A True Story by SWAPNA GUPTA

Chapter 1

It’s only ten o’ clock in the morning. The sun is scorching hot already. The air is still, with not even a slight breeze to breathe ripples across the golden wheat fields ready for harvest. Grey smoke rises in the distance as farmers burn down swaths of wheat stubble. There hangs a sense of foreboding in the air. Ali is pensive as he looks out of the latticed verandah of his home. It was only recently that an aunt in Hyderabad had found his family this house in Malir on the outskirts of Karachi.

Ali feels deeply troubled. The last few months have been very difficult for him, his young English wife, two sons and two daughters. They had left their family home in Hyderabad to begin a new life in Pakistan. Little did Ali know that he, a Muslim, would face such intense hostility in this new country. Only a fortnight ago, in the middle of the night, they had to run for their lives and hide in the fields for hours after the old caretaker of the house had been beaten up and threatened with more. “How dare you let the house to be rented by those Mahajirs?”

If only Ali had understood earlier the intense hatred Pakistanis of Sindhi descent harbored against him, he might have thought twice about moving to Karachi. To the people of Sindh, he was unwanted because he was an immigrant, a Mahajir. But where would he have gone? He had lived in pre-partition India and also England, but he wanted to serve Pakistan and help it grow into a strong nation. The communal tensions he saw upon coming to Karachi shocked him. It seemed the Punjabi Muslims of Sindh detested Muslim Mahajirs like him. Before long, the hatred had boiled over into the 1948 Karachi riots.

As he looked out of his verandah, Ali recalled the parts of Karachi scarred by the riots, horrific tales of murder and mayhem, that filled his heart with fear. The riots were intended to drive Hindu Sindhis out of Pakistan, but soon engulfed Mahajirs as well.

Ali looked around the verandah, and stopped to stare at the faded calendar hanging on the wall. The sun beat relentlessly on it, discoloring the paper. When the wind blew the calendar swayed from side to side, the metal headband scratching rhythmically against the wall, scratching a permanent semi-circle. Yes, it was the beginning of Ramadan.

Although liked by his peers in the office where he worked for the Karachi Transportation, there were many who were increasingly envious of Ali’s quick promotions. And many who of course resented him being a Mahajir.

The Sindh government had set up a Peace Board made up of Hindu and Muslim members to maintain order in the troubled province. P.V. Tahilramani, a Hindu, was secretary of the Peace Board. Karachi newspapers had carried details of the riots, and how Tahilramani rushed to the office of the Sindh Chief Minister, Khuhro, to inform the chief minister that the Sikhs in Guru Mandir areas of Karachi were being killed. According to Khuhro, senior bureaucrats and police officials were nowhere to be found and he rushed to the scene at around 12.30 p.m. where he saw “mobs of refugees armed with knives and sticks storming the temples”. Khuhro tried to stem the violence. Mr. Jinnah, the Founder of Pakistan, was pleased with his efforts. But death still took a terrible toll.

Because the house was large and isolated, inhabited by only a young couple and four young children in this remote desert-like landscape, danger lurked in every corner. Their scattered neighbors were nomadic tribals from the neighboring state of Baluchistan. Many of them were known to snatch babies, or so it was believed. They also raised armadillos and intentionally sent them into nearby houses to torment and bite the residents. Another common belief. After the attack on the caretaker who lived at the rear of the house, Ali had started to sleep with a gun.