Tales from Two Tragedies

My Feudal Lord by Tehmina Durrani, Corgi Books, 1995

A Thousand Splendid Sons by Khaled Hosseini, Bloomsbury, 2007

Tehmina Durrani’s memoir of her life with one of Pakistan’s most powerful politicians of the 70s, Gulam Mustafa Khar was not so much a devastating indictment of women’s role in Muslim societies – as the blurb says - but more an exposure of the way politics is played out in South Asian countries, in which the personal rarely impinges the public persona of important politicians. But Durrani must be credited for exposing the shenanigans of such a powerful feudal-politician and - one must credit Pakistan itself for the irony – be alive to tell her story!

What distinguishes the story firstly, is the sheer physical courage of T.D., considering the times the book deal with, the seventies in which the whole of South Asia was in turmoil. This was also the time when Pakistan – or at least very important sections of its ruling elites - began its dalliance with the forces of intolerance. Secondly, the complete openness with which she has disclosed the events in her life, including the fearless admission of her own faults and foibles, misjudgements and the compromises she had to make to safeguard her position. T.D. is so brutally open about crucial events in her life - her decision to leave her first husband Anees for GMK, her secret rendezvous with the “Lion of Punjab”, her initial romance ending in betrayal, the repeated physical abuse suffered at her husband’s hands followed by her shocking return to his embrace to suffer repeated cycles of thrashing – that the book is worth a read for her honesty alone.

Read the reasons she gives for breaking her relationship with Anees: “I now viewed my husband as inconsequential. Try as I might, I had no faith in his abilities and little respect for his intellect. I felt that he lacked the necessary drive and ambition to enhance his career and I was constantly badgering him and questioning his decisions. And yet I did not want a marriage like my parents. I needed a strong man who could manage his own professional life without my interference. I was weakened by my attachment to Anees, because he carried no weight to strengthen me.” Read along to find out her future projections of life with GMK, “I mused, Mustafa and I were two intermeshing spirits. We were both loners, who felt misunderstood. Ours, I decided, were artistic souls, struggling to find a cause to which we could commit ourselves. ........ I wanted to help him dismantle the face of ruthlessness and callousness erected around him.” All the hallmarks of female fallibility, a misogynist would jump to point out! She, however, confesses that in her heightened, emotional state, she felt the journey had just begun.

T.D. comes clean on the cruelty of GMK in his political life too. One of the first acts of GMK as Governor of Punjab was to crush the student protest of the 70s. He had the students arrested, paraded them naked on the streets and even let the policemen sodomise them. The other picture of GMK which emerges is the venality which was ingrained in him, be it in his treatment of women – he married six times and came very close to marrying TD’s half-sister – or the treachery he perfected and the political positions he changed. Curiously enough, she offers an explanation for GMK’s conduct towards women: “He resented women from our social background and made it his mission to subjugate them. He disguised his class envy by assuming a feudal air. His political idealism was merely an attempt to gain access to our class and that his concern for the poor and downtrodden was a sham. In truth, it was a manifestation of his hatred for the elite. He wanted to demolish the structure that ridiculed his origins and laughed at his lack of breeding and style. Women were his obvious victims. He was out to destroy us.” This is a hackneyed attempt to locate personal conduct of powerful men to their social origins alone neglecting the permissiveness of political and social milieu in which they live. The blame must be shared by those who allow such men to walk on the stage.

There is an Indian connection too to this story. After the military coup of 1977, GMK was exiled under suspicious circumstances. The rumour doing the rounds was that he had come to an understanding with the military to gather the support of PPP exiles to the side of the army. Once in U.K., his prescription for Pak’s illness changed dramatically. He wanted the Pak army to suffer a debilitating defeat so that it stood discredited in the eyes of the common folks of his country and the people turn to saviours like him. As TD informs us, GMK visited India secretly to convince Indira Gandhi but her assassination put paid to his ambition. Rajiv never entertained him once he took over power after his mother’s death.

Despite all his somersaults, GMK could still return from exile to become a federal minister in the Benazir Government! Benazir herself enacted a reply of it in 2008 but with tragic consequences for her and her family.

Another story which portrays a greater tragedy unravelling in Pakistan’s neighbouring country, Afghanistan, is Khaled Hosseini’s “A Thousand Splendid Suns”. Narrated through the experience of Mariam, a daughter born out of wedlock to a small businessman in Herat, who is married at 15 to a Shoe maker 30 years older whose “raspy voice reminded her of the sound of dry autumn leaves crushed underfoot”. There are poetic descriptions of ordinary events like this one when Mariam recalls the summer night at her village in Gul Daman, Herat, “the night so hot their shirts would cling to their chests like a wet leaf to a window”; the eye for detail when Mariam describes the scene after husband’s Eid party with friends, “the overturned cups, the half-chewed pumpkin seeds stashed between mattresses, the plates crusted with the outline of last night’s meal” and the pithy but accurate salvo on her relationship with Rashid, “an unloved marriage, where the coupling with husband was still an exercise in tolerating pain”

Mariam’s tragic life mirrors the tragedy of her country itself, which all begun on April 17, 1978 when the Khalq faction of PDPA, the Communist party of Afghanistan captured power in putsch. The life of Mariam passes through all the travails her country had gone through, Soviet invasion, Mujahideen resistance, the civil war after soviet withdrawal and the Taliban takeover. There could not have been a better example of the way an individual is corrupted by the all-round lawlessness which grips a society than the conduct of Rashid as he marries Laila, who is suddenly orphaned and comes under the roof of Mariam. The reason he gives in support of his proposal in the face of opposition from Mariam is cruel but it reflects the tragic state of affairs of Afghanistan, “She can leave. I won’t stand in her way. But I suspect she won’t get far. No food, no water; not a rupiah in her pockets, bullets and rockets flying everywhere. How many days do you suppose she’ll last before she’s abducted, raped or tossed into some roadside ditch with her throat slit? Or all three? The roads there are unforgiving. Mariam believe me. Blood hounds and bandits at every turn. Let’s say that by some miracle she gets to Peshawar. What then? Do you have any idea what those camps are like? Of course she would keep warm in one of those Peshawar brothels.” Not just perched on the cliff but a fall into the deep sea or an act of rescue by a devil!

The Mujahideen (Holy Warriers) thrived in this state of anarchy and brought in a new act of cruelty which was hitherto unheard of. Rasheed says of the Mujahideen’s methods of fighting the civil war: “The Mujahideen drag boys right off the streets. And when soldiers from a rival militia capture these boys, they torture them. I heard they electrocute them, that they crush their balls with pliers. They make the boys lead them to their homes. Then they break in, kill their fathers, rape their sisters and mothers.” No surprise when the Taliban marched into Kabul, the people welcomed with open arms!

After a titanic struggle which sees Mariam kill her husband, Rasheed and getting captured by the Taliban police, Laila with Zalmai – Mariam-Tariq’s child – is reunited with Tariq in Muree, Pakistan. But Mariam’s country awaits deliverance, from the Americans, Pakistanis and more importantly, from her own countrymen - drug lords, freedom fighters and the lackeys who run the country at the behest of foreign rulers.

Book Review

The City of Joy by Dominique Lapierre, ARROW BOOKS first published in 1986

No Full Stops in India by Mark Tully, Penguin Books published in 1991

Nine Lives – In Search of the Sacred in Modern India by William Dalrymple, Bloomsbury published in 2009

These three books published over a period of twenty five years could be read as a continuing narrative of Europeans at discovering the much eulogised – some would say stereotyped, cliché ridden and over - hyped – “real India”, which one must admit, many westernised, English educated and “Modern Indians” might wish does not exist; and indeed most of them even hope would soon be erased from the social landscape as it contains within itself all that is retrograde which impede the progress of the nation. Though not devoid of faults, especially in their enthusiasm for upholding the innate wisdom of the poor and deprived, these authors do not view the poor in condescending light and proffer solutions to their plight by advocating an early embrace of modernism. Their descriptions of the poor and the lives they live are largely sympathetic. In fact, these authors do suggest that the poor should be allowed to come out with their own solutions with minimal assistance by the do-gooders.

City of Joy is a narrative of the lives of people in a slum in Calcutta – now Kolkata – “ Anand Nagar” as experienced by the catholic priest Stephen Kovalski. Belonging to a family of coal miners in the Polish city of Krasnik in southern Poland, young Stephen was witness to strikes by miners, accidents, violence and death. All this happened in his life too, after the family migrated to southern France. But, what exactly prompted him to be a missionary? The suicide of his father and the desire to achieve by other means what he had attempted to accomplish by violence. And, what made him to decide to live in a slum in a poor country like India. His home was a gathering place for many North Africans, Senegalese, Turks and Yugoslavs. Once a Senegalese had challenged him, “You’ve always been saying you’re close to us, but do you really know anything about us? Why don’t you go and live in an African shantytown?” The die was cast.

What about Anand Nagar? “Three hundred thousand people stranded in this mirage city” is how the author describes it; and it was the world’s densest human habitation. The author’s description of the social geography of a slum is very accurate when he writes, “A slum was not exactly a shantytown. It was more like a sort of poverty-stricken industrial suburb inhabited by refugees from rural areas. Everything in these slums combined to drive their inhabitants to abjection and despair: shortage of work and chronic unemployment, appallingly low wages, the inevitable child labour, the impossibility of saving, debt that could never be redeemed, the mortgaging of personal possessions and their ultimate loss sooner or later. They also had to contend with the total lack of any reserve food stocks and the necessity to buy in minimum quantities – ten pice worth of salt, 20 pice worth of wood, one match, a spoonful of sugar – and the total absence of privacy with ten or twelve people sharing a single room.” But was it only poverty and squalor which characterised the slums? No says the author. “the miracle of these concentration camps was that the accumulation of disastrous elements was counter-balanced by other factors that allowed their inhabitants not merely to remain fully human but even to transcend their condition and become models of humanity.”

What are these positive factors? “The people in these slums actually put love and mutual support into practice. They know how to be tolerant of all creeds and castes, how to give respect to a stranger, how to show charity towards beggars, cripples, lepers and even the insane. Here the weak were helped, not trampled upon; Orphans were instantly adopted by their neighbours and old people were cared for and revered by their children.” Most of these features are absent in urban and modern lives, but still we feel more civilized their our counterparts in these decrepit dwellings!

The rest of the book is an elaboration of these basic features of slum life, which one must say, is not without its share of mutual suspicion, treachery, conflicts, violence and even death. But the people and characters inhabiting anand nagar such as Hazari Pal, the proud Bengali peasant who moves to the streets of Kolkata to be a rickshaw puller, Selima, the Muslim woman with four children living in the ‘house’ adjacent to Stephen’s, the Hindu priest from distant Tamil Nadu who also acts as a match-maker, the selfless Bandona, who stands besides the missionary in all his difficulties, the lepers who inhabit the secluded, outlying areas of this slum, the eunuchs who come home only at night..... are the ones who pass in front of us for a fleeting moment. They are not the ones with whom we interact intimately or even attempt to do so. But their lives, like ours, are inhabited by wives, husbands, children, relations, friends, enemies, festivities, marriages and death. Though living under extremely frightening conditions, their lives may look different to us, but the humanity which resides in them is not dissimilar to ours. Perhaps, this is the lesson one carries after finishing this deeply disturbing, yet at the same time a very enchanting book!

William Dalrymple sets out explore the role of religion in modern India and the challenges posed by modernity to religious life in the country. In his own words, Dalrymple seeks to answer questions such as, “What changes and what remains the same? How is each specific religious path surviving the changes India is currently undergoing?” and the big, but the old, tired question, “Does India still offer any sort of real spiritual alternative to materialism, or is it now just another fast developing satrap of the wider capitalist world?” These questions are sought to be answered through an exploration of the unique lives lived by seven Indians. What did he find these holy men concerned about? Dalrymple found the holy men discussing and agonising over the same eternal quandaries that absorbed the holy men of classical India, thousands of years ago: the quest for material success and comfort against the claims of the life of the spirit; the call of the life of action against the life of contemplation; the way of stability against the lure of the open road; personal devotion against conventional or public religion; textual orthodoxy against emotional appeal of mysticism; the age old war of duty and desire.

The nine lives explored range from a wandering Jain nun, a theyyam dancer of Kerala, a temple dancer in Karnataka, Phad singer of Rajasthan, a Sufi saint, a Buddhist monk, a Tamil idol maker, a tantric and a Baul singer. Dalrymple quite often succeeds in connecting the ideology informing the religious lives of these practioners with the actual lives led by them. One example being his reconciliation of the life of the Jain nun with her religious ideology. The Jains, Dalrymple informs us, conceive of karma as a fine material substance that physically attaches itself to the soul, polluting and obscuring its potential for bliss by weighing it down with pride, anger, delusion and greed, and so preventing it from reaching its ultimate destination at the summit of the universe. To gain final liberation, you must live life in a way that stops you accumulating more karma, while wiping clean the karma you have accumulated in previous lives. Dalrymple recollects the wandering num telling him, “How the people think of our lives as harsh. But going into the unknown world and confronting it without a single rupee in our pockets means that differences between rich and poor, educated and illiterate, all vanish, and a common humanity emerges. As wanderers, we monks and nuns are free of shadows from the past. This wandering life, with no material possessions, unlocks our souls. There is a wonderful sense of lightness, living each day as it comes, with no sense of ownership, no weight, no burden. Journey and destination became one; thought and action became one, until it is as if we are moving like a river into complete detachment.” One may question such forms of detachment helping the advancement of goals of modern societies, but the correlation helps us in understanding the secluded lives lived by the Jain saints.

Another chapter which is of interest is the “The maker of Idols”. Dalrymple’s quickly captures the distinct landscape of the Kaveri delta when he says that there are few places in the world where landscape and divinity are more closely linked than in southern India, where each village hosts innumerable gods, goddesses and spirits. He also acknowledges the fact that there are few sculptors who have achieved the pure essence of sensuality evoked by the Chola sculptors, who have celebrated the beauty of human body. What function does the eroticism of these idols perform in the sensual lives of its devotees? William relates how the last act of the priests, before they close the doors of the inner shrine, is to remove the nose jewel of the bronze idol of Shiva’s consort lest the rubbing of it irritate her husband whey they make love. This removal ensures the preservation and regeneration of the universe. This was nearly 1000 years before Sigmund Freud’s birth!

The religious sect which lives closest to its professed beliefs is that of the Bauls. The Bauls believe that God is found not in a stone or bronze idol; or in the heavens, or even in the afterlife, but in the present moment, in the body of the man or woman who seeks the truth; all that is required is that you give up your possessions, take up the life of the road, find a guru and adhere to the path of love. This profession is similar to the wandering Jain nun, Red fairy and Ma Tara described in the book. One is, therefore, tempted to assume that this tradition of careless abandonment is the dominant religious tradition of the country. If the wandering Jain nun, Red fairy and the Bauls represent the spiritual dimension of the religious practices in the country, what are the material dimensions of these traditions? Like the slum dwellers of Kolkata, this tradition must manifest in actually putting love and mutual support into practice. We must know how to be tolerant of all creeds and castes, how to give respect to a stranger, how to show charity towards beggars, cripples, lepers and even the insane..

Mark Tully riles egalitarianism for most of the ills afflicting India. The journalist in him quickly grasps the basic malady when he says that the people the poor have elected have ‘ruled’ rather than ‘represented’ them. His solution is that India should not ape the west and it must keep its genius intact. He approvingly quotes Mahatma Gandhi as saying, “My Swaraj is to keep intact the genius of our civilization. I want to write many new things but they must all be written on the Indian slate. I would gladly borrow from the West when I can return the amount with decent interest. And, again Tully quotes Radhakrishnan writing, “The characteristic genius of the Indian mind is not to shake the beliefs of the common man but to lead them by stages to the understanding of the deeper philosophical meaning behind their beliefs”

Some would argue that this is dangerous irredentism; falling back on social structures which are oppressive, just because the new paradigms are not working or not working well enough to benefit everybody. Perhaps one must distinguish between the ‘benevolent old” and the “malevolent old” just as one could easily differentiate between the “benevolent new” and the “malevolent new”. Mark Tully narrates stories in which both kinds of the old have clearly survived. If the “Kumbh Mela” is of the former kind, “Deorala Sati” is of the malevolent kind. The message seems to be that the past would consume us if the present practices fall short of people’s expectations.

Mark Tully also alludes to the fact that age old religious practices such as attending a “Kumbh Mela” could fulfil modern needs. He poses this question to Sant Bax Singh, the former M.P. of Allahabad and elder brother of V.P. Singh, at the Kumbh mela: “Would it be right to say that bathing in the Ganges is like a sacrament – an outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual grace?” To which Sant Bux replies: “The needs of an Indian or any human being, are the material plus something else. For the pilgrims, the Ganges washes away all sins. Krishna lived on the banks of the Jamuna and made the greatest love ever made; beyond both sin and love is wisdom and that is what the invisible Saraswati represents. A bathe fulfils an inner need without the need of a psychoanalyst.” There could not have been a better defence of the Kumbh!

Mark Tully carries forward the concept of accepting the poor as they are and empowering them to solve their problems themselves. After witnessing the squalor and chaos just outside his hotel, he writes: “When faced with the poverty of India, the temptation is to despair. I have always tried to guard against that. It is futile and does not help the poor. Despair is also frightening when you love the person or the country you despair of. The strength of India lies in the resilience of the poor. They are to be admired, not pitied. The poor may be fatalists, but that does not mean they have despaired. “ It is in this never say die spirit of the poor to live that the policy makers administrators and the assorted NGOs must find sustenance for their upliftment.

At the end of the story about the tribal artist who has made it big in Bhopal after he was discovered by the Artist Jagdish Swaminathan, Tully quotes Verrier Elwin, the Anthropologist to describe the existence of an old world in Central India: “Amid the weary decline of the great Gond race, he (the Pradhan) still stands out, jovial, original and witty. While the Gond now thinks the sum of human ambition is to be a railway clerk, an Excise Inspector, the Pradhan still believes that life itself matters more than life’s achievements, that a poem is more important than a file, that to know how to make love to your wife is a much more important bit of knowledge than how to read or write”

Both the Mr. Chidambaram and the Naxalites must read Verrier Elwin!

J I L L U

Just outside the window, a streak of black cloud was visible over the horizon. Aathma closed the window. It is going to come. By their estimates, it is going to rain that evening. They must start before it starts raining. He looked at Nithya. She was packing her clothes into the suite case.

“Quick Nithya”

“What to take and what to leave?”

“Take only the most essential. For all the three of us put together, we are allowed to carry only eight kilos.”

“What is essential?”

He had only one answer to that question, “Life”. Nothing is required at all. A new beginning could be made.

Aathma patiently gleaned through the hall. It had collections of fifteen years of married life. Articles which gave him happiness, news, knowledge and love. The speakers stood silently on either of the Stereo set. On the coloured jackets were frozen hours of music. Beethoven, Bach, Hariprasad Chourasia, none of these is required now. Nearby, stood the typewriter. Hmm, this is not the time to compose poetry. The Shelf was staked with books. Could I carry some of them? But what? “Research in Tholkappiam?”, “Temple poems of Pandya country?”, “New Poetry – Four Essays?”, “Research in Tamil Folklore?”, “Bible?”, “Thirukkural?” What to choose? All these are noise, nothing but pure noise.

“Bombs thrown set the roofs ablaze,

Children and Elderly die in heaps,

This is a everyday pastime”

“Bastards!” Aathma abused none in particular.

“What books to take?”

“Take anything to read on the journey”

“Tell me what, quickly” asked Nithya raising her voice.

Aathma looked at the bookshelf again. He picked up the “Rani” magazine and said, “this is enough.”

“What to do with the jewels?”

“Wear all of them. We can sell them there and buy vegetables there.”

Nithya looked disturbingly at him.

“For each of us I have placed three sets of dress. For Kumar I have a sweater.”

“What is so big there?”

“That is our marriage photo album. I don’t have the heart to leave it behind.”

Aathma opened it. He was very lean and Nithya looked like a doll. His heart smiled. “When I touched you for the first time, you quivered.”

Nithya did not pay heed to his comments. She complained, “There aren’t enough locks. We have only four.”

“Why, locks?” Aathma asked in surprise.

“Don’t we have to lock our house?”

Clapping his hands, Aathma laughed, “Fool, there is no need to lock. There will be none to steal. Everything, Refrigerator, T.V., Radio, Chairs, Books, Guitar, the Elephant Doll, everything will be left here. For the next hundred years, they will all be here. They will glimmer in the glow of Alpha and Beta rays.”

Nithya stayed quiet for some time and then asked, “Aathma, where are we going really?”

“Who knows? They say, it is Arabic Ocean. Minnicoy Islands, Anadamans, they would take us in the opposite direction to the winds.”

“Do we have to go to Bombay first?”

“Bombay? You Stupid. Bombay has gone to dust. There is nobody there. There is a gigantic fungal umbrella over Bombay. Madras, Delhi, Calcutta are all gone. We escaped because I got transferred to this small town. We will keep running against the rain, it is all luck.”

“It it good to survive?”

“That’s a good question, but I don’t have the answer. Where is Kumar?”

“He is playing out there.”

Kumar came running with bated breath and announced excitedly, “Look, seven helicopters have arrived, all at once.” Both rushed out to the balcony. They saw those giant insects touching the ground down and coming to a screeching halt.

“Nithya, they have come. Pack quickly.” ordered Aathma.

“Papa, are we going by helicopter?” asked Kumar.

“Yes. Dear.”

“Where are we going?” persisted Kumar.

“To a distant place”

“Is the School closed?”

“From now on, it is going to be holidays forever.”

“When would we return?”

“We won’t.”

“Why?”

“Because, Do you know Pakistan? Pakistan and China together have fought with us and in the war a large number of people have been killed. Only we are alive.” Aathma’s voice was half-filled with anger and exasperation.

Nithya asked from inside, “Is it at all necessary to tell all this to the child?”

“He must know, Nithya.”

“Then, why do we go to our native place?” asked Kumar after giving some thought to his father’s explanation.

“The crackers burnt by them have let out a huge quantity of poison gas and the gas is fast approaching us.”

“Did we not shoot at them?”

“Yes, we also did. It is like crackers during Diwali. We have also burnt Karachi, Lahore, Rawalpindi and Beijing.”

“Why we have stopped doing that?”

“Because the crackers have run out of stock.”

“Once we reach our native place, get me some bombs.”

“What bombs?”

“Atom Bombs.”

“You must be a leader.” Aathma laughingly said.

“Kumar, Did you collect your items?” asked Nithya.

“Yes” he said, pointing out his School bag. It had a writing stick, eraser, rope of spinning top, stamps, labels of match boxes and glass balls.

“Is that all?”

“Only this much, Amma. Because we need to take Jillu too.”

“What? Do you want to take Jillu too?”

The moment it heard its name being pronounced, Jillu lying beneath the Cot, woke up from its sleep and came running towards Kumar with its ears raised and by wagging its tail.

“Jillu, shake hands with me.” Jillu raised one of its front legs.

“Jillu walk.” It walked on its rear legs a few steps.

With dark eyes and all kinds of smells on its body, this little doll was a springing ball of happiness.

Kumar subjected it to affectionate torture. He lifted it on its ears, its rear legs; but the dog played with him unmindful of all the trouble. There were two kids in that house.

“JilluJilluJillu.... Papa, we are going to take Jillu along with us?”

“No we are not.”

“But Amma said we could.”

“Amma lied. Look Kumar. There wouldn’t be enough space for people even. They won’t allow dogs to come in.”

Kumar started to cry embracing Jillu. “I am not coming.”

“You must come. There won’t be a soul here in this town.”

“Me and Jillu will stay. You both go.”

Nithya intervened. “Why, what is the matter? Why are you crying Kumar?”

“Amma! Appa says Jillu cannot come with us.”

“Who said that? We are definitely going to take Jillu with us. You go in.”

Kumar though unsure about the fate of Jillu, wiped his tears and went in taking Jillu along. Aathma could see through the balcony a queue of people lining in front of the resting helicopters.

“Why did you lie to the kid? You know very well that they won’t allow dogs to be taken along.”

“Why reveal it at this time. I thought I could somehow convince him at the time of boarding. You broke the story before.”

“No, Nithya. We must prepare him for such disappointments. We should not keep supplying him with dreams. He must know what contemporary worlds is all about? He must have the strength of character to understand it.”

“Hmm.. Does a seven year old kid need all this tutoring? He is still a kid. He is so fond of Jillu that he wouldn’t bear the thought of leaving it behind. He would fall sick if he comes to know about it. We will somehow convince him at the end. Now go and tell him that we are taking Jillu with us.”

Still two more hours are left.

Inside, Kumar kept telling Jillu. “Don’t worry. I will take you alongwith me. I they don’t allow you, we will shoot them.”

Suddenly Nithya said, “Why don’t we do like this?”

How?

“There is enough space in the suite case. We could wrap it up in a towel and ,,,,”

“It would die crying.”

“Could we not carry a basket?”

“Look, Nithya. Don’t complicate matters. We’ll leave it here. It would roam around for food, definitely. If it were British, the dog would have been shot!”

“Even I don’t like to leave this little devil behind.”

“What do we do? The bastards have all done their job.

“Aathma, please control yourself.”

They left home at five. The streak of black clouds has grown a bit. Aathma, Nithya and Kumar came out of the house. For the last time, he saw the house, completely open, the roof of Jasmine creepers, mango tree and the name plate in blue at the door step which bore his name, “R.S. Aathma”.

“Did I close the Gas?” suddenly Nithya remembered.

“Stop. How does it matter if you closed it or not?”

A Suite Case and a little Basket were all they had taken.

“A little Basket.”

“Hi, what is there in the basket?”

“Shut up. Jillu is deep asleep. We’ll somehow manage.”

“Why do you invite trouble? If they notice, then we’ll have to cut a sorry figure. Let’s leave it now.” Aathma tried to snatch the basket from her hands. Kumar shrieked at the attempt.

“Leave it to me. I’ll manage. I heard they are not checking everything.”

A three ton military truck stopped in front of their house.

“Come on! Quick!” A Uniform yelled at them.

As Aathma, Nithya and Kumar with their Suite case and Basket mounted onto the truck , he looked at the faces all around. All disturbed faces, their futures uncertain. Where would we go and stand? Which land? Nothing was known. The truck trudged its way to the playground. Aathma kept looking at the basket repeatedly.

They got down and formed a moving column. The military officials were moving from one end to another. The seven helicopters had seven rows of seats each. All the town’s folks without any distinction were getting into the unknown entrance with some hesitation and anxiety. The young military men lifted the aged and sent them in. There were people sitting, standing, on wheel-chairs, with walking sticks, the poor and the children. The entire town would be emptied in an hours’ time. As Aathma, Nithya and Kumar approached that mechanical bird, Aathma’s heart beat fast. If only we could get in and the copter starts flying, then we could manage with an awkward smile. They came very near.

“You have only one suite case, right?” asked the officer.

“A suite case and a basket.” answered Nithya. The basket was covered with a towel.

The officer lifted and weighed it with his mind’s eye. “Get in.” He ordered.

“Oh!” Aathma sighed in relief.

Nithya lifted and kept the basket with her. Exactly at that time, the sleeping Jillu started to moan. “Get in fast, Nithya.”

Now, Jillu started howling, full blown.

“Just a minute, madam.”

The officer snatched the basket from her hands and within no time removed the towel.

“Dog!” He picked Jillu and placed it on the table.

“My God! Whose dog is it?”

“Officer, it is like this. My son.........”

“Hi! Did we not tell you time and again? Did we not announce it through loud speakers? Did we not tell each one of you? That, you should bring only the most essential?”

“Dog! What stupidity, I say.”

“Officer, just listen. My son...”

“Look, Gent. I don’t have the time to argue with you. The helicopter must leave now. Look at the clouds. Radiation Clouds. They are fast approaching us. We are just miles from death. We don’t even have space for people and you want to bring your dog. If I make an exception, another would want to bring his piano, yet another his cow! We are running away to live another life. In fact, the CO shouted at me for allowing you to bring eight kilos. I can’t allow the dog.”

“Sir, this is like our own kid.” pleaded Nithya.

“Get in. Get in. The dog can’t. Who is next?”

“Heartless Creatures.”

“What did you say?”

“The war was a creation of yours.”

“You threw an atom bomb at them, quite irresponsibly. They retaliated. Now we have been let all alone to handle cruel men like you. It is all because of your instinct for killing that such a mayhem has taken place. Innocents like us have been caught in between, separated and left to roam from place to place. Bloody military rascals! Bastards!”

Next moment, Aathma received a thundering slap on his face.

“Look man! It is not us. It is the leaders who have done this. Haul him up I say.”

Aathma was bundled and thrust inside. Nithya also got in. Then others came in a hurry and at last the military officers mounted. The door was closed.

The head began to rotate and as the speed increased. All the seven helicopters rose sideways one after another.

“Is it paining, Aathma?” Nithya asked him.

There were lot of people cramped inside. Aathma and Nithya stood at a corner and clasped the hanging handles. As the helicopters rose, the intensity of fear also increased.

“Don’t worry, Kumar. We’ll get a new one for you.” said Aathma, in a conciliatory tone.

“Kumar?”

“Hi. Nithya! Where is Kumar?”

“He was with you.”

“No, he was holding your hands.”

“Kumar? Kumaaaaaaaaaar?”

Nithya’s shriek was silenced by the thudding noise of the machine.

“Sir, Please open the door. We have left our son behind.” Aathma banged the doors. A muscular hand pulled Aathma and held on to him.

As the helicopters became a dot in the sky, Kumar came out from beneath the table, caressing Jillu softly.

“Don’t worry Jillu. Papa and Mama will come back soon. We will go home now.”

The little boy and the dog walked spiritedly on the deserted street. He picked up a huge quantity of biscuits from the bakery. Kumar ate some and gave the rest to Jillu. As they began to walk the way back home, the rains came. They got drenched in it, joyfully.

(Translated from the Tamil original, this is a science fiction story written by the famous Tamil writer, the late S. Rangarajan, alias SUJATHA, who passed away in 2009. He had left a note beneath the story, which runs as follows: “Some of the predictions made in my science fiction stories have come true. It is sometimes gratifying and sometimes embarrassing. This story written almost twenty years ago has come very close to reality. We wish and fervently pray this does not ever happen.” Such a situation need not rise owing to bad calculations of political leaders and military generals alone. Fukushima is another possibility.)