Das lived, close to the singhdwar of Hanumangarhi.

That, however, was only a night shelter for him. In his waking hours, Abhiram Das had innumerable engagements, and the temple at Ramghat always figured prominently among them. Not just because it was under his control, but because it housed his three younger brothers and four cousins, most of whom were enrolled with the Sanskrit pathshala in Hanumangarhi. Two of his cousins, Yugal Kishore Jha and Indushekhar Jha, as well as Abhiram’s younger brother, Upendranath Mishra, were students of Maharaja Intermediate College in Ayodhya. Abhiram Das’s relatives lived in the rooms adjacent to the garbhagriha and survived on offerings made by devotees to Lord Rama. They cooked for Abhiram as well. Thrice a day, they would carry his food to his room, braving the scorching sun in summer, icy winds in winter, and downpours during the rainy season. Abhiram’s closeness to his extended family was unexpected in a sadhu. The ascetic in him often cautioned against such human weaknesses, but it had always been beyond him to transcend them.

Yet, visiting Ramghat temple that night was not part of his original plan as he set out to install the idol of Lord Rama inside the sixteenth-century mosque. Nor were his brothers and cousins used to seeing him at this odd hour in his second home. For, like any other sadhu, he was in the habit of going to bed and getting up early.

Indeed, it was awkward for Abhiram Das too. He had to change his original plan owing to the sudden disappearance of his friend Ramchandra Das Paramhans, who was supposed to accompany him in his surreptitious mission…

…According to the plan, Paramhans was to arrive at the Hanumangarhi residence of Abhiram Das by 9 pm, after his meal. They were to go together to the Babri Masjid, where another sadhu, Vrindavan Das, was to join them with an idol of Lord Rama. The trio was then supposed to go inside the sixteenth-century mosque, plant the idol below its central dome and keep the deserted place of worship under their control till the next morning when a larger band of Hindu communalists would pour in for support. They had been strictly instructed that their entry into the mosque had to be completed at any cost before midnight – the time when there would be a change of guard at the gate of the mosque.

Every detail had been planned meticulously, and everything seemed to be moving accordingly, till Ramchandra Das Paramhans vanished from the scene. Forty-two years later, when none of those involved in planting the idol was alive to contradict him, Paramhans sought to appropriate history. “I am the very man who put the idol inside the masjid,” Paramhans declared in a news report that appeared in the New York Times on 22 December 1991.

However, on that fateful night of 1949 and for a few days thereafter, Paramhans went missing from the scene in Ayodhya. Indushekhar Jha who, together with Yugal Kishore Jha, followed Abhiram Das into the mosque, had this to say about Paramhans: “I saw Paramhans in the evening [of 22 December 1949]. Thereafter, he was not seen in Ayodhya for [the] next three days. Yet it was he who took maximum advantage from that incident.”

Nor did Awadh Kishore remember seeing Ramchandra Das Paramhans in the mosque early next morning when curiosity led him to the spot as early as 5 am. Awadh Kishore recalled what his elder brother, Yugal Kishore Jha, had told him many years later:

“Baba Abhiram Das and Paramhans used to be together most of the time during the months before the installation of the idol. I was therefore surprised not to see him in the Babri Masjid early next morning [on 23 December 1949] when I reached the spot. Later, I asked Yugal Babu about this puzzle. He told me that Baba Abhiram Das was shocked when Paramhans disappeared on the night of 22 December because the original plan was that they would go inside the mosque together and carry out their secret mission.”

There is no precise evidence to suggest exactly where Ramchandra Das Paramhans went that evening. Many senior residents of Ayodhya as well as Awadh Kishore believe that on the evening of 22 December, without informing Abhiram Das, he left town to attend the three-day conference of the All India Hindu Mahasabha that was scheduled to begin on 24 December in Calcutta. As for the reason for his sudden decision to leave Ayodhya and participate in the conference instead of accompanying Abhiram Das, nothing can be said for sure except that he may have been apprehensive of the consequences of the act. On his part, Ramchandra Das Paramhans, after having taken credit in 1991 for installing the idol inside the Babri Masjid, preferred to remain silent on the issue till his death in 2003.

Back in those uncertain moments of 1949, Abhiram Das waited at his Hanumangarhi residence for Ramchandra Das Paramhans till around 10 p.m., after which he left in search of his friend. Paramhans lived in a temple in the Ramghat locality of Ayodhya. It was quite close to the one inhabited by Abhiram Das’s brothers and cousins. But Paramhans was not to be found there. This made Abhiram rather less confident of accomplishing the task he had set out for. The strength he had was that of faith, without any rationale to go with it. But as the moment approached, the magnitude of the job, as well as its possible repercussions unfolded with a clarity that was missing till then.

Wanting to prepare for any eventuality, he decided to give appropriate instructions to his brothers and cousins at the temple in Ramghat before proceeding on his journey towards the Babri Masjid…

With so much force did Abhiram Das enter the room that his cousin Awadh Kishore Jha felt that it was some wild animal blundering inside. He recounted later:

“I lay in my bed trying to understand [what was going on]. He tried to appear confident as ever, but he looked badly shaken. A few days later, I got to know the reason. The disappearance of Ramchandra Das (Paramhans) had shaken and scared him as never before. Abhiram Das looked completely different that night. It was not that he had changed, but that some new feature had unfolded itself in his character. I had always seen him as a 100 per cent confident man. It was around 11 p.m. [on 22 December 1949]. He ordered us all to get up.”

While the occupants of the room were getting out of bed, Abhiram Das kept pacing up and down, quivering – apparently with the strength of the emotions stirring within him. In one hand, he held the long bamboo staff, while the other instinctively fumbled with the beads in the mala-jhola.

As they got up, he asked his younger brother Upendranath Mishra to hold the hand of Yugal Kishore Jha, the eldest of his cousins there, and said, “Listen to me carefully. I am going and may never return. If something happens to me, if I don’t return till morning, Yugal will be my successor and in charge of this temple.” Yugal Kishore Jha pulled his hand back and stared at him incredulously. “What on earth are you up to, maharaj?”

But Abhiram Das said nothing, nor did he look at anyone. Having put the succession issue in order, he was ready to resume his mission. He rushed out of the room and then the temple, and with rapid strides, dissolved into the darkness. His cousins Yugal Kishore Jha and Indushekhar Jha followed him, completely clueless about what was happening.

It took them hardly ten minutes to reach the spot. As they approached the open area near the Ramachabutara, another vairagi emerged from the dark corner of the outer courtyard of the Babri Masjid. It was Vrindavan Das, a Ramanandi vairagi of the Nirvani Akhara, who lived in a thatched hut near the gate of the sixteenth-century mosque. A heavy cotton bag hung from his shoulder, and there was a small idol of Rama Lalla in his hands.

Abhiram Das took the idol from Vrindavan Das and grasping it with both his hands, walked past him – as if he were not there – towards the wall that separated the inner courtyard around the Babri Masjid from the outer courtyard that contained the Ramachabutara. Vrindavan Das tried to ask him something in whispers, but Abhiram Das, appearing calmer now, once again took no notice of him.

Abhiram Das stood at the end of the pathway close to the inner courtyard, staring at the walls – his sole hurdle. Then, apparently addressing Vrindavan Das, he said, “Maharaj …”

Vrindavan Das said nothing, just moved closer to him, eager not to miss any word of instruction that might come his way.

“Maharaj,” said Abhiram Das again, this time coaxingly. He turned his head to look at him and said, “Follow me.” With these words, he held the idol firmly and began climbing the wall. Soon, he was straddling it.

Excerpted with permission from Ayodhya: The Dark Night ‒ The Secret History of Rama’s Appearance in Babri Masjid, by Krishna Jha and Dhirendra K. Jha, Harper-Collins India.

Book Review: Kanshiram: Leader of the Dalits

December 4, 2014 by Nasheman

by Abhay Kumar

Not many political leaders of the twentieth century have so much changed the landscape of Indian politics as Kanshi Ram, a true mass leader, did. Born in a Ramdasia Chamar family in a village of Punjab, he struggled through his life with an aim of politically empowering the most deprived sections of society. Among his many achievements, ‘Manyawar’ as he was popularly called, succeeded in “installing” a Dalit woman to become the chief minister of Uttar Pradesh — politically the most crucial state of the country and citadel of Brahminism. Much of his eventful life has been portrayed in a political biography authored by the noted social historian and cultural anthropologist Badri Narayan.

The biography “Kanshiram: Leader of the Dalits”, comprising eight chapters, portrays his childhood, political journey beginning from Maharashtra to Uttar Pradesh as well as the political ideas. Moreover, the book also gives a brief account of the criticisms of Kanshi Ram and the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP).

The author, who has spent decades in Uttar Pradesh both as a student and scholar and “closely followed” Kanshi Ram’s “journey”, mentions that all Dalits whom he interacted “acknowledged” Kanshi Ram had inculcated a strong sense of confidence and indemnity and self respect in them. The author, too, expresses his appreciation for Kanshi Ram whom he calls a “democrat to the core”. He, Badri Narayan goes on to say, was a “master strategist”, who brought Dalits, Adivasis, Backwards, and other religious minorities under the social category of ‘Bahujan’, making them “realise the value of their votes”, floating the BSP in1984 that represented freedom and respect and brought about social transformation in society.

Kanshiram: Leader of the Dalits, Author: Badri Narayan, Penguin India, New Delhi, 2014, pp. xxi + 265, Rs, 499.

The first chapter discusses his childhood. Born on March 15, 1934 in “relatively-well off” family, he had his early education in Government Primary School Milakpur, Punjab. Like most of the Dalit students he also faced discrimination at the hands of teachers. For example, at the school, a different pot for Dalits was kept to drink water. Yet another incident of caste discrimination that had deep impact on his life was when a senior officer mistreated and humiliated his father. Kanshi Ram recalled this incident. ‘Once, when I was a school student, my mother asked me to go and deliver food to my father who was performing a menial job (bagaar kar rahe the) at the Ropar Canal Guest House. I asked her what begaar meant and she replied that it meant serving the high-up officials, which we poor people were supposed to do. I took the food and set off for the guest house. It was intensely hot and when I reached the guest house I saw that my father was drenched in sweat. I could not bear to see his condition so I asked him to rest. But my father said that he could not do this as the senior officer was sleeping inside and he had to constantly tug the rope of the hand-pulled fan to keep him cool. Before electric fans, there used to be hand-pulled fans with long ropes and the rope-puller had to sit outside constantly working them to keep the fan moving. My father was doing that job in return for a small amount of money and explained that if he stopped pulling [the rope], the officer would wake up and punish him. I then told him to keep a small fan in his other hand to cool himself but my father said he would do no such thing.’ (pp. 17-18.)

Overcoming such barriers of caste, he continued to do well in study and kept his interests in sports as well. In 1956 he became a graduate in science from Government College, Ropar.

The second chapter discusses his foray into politics from the RPI (the Republican Party of India), founded by Ambedkar at the last stage of his life, and the BAMCEF (Backward and Minority Communities Employees Federation) to the BSP. The author has divided the political life of Kanshi Ram into four periods. The first phase began from (1958- 1964) when he, having completed his education, found a job in Poona and also got associated with the RPI. Moreover, he worked with the People’s Education Society, established by Ambedkar, with a mission to work for Dalits. The second phase (1964-1978) began when he quit the job in 1964 and joined the RPI which he later criticised for being fractions-ridden and overshadowing its “original objective”. The RPI drew his flak for entering into “opportunistic alliances” with the Congress in Maharashtra. As he became disillusioned with the RPI, he, in 1971, formed the SMCEA (SC/ST/OBC Minorities Communities Employees Association) in Poona, which was later renamed as the BAMCEF. The third Phase (1978-1984) began with the formation of the BAMCEF, which was established as a formal organisation on December 6, 1978. Preceded by the DS4 (Dalit Shoshit Samaj Sangharsh Samiti) in 1981, the BAMSEF’s called upon its follower to “become educated, become consolidated and struggle”. The fourth phase (1984 onwards) is no doubt the most important phase of his political life during which the BSP emerged, epitomising the political rise of Bahujans.

The third chapter is based on Kanshi Ram’s book “The Chamcha Age: An Era of Stooges” (1982), which he published on the fiftieth anniversary of the Poona Pact 1932 when Gandhi blackmailed Ambedkar to sign a pact that he would give up on separate electorate for the depressed classes awarded by the British Government. In my view, the author fell short of critically engaging with the text, “Chamcha Age”. On many occasions the author inserts long quotations, disturbing the coherence, and flow of the text. It is to be noted that the purpose of Kanshi Ram to pen ‘Chamcha Age’ was to awaken the masses about the “genuine” and “counterfeit” leaders, who, according to him, have been born in the oppressed community but have been serving the interests of the oppressors. Comparing Ambedkar with Kanshi Ram, the author says that Ambedkar, unlike Kanshi Ram, called politics of emancipation of marginalized sections as a “Dalit Movement” (p. 93.) I think this may be seen as an anachronistic reading of Ambedkar as the term Dalit, according to noted anthropologist S. M. Michael (Dalits in Modern India: Vision and Values, 2007, p. 16), was first used in 1931 and it “gained currency” with Dalit Panther Movement in the 1970s in Maharashtra.

The fourth chapter talks about how Kanshi Ram used subaltern culture, history, myths as political resources to build self-respect movement among Dalits and Backwards. For example, the BSP in order to mobilise Bahujans, constructed and popularised the subaltern icons such as Buddha, Kabir, Ravidas, Daria Sahib, Jagjivan Das, Jhalkaribai, Bijli Maharaj, Daldev Maharaj, Baaledeen, Veera Pasi, Mahamaya etc. While the author has done a fairly good job in analysing the cultural politics of Kanshi Ram, he mentions in passing a problematic paragraph about Guru Ravidas whom he interprets as a bulwark against “frantic” Muslims rulers who wanted to convert lower castes to Islam. According to Badri Narayan, ‘In addition, the Mughal rulers were frantically converting the lower castes to Islam through various allurements and temptations in order to expand their numbers and consolidate their position in India. Sant Ravidas, through his preaching, tried to reform Hindu society so that the lower castes were not tempted to convert to Islam and the Varna system was maintained,’(p. 121.) Unlike the myths and propagandas of the Hindu Right that the medieval period saw the forceful conversation of Hindu to Islam, many secular historians have largely agreed that the egalitarian ideology of Islam provided a relief to lower castes, who were suppressed by the Brahminical social order. Further, the author misquotes Kanshi Ram as saying that the number of castes in ST category, according to Mandal Commission Report, is 100 (p. 143.) In fact, it is 1000. Kanshi Ram (Cited in Anuj Kumar, ed., Bahujan Nayak Kanshiram ke Avismarniya Bhashan, 2000, p. 76), quoting the Mandal Commission Report, stressed the need to unite around 6000 castes, including1500 SC castes, 1000 ST castes and 3743 OBC castes.

The fifth chapter is about the BSP, its bid for power and the role of Kanshi Ram. The author rightly acknowledges Kanshiram’s ability to “sway and mobilize large crowds”, who realised that in democracy if the oppressed majority are made conscious of their votes the master key or Guru Killi, which Kanshi Ram would often call, can be seized. As he always spoke in people’s language, his concept of democracy is expressed in such a simple, yet profound way. “Lokshahi mein rani aur mehtarani ki keemat ek hi hoti hai”. (In a democracy the worth of a queen and [that] of a maid is the same, p. 165.). Kanshi Ram, departing with the radical armed struggles pursued by a section of communists, he, instead, mobilised the Bahujan through constitutional means and democratic processes.

The sixth, seventh and eighth chapters are a discussion of the criticism and limitation of Kanshi Ram and his party. For instance, he was alleged of indulging in “opportunism as a strategy”. For example, the BSP, according to his critics, welcomed “defectors” like Arif Mohammad Khan and Akbar Ahmed ‘Dumpy’, while it forged alliances with the BJP which it had opposed. ‘Kanshiram’, according to Badri Narayan, ‘faced the greatest flak in his political career over the BSP coming to power twice in UP with the support of the BJP.’ (p. 181.)

Despite some forces and merits in these criticisms, they tend to overlook the changes which were made by the BSP under the leadership of Kanshi Ram and Mayawati. The critics should not forget the constraint under which the BSP had to mobilise the most deprived sections of society to fight against oppressive social system. Apart from giving voice to voiceless and installing in them respect and confidence, Mayawati rule in UP has also brought about some concrete changes. Noted scholar Christophe Jaffrelot (‘The BSP in Uttar Pradesh: Whose Party is It?’ in S. M. Michael, ed., Dalits in Modern India: Vision and Values, 2007, p. 262.) acknowledged this when he said that Ambedkar Village Scheme under her government, gave special funds to socio-economic development of village which has 50 per cent SC population in which all 25, 434 villages were included.

Conclusion

Before I close, let me show my reservation to the title of this book. Badri Narayan has not done justice to call Kanshi Ram a ‘Leader of Dalits”. It is paradoxical that while the author appreciates his contribution through the book for mobilising masses and transforming the society, he, nevertheless, reduces him to the margin and pins a label of Dalit on him. As far I know no biography of Jawaharlal Nehru has been published with a title or subtitle that describes him as a “leader of Brahmins”. May this prejudice against Kanshi Ram be seen as a continuation of the hegemonic discourse in mainstream social sciences that often reduces Phule, Periyar, Ambedkar, Iqbal etc. as those who are expressing the sectional interests while it eulogises leaders like Gandhi and Nehru as those fighting for national interests? Unfortunately, Badri Narayan forgets to take heed to the insight of the radical turn in social sciences that questions the very idea of “core” and “periphery”, “centre” and “region”, “national” and “regional”, “universal” and “sectarian” or “sectional” etc. The radical scholars ably have shown that any category is constructed through the language and power and the talk of universalism, therefore, is often secretly coded in favour of the sectional interests.

Apart from this, the author has not properly spelt the name of Kanshi Ram in both title and the text. Badri Narayan has spelt “Kanshiram” in a single word, while his name should have been spelt as Kanshi Ram. He could have avoided this mistake if he had verified this from Parliament website or the official website of the BSP or “Chamcha Age”, which he has discussed in the book.

Abhay Kumar (debatingissues@gmail.com) is doing Ph.D at Centre for Historical Studies, JNU.

Five African novels to read before you die

December 1, 2014 by Nasheman

Odds were on for Kenyan author Ngugi wa Thiong’o winning the Nobel Prize this year. University of California/Ho/EPA

by Brendon Nicholls, The Conversation

There is a surfeit of book prizes. Big ones, small ones, ones that award experimental fiction, others that concentrate on female authors, or young authors, or authors from Ireland or Latin America. African literature is blossoming, and its prize culture is flourishing alongside. The Caine Prize is well-established, and the last few years have seen the establishment of the Mabati-Cornell Kiswahili Prize for work in African languages (announced on November 18), the Etisalat Prize for first time authors, and the South African Literary Awards.

None of these are recognised on a global level, and so people following this growing trend were excited when this year’s Nobel Prize for Literature re-ignited speculation that the Kenyan novelist Ngugi wa Thiong’o would receive the award. His fans reasoned that the recent death of Chinua Achebe might focus the minds of the Swedish Academy on their pioneering and accomplished, but now ageing, generation of African writers.

But it was not to be. So to partly address this yawning oversight, here’s a list of five of the greatest African novels:

1) Chinua Achebe, Things Fall Apart (1958)

Things Fall Apart comprehensively imagines how the Nigerian Igbo community functioned prior to colonialism. The divisions in this community accompany the tragic fall of the hero, Okonkwo, whose heroic but rash stand against colonialism ends in a lonely suicide. Achebe’s wisdom is sufficient to move readers beyond recriminations or historical blame, since the Igbo community adapts to accommodate Christianity and new forms of colonial governance. Just as the novel’s title quotes Yeats’ poem The Second Coming, Achebe’s African philosophy of balance in all things works towards a millennial partnership with Western modernity.

2) Ngugi wa Thiong’o, Petals of Blood (1977)

This is the great novel of African socialism. Petals of Blood reaches beyond its native Kenya to embrace the wider black histories of the Caribbean and the US. Drawing together four village outcasts – a teacher, an ex-Mau Mau soldier, a student teacher and a barmaid – the novel intertwines the characters’ memories and life-experiences to construct a shared communal past. Ngugi accumulates a deep communal history of colonial, multi-national capitalist, and post-Independence theft. Charting the development and decline of a single village from Edenic pastoral to apocalyptic disorder, Petals of Blood likens the endlessly regenerating African socialist struggle to the Biblical resurrection.

3) Ayi Kwei Armah, The Beautyful Ones are Not Yet Born (1968)

Armah’s novel reflects on the existential predicament of one honest man, a lone moral beacon in the corrupt last days of the Ghana’s Nkrumah regime. Amid the greed of all who chase the “gleam” of possessions and wealth, Armah’s unnamed man endures slights from his political friends and chastisement from his wife. When the Nkrumah government eventually falls, the man becomes the ironic saviour of those who have attempted to corrupt him. The man’s moral purposes become vindicated for a moment and they anticipate a future in which the “Beautyful Ones” will one day be born.

4) Tsitsi Dangarembga, Nervous Conditions (1988)

A young Rhodesian girl, Tambu, dreams of going to school in a family that favours her brother. Breaking with her female destiny to work in the fields and bear children, Tambu realises her ambition of attending her uncle’s mission school. But all is not well. Tambu’s cousin, Nyasha, is aware of the trap of a colonial education, which empowers individuals at the cost of their belonging to family and community. As Tambu’s dream materialises, Nervous Conditions charts Nyasha’s increasingly self-destructive eating disorder in a futile rebellion against patriarchy and history.

5) Bessie Head, Maru (1977)

A powerful love story written during Head’s exile from Apartheid South Africa. Margaret Cadmore is a young Masarwa (Bushman) woman adopted and educated by a British namesake. Margaret’s identity breaks the usual categories in the Botswanan village of Dilepe, where her people are slaves. Unknowingly, she inspires a deadly love-rivalry between two powerful men, Maru and his best friend Moleka. Maru defeats Moleka and kidnaps Margaret through the wiles of witchcraft and suggestion. His marriage to Margaret has the effect of freeing her people from slavery. However, in an unconscious room in her mind, Margaret continues to dream of Moleka.

These novels contain stories that Africans themselves want to tell, stories that imagine a world exceeding all expectation. Their world, it is true, contains its elements of suffering, but it also offers the surprises of triumph, community, magic, justice, philosophy, wisdom, humour and the habits of African dailiness.

In celebration of African literature, readers can judge for themselves which of these great novels merit plaudits and accolades. So this year, stop that desperate rifling through the Booker and Nobel lists to find something to buy distant relatives for Christmas. Your list is right here.

Brendon Nicholls is a Lecturer in African and Postcolonial Literatures at University of Leeds.

'Garm Hawa' – as timeless and relevant now as then

November 14, 2014 by Nasheman

The Mirza family of Garm Hawa, in 1973

by Subhash K. Jha

Very few Indian films have had the enduring impact of M S Sathyu’s “Garm Hawa”. This is the kind of rare cinema that serves the very core purpose of art. And now this tale of imperishable resonance comes to us in a restored digitally mastered avatar.

It stimulates the heart, stirs the soul, lifts the spirit and pricks the conscience. Dealing with Muslim pride and Islamic isolation during times of the stress and separation of the Partition, the relevance of “Garm Hawa” resonates to this day.

M S Sathyu’s “Garm Hawa” brought in furious winds of change in Hindi cinema and its approach and attitude to the theme of Muslim isolation in pre-Partition India. Though it is set in Agra just after the division of India into two separate countries, “Garm Hawa”, which re-released on Children’s Day Friday, doesn’t focus on the riots and bloodshed that followed the decisive moment in history.

Sathyu’s film, brilliantly written by Kaifi Azmi and Shama Zaidi, seeks to pin down the violence that the community experienced from within their own hearts and souls. That sense of agonised isolation when history seems to have betrayed a whole community and its people comes vividly alive in “Garm Hawa” as Salim Mirza (Balraj Sahni) watches his family torn apart as one by one they all leave, most of them across the border and a beloved daughter for the other world.

Heartbreak is a constant in the narration. But the sound of the broken heart is muffled in the aggressive voices of politicians and religious leaders seeking to establish their own self-interest in a nation that desperately needed selfless leaders in the post-Gandhian era.

“Garam Hawa” is as real as Indian cinema gets. The crowded mohallas and gallis of Agra are shot in documentary style. But the characters don’t seem to occupy that dispassionate space that documentaries are known to nurture.

We are without fuss taken into the world of Mirza’s family. We learn soon enough that Ameena (Geeta Siddharth) is the apple of Salim Mirza’s eyes. Co-writer Kaifi Azmi drew liberally from his own gentle and sensitive relationship with his daughter Shabana Azmi. And Balraj Sahni, that actor-extraordinaire who didn’t seem to be acting at all, drew from his own relationship with daughter Shabnam who, like Ameena in the film, committed suicide.

“Garm Hawa” is many things at the same time. It’s an evocative mirror of a people who chose to stay on when the land was divided. The film is also a love story. It is the intense tragic story of Ameena’s two aborted relationships, first with her cousin Kazim(Jamal Hashmi) , her childhood sweetheart who’s stolen away by Pakistan, and then her ardent suitor Shamshad(Jalal Agha) who leaves the country promising to return but never does. The second betrayal kills Ameena.

Finally , in a bizarre evocation of Agatha Christie’s “And Then There None”, Salim is left in India with only his wife and younger son, the rebellious Sikandar(Farouq Shaikh) who refuses to leave India for “greener pastures”(read: Pakistan).

The film ends on a note of heart-wrenching optimism when Salim Mirza changes his mind at the last minute about leaving the country.

Balraj Sahni as Salim Mirza gives what many film experts consider the one single-most flawless performance in the history of Hindi cinema. He gets into the skin of his character and inhabits the inner-most recesses of Salim Mirza’s soul. You really don’t see Balraj Sahni on the screen. You see this Muslim patriarch of a disintegrating family who never stops believing his God even when He seems busy elsewhere.

“Garm Hawa” is not just a cinematic experience. It is much more. It is a treatise on life’s most precious emotions. Unfiltered, raw and still hurting.

(IANS)

Book describes the Urdu literary culture of North Indian cities

November 11, 2014 by Nasheman

Dilli ke na the kuche/ Auraq-e-mussavir the. Jo shakl nazar aayi/ Tasveer nazar aayi.

(It wasn’t the lanes and streets of Delhi: It was the pages of an album. Each and every face that one saw Was a painting.) – Mir Taqi Mir

The thriving Urdu literary culture of 18th and 19th century in North Indian cities of Delhi and Lucknow that remained vigorous and resilient even at the face of glaring defeat in 1857 at the hands of ‘Company Bahadur’ is the subject of the book ‘The Sun That Rose from the Earth’ by noted Urdu poet and critic Shamsur Rahman Faruqi.

Only last month, his earlier book The Mirror of Beauty, also describing the high Urdu literary culture of 19th century, was long-listed for the prestigious USD 50,000 DSC Prize for South Asian Literature.

First published in the Urdu as ‘Savaar aur Doosre Afsaane’ in 2001 and translated in English by Faruqi himself, the book is a collection of five stories written between 1999-2012, all having a similar quest, “to rehabilitate in people’s mind ,” as Faruqi himself puts it, “the vigour and resilience of Urdu poetry amidst decaying imperial Mughal rule.”

Although fictional, the stories are replete with historical figures of Urdu literature like Mirza Ghalib, Mir Taqi Mir, Shaikh Mushafi, Budh Singh Qalandar, Kanji Mal Saba, and are set in the historical background of 18-19th century, some in the immediate aftermath of the calamity of 1857, thus placing the book in the category of historical fiction.

The stories are woven around the historical personage of these towering Urdu poets, and represent a quest for mastering the nuances and subtleties of their poetry. Faruqi, the noted Urdu literary critic is never missed in these stories, and often the protagonists of his stories not only chase, idealise and romanticise these great poets, but also discuss and critique them.

These Urdu poets, whose verses and shadows loom large in his stories, are drawn from a diverse Hindu-Muslim background to deconstruct the popular notion that equates Urdu with the language of Muslims. Budh Singh Qalandar, Kanji Mal Saba, Ikhlas were all Hindus.

“Urdu was not the property of Muslims alone,” says Faruqi, as he laments its association in the 20th century with the language of the Muslim Lashkar (army), or the language that caused partition.

(PTI)

Book Excerpt: Iqbal: The Life of a Poet, Philosopher and Politician

November 8, 2014 by Nasheman

by Zafar Anjum

In a wide green field, a crowd chases a pretty, white pigeon. The pigeon circles above the heads of the chasing party. The crowd, in a mad dash, tries to capture the bird in flight. Now the bird flies high and now it descends down, teasing those who are sprinting after it. At last the pigeon swoops down into the lap of a tall and handsome 40-year-old man who accepts it as a gift from the heavens.

Shaikh Noor Muhammad, the man dreaming this dream, wakes up with a smile in a house near Do Darwaza Mosque in Kashmiri Mohalla in Sialkot, a border town of the Punjab located by the Chenab river, at the foot of the Kashmir hills.

It is a cold night in early November and he sees his wife Imam Bibi sleeping peacefully next to him under a warm blanket. She is expecting again and he interprets the dream to be a divine indication that he will be blessed with a son whose good fortune it will be to serve mankind.

The tall Kashmiri Noor Muhammad, red of skin and with a penetrating gaze, is known for his simplicity in the community. He has a peaceful and aff ectionate nature. When he was growing up, he could not study at the maktab, the local school; but this did not stop him from teaching himself the alphabets. Because of his own efforts he becomes literate and is able to read books in Urdu and Persian.

He is the eleventh child of his father, Shaikh Muhammad Rafiq, the only child to have survived from his father’s second wife. After him, another son, Ghulam Muhammad, was born. He grew up to be an overseer in the department of canals in the British government.

Noor Muhammad and his family have always lived together with his younger brother Ghulam Muhammad’s family. The house near the Do Darwaza Mosque was bought in 1861 by their father Muhammad Rafiq and they have been living in this house ever since. It has been expanded over time to accommodate new members of the family.

Noor Muhammad loves to spend a good deal of his time among sufis and Islamic scholars. By virtue of keeping such pious company, he has come to have a good grasp of Shariat and Tariqat. His knowledge of tasawwuf (mysticism) is so deep that his friends call him Anpadh Falsafi (Untutored Philosopher). He regularly studies and recites the Quran which he considers to be the ultimate source of all bliss, worldly and for the hereafter.

By profession, he is a tailor and embroiderer. In his early career, he helped his father, Shaikh Muhammad Rafiq, in his dhassa and loi (blankets and shawls) business but when an official rents him a Singer sewing machine, a mechanical marvel of its time, he turns to tailoring. His wife, Imam Bibi, disapproves of the sewing machine when she learns that the machine was bought with illicit money. Noor Muhammad returns the machine to the official and he strikes out on his own as a cap embroiderer, and makes Muslim prayer caps. The enterprise becomes a success and soon he employs other workmen in his workshop. By virtue of his popular merchandise, people start addressing him as Shaikh Natthu Topianwale. In the later stages of his life, he slowly loses interest in his business and takes a deeper interest in mysticism. He ignores his business and, with time, his business suffers decline.

Noor Muhammad’s is a family of migrants in Sialkot. What he has heard is that his ancestors came from an old Kashmiri Brahmin family. One of his early ancestors, a Kashmiri Pandit, converted to Islam in the fifteenth century. His gotra was Sapru.

Even Noor Muhammad doesn’t know how or why his family moved from Kashmir to Sialkot. But he has heard stories of migration from his father and from his grandfather. These are not very appealing stories. These are stories of poverty, desperation, and struggle.

His elders tell him that in the five thousand year old history of Kashmir, twenty-one Hindu families ruled over that famed piece of paradise on earth. Droughts, floods, palace intrigues, and civil war weakened this Hindu dominance in the eleventh and twelfth centuries. Finally, Zulqadir Khan Tatari’s invasion finished the last family of Hindu rulers.

When Muslims became predominant in Kashmir in the thirteenth century, the Brahmins of the province did not pay much attention to the knowledge or languages of Muslims. The bias reflected a kind of social obscurantism among the Brahmins who considered Persian the language of the malechch and prevented their community members from studying Persian or working for the government of the Muslim rulers. Those who defied this social practice were disowned by the community.

However, Kashmir’s Sultan Zainul Abidin Budshah (who ruled between 1420 and 1470 AD) encouraged Hindus to study Persian and allocated many scholarships and allowances for Hindu students. The first group of Brahmins in Kashmir who courted the Persian language and literature (which had become the court language in 1298) and earned the trust of their Muslim rulers were called Saprus. This word denotes a person who starts reading early. For Kashmiri Brahmins, the word Sapru became a derogatory expression, used to describe fellow Brahmins who had left behind their customs to embrace Islamic languages and knowledge. Slowly, as the category Sapru crystallized into a gotra in the Kashmiri Hindu community.

One of Noor Muhammad’s early ancestors, known as Hazrat Baba Lol Hajj or Loli Haji (Lover of Hajj) was one of Kashmir’s famous sages. According to Kashmiri folklore, he performed Hajj several times on foot, and came to be known as Lol Hajj. He belonged to a village called Chaku Bargana Aadoon. For twelve years, he stayed outside Kashmir and trekked from country to country. It is said that he had left Kashmir because he did not enjoy cordial relations with his wife. According to one legend, he was cross-eyed and bow-legged and hence a target of his wife’s derision. Heartbroken, Baba not only left his family but also gave up on the world and turned into a mystic.

When he came back to Kashmir, he received a divine signal to become a disciple of a sufi pir named Hazrat Baba Nasruddin. Nasruddin, in turn, was a disciple of Hazrat Nooruddin Wali. Baba Lol Hajj spent the rest of his life in the company of Baba Nasruddin and he is buried close to his master’s grave.

Noor Muhammad does not know exactly when his ancestors migrated from Kashmir to Sialkot. This migration most probably happened towards the end of the eighteenth century or in the early nineteenth century. This was the time when Afghan power was declining in Kashmir and Sikh power was on the rise. The Sikhs, having established rule in Punjab, drove out the Afghans from Kashmir with the help of Raja Gulab Singh. Between 1837–39, Gulab Singh extended his rule by seizing Ladakh and Baltistan from Tibet. Seven years later, the Sikhs lost Kashmir to the British in the Anglo–Sikh wars. Raja Gulab Singh offered the British 750,000 pounds (Rs 75 lakhs) to continue ruling Kashmir. In 1846, the two parties signed the Treaty of Amritsar—Kashmir was made an independent state under Raja Gulab Singh.

Sikh rule over Kashmir (1819–1864) inaugurated a tragic phase for Kashmiris. After the Treat of Amritsar, the Dogra rulers who now possessed the state ‘set upon a policy of unlimited cruelty on the helpless Kashmiris, with the result that many Kashmiri families migrated from Kashmir to the Punjab.’ The Sikhs had treated Kashmiris like animals. For instance, if a Sikh murdered a Kashmiri, he was legally bound to pay a fine to the state which ranged between sixteen and twenty rupees. Four rupees were paid to the family of the victim if he was a Hindu and two rupees were paid to the victim’s family if he was a Muslim. The local people were burdened by heavy taxes. To escape their dire situation, many migrated to Punjab in a state of penury. In those days, the punishment for cow slaughter was hanging by death. If a Muslim was found to have slaughtered a cow, he would be dragged through the streets of Srinagar and then be hanged or burnt unto death. In 1831, during the reign of Kanwar Sher Singh, a deadly drought reduced the local population from eight to two lakhs.

Fleeing such painful circumstances, one of the migrants was either Noor Muhammad’s great-grandfather, Shaikh Jamaluddin, or his four sons, namely, Shaikh Abdurrehman, Shaikh Muhammad Ramzan, Shaikh Muhammad Rafiq, and Shaikh Abdullah. It is also possible that Shaikh Jamaluddin, along with his four sons, migrated to the Punjab through Jammu. Of the four brothers, three lived in Sialkot and Shaikh Abdullah lived in Mauza Jaith Eke.

Noor Muhammad’s wife Imam Bi was known as Beji amongst the relatives. She comes from a Kashmiri family from a village in Sialkot district. She is illiterate but god-fearing and devout, and is very particular about performing namaz. She takes care of the household affairs and folks in the neighbourhood respect her because of her helpful nature. Even though she is a housewife, she is a bit of a social worker. She can’t help but settle neighbourhood disputes and when her friends ask her to keep their cash or ornaments in her safe custody she takes on this responsibility gladly. She also secretly helps the poor in her locality. It is no surprise that their son Shaikh Ata Muhammad teases her by saying that she practices gupt daan, secret donations.

Now that Imam Bi is pregnant again, Noor Muhammad wonders if it will be a boy or a girl this time. His dream of a pigeon falling into his lap gives him the intuition that this child will bring him good luck and will make a name for himself and his family.

Noor Muhammad closes his eyes and prays to Allah for his child’s safe delivery and survival. Imam Bi and he had lost a child during childbirth earlier.

He recalls an incident that marks a painful phase in his family’s history. It so happened that his brother had only girls, no boys. But like most mothers, his brother’s wife desired boys too. Once, both Imam Bi and Ghulam’s wife got pregnant nearly at the same time. Imam Bi gave birth to a boy whereas Ghulam’s wife had a baby girl. Imam Bi knew that her sister-in-law had desired a male child. To cheer up her sister-in-law, she suggested an exchange of babies. The swapping of babies took place but unfortunately the male child died within a few months. Imam Bi bowed her head before Allah’s will and returned the girl child to her sister-in-law.

On Friday, November 9, 1877, when the dawn is yet to break, Noor Muhammad and Imam Bi are blessed with a son in one of the dark and narrow rooms of their house. Remembering his dream, Noor Muhammad names him Muhammad Iqbal, indicating luck and fortune.

Noor Muhammad beams with happiness when he holds Iqbal in his hands for the first time. The cute little thing is fair, bonny, and ruddy like a cherry. With the tender love of a father, he kisses the boy on his forehead, folds him in a rug carefully, and returns him to his smiling mother. It is time for the fajr prayers and he needs this moment to thank Allah for this beautiful gift.

This is an excerpt from ‘Iqbal’ by Zafar Anjum: http://bit.ly/1xwmLht