The caravan of Mahendra Nayyar’s family reached Delhi around noon. Their train was held back for six hours, to give way to two special trains carrying Muslim refugees to Pakistan. After spending eighteen hours in the packed and sweaty Inter-class compartment, they all looked weary and bedraggled. Anxiety for Panditji’s health was gnawing at their hearts. No one was willing to believe that they had been summoned by telegram unless he had fallen seriously ill.
The family loaded their luggage onto two tongas at the railway station and set out towards Faiz Bazaar. Every passing moment of their first impression of Delhi filled them with apprehension and a feeling of depression. A sea of humanity stretched out on all sides; people without shelter, without a place of their own. Under the trees, on footpaths and by the roadside, in improvised shelters of reeds and straw, under tents and awnings. Or just out in the open. A premonition of what they might face made them forget the discomfort of their train journey.
At the first crossroads inside Faiz Bazaar, policemen diverted the traffic and made the tongas go through Daryaganj. The road ahead was jammed with people. They were told that Mahatma Gandhi had come to comfort the plight of Muslim families still living in Koocha Chelan, and express his compassion for them.
The Hindu tonga driver exploded with anger and cursed the Mahatma, ‘He will end up getting all Hindus wiped out.’
Panditji had brought his charpoy into the doorway, and was sitting there, hugging his knees. He sprang to his feet when he saw the family arrive, ‘Come on in! Kantu, Kanni, Kanchi … my daughters!’ His voice cracked with emotion as tears filled his eyes. He took Nano from Nayyar’s arms and clasped her to his heart.
Nano screamed with alarm, then, recognizing her grandfather, hugged him back. Panditji’s wife heard the noise and hurried out. She sobbed loudly as she embraced her daughters one after another. Panditji welcomed the others also with a hug, and politely escorted Kanta’s mother-in-law inside.
Panditji was in ecstasy, ‘Thank God! Thank Him! We are all together again. Now everything is all right.’
The relief that Nayyar, Kanta, Kanak and Kanchan had felt on finding Panditji in good health soon gave way to a silent concern, when they saw that the faces of Panditji and their mother had turned sallow like dry leaves, that they had lost weight and that the house was almost bare. They avoided looking at each other guiltily.
Panditji fussed over the rearrangement of rooms trying to show that nothing was wrong or had changed. A bed was set up for Nayyar’s mother in one room. In another, they spread dhurries on the floor, unrolled quilts and mattresses that had been brought down from Nainital, and covered them with white sheets. The house had no electric fans. Patting Bajrang’s back, Panditji said, ‘Go, my lad, and get six hand fans.’
In late afternoon, after they had bathed and had a meal, the family lay down in the room on the mattress-covered floor. They waved the fans in their hands. Panditji lay face up in the centre, waving a fan over himself, feeling contented and happy, and repeating over and over again, ‘A thousand thanks to Him! Everyone’s here. We at least have a roof over our heads to protect us from rain, storm and sun. Just think what other people are going through. Babies dying of pneumonia, because they can’t be sheltered from the rain. People living among the ruins of old buildings and in the shadow of walls. People who steal bricks from old graves to build walls and then cover the shanties with a straw roof. Tsk, tsk! Thanks be to God for giving us this place of rest.’
Next day brought a fresh round of worry when Nayyar broached the subject of going to Jalandhar to assess the prospects of beginning his law practice. Panditji agreed with Nayyar, but advised him, ‘Son, wait here for a week or two. Send Kakaram your address here. Let Nano, Kanta and your mother stay here for the time being. First look for a house and an office for your law practice.’
Nayyar’s messages to his bank in Lahore had gone unheeded. He went to the bank’s head office in Chandni Chowk, only to find that neither had his account been credited with any money, nor had it been transferred to any branch in India.
Panditji would bring up the subject of starting some business or other. He had had to abandon his printing press in Lahore. Now he found that the governments of both countries had banned the export of any machinery.
Left behind in Lahore was a stock of books worth a hundred thousand rupees. Many booksellers of western Punjab had owed money to him. How could he hope payment of any old debts from those who had lost everything? It was not possible to start a new business even with the funds he had had the foresight to transfer to the Delhi branch of his bank. After sharing his concerns with the family, he would say with a deep sigh, ‘We’re still better off than millions of people left destitute. A thousand thanks to Him.’
Those were days of anxiety, of discomfort and inconvenience, and of an uncertain future, but it was also the first time Nayyar, Rajendra, Kanta, Kanak and Kanchan had come to this new and bustling city. They could not spend time quietly in the ‘comfortable’ place that Panditji had found, as they had been able to do in Lahore. They would go out in the late morning and spend several hours away from home. In the evenings they mostly went towards New Delhi. Camps for refugees had been set up in every available stretch of open space in Old Delhi and in the surrounding districts. The grand boulevards of New Delhi, Connaught Place and the government buildings had remained untouched by the flood of refugees. The invasion had rather enhanced the glamour and bustle of New Delhi. Streets were full of young Punjabi men and women wearing stylish and expensive dresses; as if they were there to show off their wealth and finery, or just to forget their misfortune by putting on a show of cheerful happiness.
Kanak’s days in Delhi were full of gloom and despair. The constraints of space, the humid heat, and the house packed with people did not bother her. But she had still not got news of Puri and that constantly tugged at her heart and made her increasingly despondent: What if he had been left destitute and helpless by these cataclysmic, chaotic winds of change? Maybe he had been forced to seek refuge in some camp. How can anyone be found in this seething mass of millions of refugees? Had he been able to find his family? What could be the reason behind his inability to contact her? He knew her address at Nainital. If he had gone back to Nainital or had sent a message to her address, she would have to depend on Ramprakash to pass on any news. Before leaving Nainital, Nayyar had asked his brother-in-law to forward their mail immediately to Panditji’s address his Delhi. How long would Subhadra and Ramprakash be able to stay in Nainital? There had been some talk about their moving to Ludhiana or Ambala. While roaming the streets or sitting forlornly beside the lake in Nainital, she would go back in memory over the time she had spent with Puri. She became withdrawn
and pensive, hardly speaking to anyone.
Fearful of her husband going alone to Jalandhar, Kanta wanted to accompany him. Her mother-in-law, and her father and mother also, explained that she would only be an encumbrance. If the thought of her husband leaving her made her unhappy, this was considered natural, and she did not have to hide it. But how could Kanak reveal the real reason for her feeling downcast? Reading the newspapers end to end was the only way for her to hide her feelings. She read advertisements, legal notices and ‘situations vacant’ columns as well. If she saw some job advertised for a woman, she would read it carefully and wonder whether she should apply.
Panditji did feel for his daughters who had been brought up in comfort. He noticed Kanak’s remote and absent looks, and the pervading mood of sadness all around. The monsoon season had ended, but a downpour fell in the early evening. It was not possible to go to New Delhi to escape the hours of tedium and the oppressive heat. His hand waving his fan, Panditji tried to divert everyone’s attention and lighten the atmosphere by recounting a couple of anecdotes. Then he said, ‘My daughters can face up to anything. They are like lion cubs. What could it be that they can’t tackle? To live off one’s family’s property is to live the life of a leech. That’s a parasite’s life.’ He roared with laughter at his own joke, took off his glasses and began to polish them with the end of his shirtfront.
After coming to Delhi, he had learned a new trick. If he wanted to avoid meeting someone’s eye, he would begin to polish his glasses and screw up his eyes. He apparently thought that if he could not see others’ faces, they would not notice the worried expression on his own.
Panditji picked up the thread of his thoughts, ‘Mahendra, my son, I told you about it, remember? My first job was as a proofreader at Desraj’s press for twenty rupees a month.’ He again guffawed, as if wanting to tell his daughters to make light of every problem, ‘Nobody was willing to hire anyone jailed for political reasons in those days. Desraj was a decent man. Even in that situation I found time to do some writing. The night-time was my own, I was young, and my spirits were high. I wrote light, romantic novels.
Dream Waves
was published by Makhzane Adab. I gave that publisher four novels in three years;
Dream Waves
, a novella about the life of Tipu Sultan, and translations of two English novels. My friend, who was willing to pay out royalties in those days? People wrote for fun, therefore the quality was
better. Well, in lieu of royalties, I asked the publisher for 150 copies of each book. Those I traded with some booksellers for other titles, and opened a small shop in Sootar Mandi. Then I brought out the weekly
Des-Sandesh
, and got a second-hand printing press to turn it out. I was able to publish bit by bit about twenty books, school texts and notes that some friends of mine and I had written up. I then expanded the press, built the house, and what a comfortable house it was! I had thought that my daughters and sons-in-law would look after all that, but then this hour of doom sounded. It was all His doing,’ he again roared with laughter, ‘everything went to pieces.’
Still laughing, he took off his glasses and screwed up his eyes. His attempt to clean the lenses only smudged them. He went on, ‘It was so well said by that poet … what’s his name, Kanni?… Yes, that’s it, Momin! Momin said, listen Mahendra, you too Kanta,’ he said, raising his finger, ‘“The gardener rues the bulbul’s ruined nest, strewn by the storm along the ravaged ground…”’
Panditji shifted excitedly in his seat as he repeated the first half of the verse in a louder voice.
‘Listen, Mahendra, “…But in the tree the bird, with swelling breast, rebuilds, and greets the dawn with joyful sound.” Wah, wah! Beautifully said.’
Panditji’s words, Kanak felt, were meant especially for her. She also knew that her father, despite his own great unhappiness, said such things to cheer up the family. He often did that to express his own burden of frustrations.
She prompted him to say more, ‘The bulbul bemoans and laments over her misfortune. What else is there in poetry? Some poet may write poems about our misfortune, while others write stories about it.’
Panditji replied gravely, ‘Beta, poetry and fiction have their own place, but why should we fall into despair and gloom?’
Nayyar sensed that Kanak’s joke had missed its mark. A light drizzle was falling. Seeing his mother standing in the aangan and peering up at the grey sky, he said to her, ‘Ma, what’re you doing … looking for God?’
‘Yes, son, who else is there to look for at my age? He’s the only one who cares,’ she replied.
Kanchan leaned towards Nayyar, and dropping her voice so that her father could not hear, said, ‘Ask her, who she looked at when she was young?’
‘Really! Look, aren’t you being just a bit too mischievous,’ Nayyar said with a mock scowl.
‘What did she say?’ asked Panditji.
‘Ma, Kanchi was saying …’ Nayyar raised his voice so that Panditji could hear.
Kanchan pinched the flesh on Nayyar’s leg to make him stop. He rubbed the spot but went on teasingly, ‘Ma, Kanchi was saying …do you want me to tell her?’
His mother asked, ‘What was she saying?’
Nayyar challenged Kanchan, ‘Want me to tell?’
‘Go ahead!’ Kanchan threatened him with another pinch.
He stared at Kanchan mockingly as he spoke, ‘Ma, she was saying, who did you …? Should I tell …? Asking you to tell God that we’re all fed up with this rain. He should stop it. Why is He making us suffer?’
His mother joined her hands in supplication to the sky and prayed, ‘Divine Father, please stop now.’
‘Bahinji, just look at how little these youngsters know,’ Panditji spoke to Nayyar’s mother in Punjabi. ‘What do they know about how important this rain is for the wheat crop? Every act of God above brings some good to us humans.’
‘You’re right, bhaiji,’ Nayyar’s mother agreed, ‘These children were born in cities and raised in cities. So what would they know about crops, How wheat is grown and so on?’
‘If this rain is good for the crop, ask God to make it rain over where the wheat grows,’ Kanak spoke up. ‘Is He wasting all this water here in the city just to make us paddle about in mud? So that people get soaked and fall ill? Can’t He see that wheat doesn’t grow on top of our heads? When the gardener at our Model Town house watered the plants, did he soak us too? That gardener had more sense than God.’
‘You’re quite right, Ma,’ Nayyar took his mother’s side to tease his sisters-in-law, ‘What do these girls know about growing wheat? They think that chapattis grow on one kind of tree in the countryside, and double-rotis on another kind. Listen…’ he straightened his back as he launched into his joke, ‘I once asked Kanni if she had seen the fields where wheat grew? She replied, “Yes. I went once to my uncle’s place in the country. We were out in the open when a tiger charged at us fiercely. I was so scared that I climbed up a wheat tree” … Aah!’ Nayyar stopped in mid-sentence as he felt his back where Kanak had pinched him viciously.
‘What is it? … What’s the matter?’ Panditji wanted to know.
‘Bedbugs, pitaji, and lots of them,’ replied Nayyar, rubbing his back.