Two Pakistans
I have found that there is disconnect between the people of Pakistan and that makes us citizens of two different Pakistans.
Pakistanis who were born before the 70s saw a different Pakistan that is unimaginable for our younger generation. The cultural tolerance of different communities was still intact despite the communal riots of partition. Religion was a devotional experience and had not become a ritual. Minorities and different faiths were not considered as the ‘other’. Cultural activities weren’t the basis of division as today, but points of connection even between Hindus and Muslims. These two instances of my early childhood might explain the different Pakistan that we grew up in.
The Mosque
In the early 70s, I remember visiting my maternal grandmother’s village a few kilometers away from Kohat. It was lush green with guava orchards surrounded by mauve, olive green, ultramarine, yellow ochre and burnt sienna mountains that formed a perfect reservoir for Tanda Dam, the hot spot of family picnics. We often used to walk or hire a tonga to get to the village. My mother and other female members would gather in a large compound under an old peepal tree. Us boys would rush out with our cousins to collect fresh guavas. This village had only few mud houses on either side of a mud road.
Of the two deserted houses, there was one with low walls that looked like a haunted house. It had only one room in the middle and we could see cobwebs on the broken front door and window from the road. We never ventured going close to that mud structure, hurriedly crossing it on opposite side of the road. We were even frightened to ask our cousins about this house. A few years later I asked my chum Sajjad, about the deserted mud house. He laughed and said, “Oh! That was a mosque”. I asked him why it was always deserted. He replied, “No mullah stayed for more than few days as there were very few namazis”.
-Illustration by Sabir Nazar
Three years ago, I visited the village after more than 30 years. This time I saw concrete houses with electricity and a school just opposite my friend’s house. Sajjad, who is now a grandfather, told me that cable TV is not allowed in the entire area. Upon inquiring he told me that the elders of all the surrounding villages were summoned by the tablighi jamaat center and they decided “voluntarily” to not allow cable TV in the entire area. Later on my way back I saw that the 200-kanals expanse that housed the tablighi centre on the road that goes to Hangu and then to Parachinar. Tanda dam that was once a favourite picnic spot for families is now deserted after the Taliban threatened families.
The Mandir
Our house in Kohat was at the back of PAF barbed wired boundary and guava orchards. A Balmiki mandir was the only building close to our house. I remember the festivals and stage plays performed at this mandir. For the first time, I saw Valmiki’s Ramayana and Mahabharata during those festivals. A mud raised platform served as a stage. The garuda was made with shining cardboard, cardboard crowns and wooden swords covered with silver paper. A Muslim actor performed as Rawan whom I often saw in the bazaar. I liked his acting and was mesmerised to see him gulping kerosene oil and then spitting it from his mouth to create the impression of a fire emitting monster. I remember a mixed audience that included Muslims and the distributing of parshad on banana leaves at the end of the play.
-Illustration by Sabir Nazar
I recognized the play of Pandavas and Kauravas as my mother was a great story teller. I heard from her stories of Mahabharata, Samson and Delilah, Yousaf and Zulekha, Kalidasa’s Shakuntala, Laila and Majnu and many others. We left that house and moved to Peshawar and forgot about those stories.
Some 10 years later students of our arts college toured India and I saw Mahabharata again on stage. This time it was the powerful acting and expressive voice of Naseeruddin Shah as Karna and his dialogues with his mother Kunti. Like my city actor who played Rawan, it was the character of Karna that inspired me, again played by a Muslim actor.
In hindsight, I remember my final year thesis painting was titled, ‘The fall of Lanka’. The painting showed a cow inside an elephant in a turtle. Sita is sitting inside the lakshman rekha and Rawan appears as a beggar to trick her to come out of the circle. Lanka is shown as a row of houses, with Hanuman jumping on the roofs with his tail on fire setting ablaze all of Lanka. The main idea was that imperialism has reached deep inside our societies as symbolised by the goldern dear, the rakhshas who changed into a shining golden dear (the shine of money) to attract Sita.
-Illustration by Sabir Nazar
My teacher objected that people wouldn’t understand the symbols in this painting. I pointed out that I have seen these stories being performed and people do know about them. I called a labourer who was white washing the walls of the studio for the final thesis exhibition. I asked him if he could recognise any characters in the painting. Hesitantly, he recognised the figure of Hanuman.
‘So let the labourers be your art critics and evaluate your painting,’ shouted my teacher and stormed out of the painting studio.
The author left architecture for painting but ended up as a cartoonist and now writes Hijjo. He is the jack of all trades.
The views expressed by this blogger and in the following reader comments do not necessarily reflect the views and policies of the Dawn Media Group.
Sabir should be happy that in any country there are more labourers than art teachers, more lay persons than clergy.
We should respectfully allow the self professed wise men to have their say, but equally they should respectfully allow the multitude to have their way.
Insisting on rigid conformity to thought, dress and habits would prevent evolution and improvement. A richly interesting society that adapts to the current situation can only exist when societys freedom is not curtailed by diktats of however well intentioned individuals.
There is not only one path to salvation….
You reminded me of time when as a young boy in the early fifties in a small town of Gujarat in India I experienced the same thing still fresh in my memory.I remember the audience at least 15% Muslims and some Parsi.Those days are gone in India too,why talk of Pakistan.We have learned to hate each other, may God,Ishwar,Bhagwan,Allah,Khuda help us.
wow….great article.i salute mr writer
Sabir Nazar is not only a wonderful person but a great cartoonist & Painter … I am a proud possessor of few of his paintings …His humour and sting go side by side … In many of his paintings he uses symbols of Hinduism, Islam and other faiths … he had related to me the above story when I met him in lahore in 2010 … May ur tribe grow Nazar Sahib …!!
I am personally fed up by Zia this and Zia that. The fact remains that Pakistan has been ruled by secular people for most of the time. The current rules are also seculars. Instead of blaming dead people we should hold the current rulers to account. When people vote for NRO people and parties then they should not complain when their elected do not deliver!
Sabir:Boy, I am glad to see NFP like young people coming up.Beware you may be labeled ‘infidel’ for visiting a mandir. You remind me the days of Roma Shabana, Excelsior & the like in KHI, the city i grew up & lived. Gone are the days & the people…..
Human mind always romanticize the past. Its that feeling of youth, energy and the excitement for future that we actually remember…. Still there were some good years in 70s and early 80s.
- born 1966, raised in Model Town Lahore, now live in USA.
excellent article. you are so right. It was a different Pakistan in the old days. We had so much tolerance and understanding.
Pakistan is a land where Ramayan and Mahabharat Originated. It is a place where vedic scholars and philosophers lived. It is a place where Buddhist Gurus like Padmasambhav were born. But alas ! they were not Muslims, therefore the present generation living in this place never recognises or remembers them because as per their beliefs the civilised world started only after the plunders of Bin Qasim and only Arabian civilisation is worth emulating. Perhaps they never know that a gem of world civisation is being ignored by them.
I witnessed a peaceful and tolerant motherland of mine all along my growing up in fifties and sixties.Now the intolerance ,extremism and a huge doze of religion all around me makes me sad. Faith is my matter with my God. I term it a delicate personal devotional bond. No individual,no organization,no state,no government need to interferer in this sacred binding relationship. The solution is septate the State and religion.
In the 70′s in Karachi I once was out with friends late night. In a round about near Tariq road we fell asleep on the grass. No fears!! Great old days.
Yes long gone those days of innocence. Now there is only havoc, uncertainty, and so many people every where, on the roads, streets, sidewalks, roofs, and any place where their feet can go. With humans share horses with carriages, camels, donkey carts, rikshwas, vans, cars, trucks, tractor trolleys,buses with people hanging on them. When you see so many people on the road you feel no body work in this country just every body is on the road..
Our father bought us a color TV which I know now he ill afforded.He took us to movies and our library was full of wonderful books. Tolstoy, Shakespeare, Hardy, Toynbee, monthly subscription of Reader Digest and an occasional Life. To this we added Ladybird series, Fantastic five, Hardy Boys, Alistair Maclean, Harold Robins, Robert Ludlum. And it is not that he was not a religious man. Mazar, Majlis, Mandir, Masjid, everything was reverend and acceptable. Evenings were fun with no ” pious men ” in white robes, suggesting to us the “uselessness” of our lives. And now when some young person in the family corrects us to say Allah Hafiz, argues that cable is haram, coerces the females to wear HIjab and wants his marriage the Arab way , you should know that something has been rotting all these years.
Change is the only constant thing. This piece of land has changed from an extremely tolerant society during pre-partition era to extremely intolerant one. When whole world including Russia and China are moving towards freedom, democracy and secular society. Pakistan seems determined to race in reverse gear. It is really unfortunate that writer has to write such article in 2012. Hope no one will need to write similar article after 20 years.
Yes, I remember the Pakistan of the 70s which commited genocide of bengalis specially hindus. Who are you kidding ?
Yes I also remember.I can never forget.
I will just say ” those good days are long gone “.