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Archive for the ‘Personal’ Category

Do it anyways


I wasn’t so, not so long ago. But after all the chaos pertaining to hatred, intolerance and self-righteousness all around, I have come to believe that the only way to have real  ‘peace’ is if we donot reciprocate hate with hate or evil with evil.

The following words by Kent M Keith which inspired even Mother Teresa, hold the key to peace in this world, perhaps:

The Paradoxical Commandments

People are illogical, unreasonable, and self-centered.
Love them anyway.

If you do good, people will accuse you of selfish ulterior motives.
Do good anyway.

If you are successful, you win false friends and true enemies.
Succeed anyway.

The good you do today will be forgotten tomorrow.
Do good anyway.

Honesty and frankness make you vulnerable.
Be honest and frank anyway.

The biggest men and women with the biggest ideas can be shot down by the smallest men and women with the smallest minds.
Think big anyway.

People favor underdogs but follow only top dogs.
Fight for a few underdogs anyway.

What you spend years building may be destroyed overnight.
Build anyway.

People really need help but may attack you if you do help them.
Help people anyway.

Give the world the best you have and you’ll get kicked in the teeth.
Give the world the best you have anyway.

Category:

CULTURE, Peace, Personal

When hatred reigns.


It was with helplessness that I read an article in one of the newspapers about how school kids in certain areas of Karachi were not able to attend their school safely because of prevailing tensions between two ethnic groups- both Pakistanis, both Muslims of the same sect. A kid claimed he was friends with his schoolmates from the other ethnic community and they even played together after school, but now the same friends say they could not play with him anymore.

Another article read of how Hindus in Baluchistan who have been living there for centuries were fearful of sending their kids to schools due to escalated kidnappings for ransom and killings of the community. Although they have no animosity with the Muslims in neighborhood,  they all scared to mingle.

In brief, the hatred of a handful prevailed over the helplessness of the lot.

Before I could finish, the news broke of Karachi blast in the DHA where along with others, an innocent passerby mom and her 5 year old son got killed.
What prevailed here too was nothing but hatred.

I know first hand, exactly how it feels to be helpless in the face of hatred.

I was a first year medical student in  Lady Hardinge Medical College, situated in the heart of New Delhi, when Indira Gandhi was assassinated on 31 October 1984. The mayhem spread as faster than the spread of the news. As if a riot button was switched on. Delhi’s panorama was puking smoke of hatred from every direction.

Parents were coming to pick up their daughters, from the college hostel, and narrating the harrowing tales of watching limbs and other body parts splattered across the killing fileds that Delhi roads had turned into. I remember how a Sikh girl from my class sat cautiously frozen in the crowd of girls in the hostel’s TV room.  She broke down when she learnt that her brother had left home an hour ago to pick her up. No one reassured her not to cry or to worry for her brothers safety.  Not a single parent even offered to drop her home. Why would I blame others, when I felt the same helplessness, and feared what will happen when my parents come, will they be reluctant to take her too.

Ultimately, along with her and a few other girls, I ended up staying back to spend the terrible night in the hostel. The city had turned into an open house of looting and rampage. Next day on my way back home,  all I saw was roads stained with fresh blood, a charred and empty shop after every few well preserved shops and selectively  burn’t buildings along the way to home. Though I did not have the courage to give a second look, but I did see a glimpse of most likely a charred body lying inside a burnt shop.

At home everyone shared their eye witness accounts. Our house boy Jung Bahadur described how the shacks(jhuggis) in the slums of Mangolpuri and Sultanpuri were stocked with stacks of VCRs, TVs and other electronics. He even shared how some dead bodies were piled together, doused with kerosene and burnt to ashes. Papa had witnessed a headless body being carried in an autorickshaw.

I do not remember how and when did the Sikh girl go home, but we learnt days later that her brother could neither arrive at the college, nor ever return back home. His body was  identified some days later in the morgue.

Again, amidst the helplessness of us all, hatred prevailed like a king.

The same story was repeated with my parents, as they were left in the cold, during the riots in December 1992, that followed Babri Masjid demolition. Many Muslim houses were chalked in Delhi, including those of IAS officers, doctors, cricketers, poets etc.

In fact some like Bashir Badr’s house in Meerut was actually attacked. It was after this incident that Bashir Badr wrote this shair:
Log toot jaatey hain, ek ghar banane mein
Tum taras nahin khaatey bastiyaan jalane mein.

Being  staunch beleivers of Indian secularism, my parents had proudly built a house in 1977 in a University housing cooperative compound where his colleagues and other University professors resided. We were only 2 Muslim houses in a colony of 238 lots, but that was besides the point. However, that cold and lonely December night none of our neighbors, his University colleagues or friends came forward to even reassure them of support in case of any danger. There was a criminal silence from friends and neighbors.

As my mother narrated later, that was the first time she saw my father cry with tears, not for his life, but at the ‘sudden’ transformation in hearts of trusted and indeological friends for several decades. My parents had packed their car with valuables, in case they had to leave. Once the crisis was over, a few friends did come up, begging their helplessness.

Once again, amidst the intelligentsia of the society, hatred took an upper hand .

My grandfather often narrated of an incident when during the 1947 riots a Sikh boy had come to drop a pregnant Muslim woman to Matia Mahal,  Jama Masjid area, but was not let to go back alive, despite the helpless cries from the woman’s family to spare her saviour.

The helpless family members could do nothing as the hatred reigned.

I know I can never be able to guess from where this business of hatred all began, but can we really dare dream a day when the hatred propagated by a handful of vested interests will not prevail over the helpless masses ?

This reminded me of a discourse I had read about the controversy between Tagore and Gandhi during the non-cooperation movement against the British in 1930s.

Tagore had warned Gandhi by saying: “….besides, hatred of the foreigner could later turn into a hatred of Indians different from oneself.”

Gandhi on the other hand believed that this non-cooperation would dissolve  Hindu-Muslims differences.

Ultimately Tagore was proved right, and Gandhi had to shift his  non cooperation  against the British into a non violent movement.

The same corollary of Tagore’s could easily be applied to the situation in Pakistan, too.

What began as a hatred for the foreign faiths has turned into hatred among Pakistanis different from each other.

And ironically a handful of vested interest first made the helpless common Pakistanis hate the foreign faiths and now have turned the Pakistanis of different sects and ethnicities hate each other.

This business of hate has to stop somewhere. Whether it is for a fellow Indian/ Pakistani of different ethnicity, of a different faith or of a foreigner of different color, we have to shout in the face of hatred: “Enough is enough”.

Or else, as poet E E Cummings lamented: Hatred bounces.

Category:

Down the memory lane.., India, Indo-Pak, Pakistan, Peace, Personal, Politics, RELIGION, Uncategorized

Heart Health presentation at Aurat Health Services for South Asian Community


A Heart Health presentation done on behalf of  Aurat Health Services ffor the South Asian Community at CPR and AED Event, Mississauga, Ontario.

Category:

Health, Indo-Pak, Personal, Science, Women

Nihari, here and there


The story goes back to two decades ago, when as newlywed and I had just arrived in Karachi.
An aunt ( Phuphi) of my husband invited us for a dinner on some ‘special’ delicacy (in her own words). There were a few other dishes, but all the focus was on the ‘special’ dish.

In the first glance, it looked like a thick curry with some extra large pieces of boneless meatloaves lying in it. Garnished with greens and some baghar, the aroma was appetising, I must admit.

While eating my Phuphi-in-law asked; “Do you know what this is?”
I said, “Some salan (curry) I guess.”

That must have really hurt her. She twisted her mouth with a wicked smile. My husband, too, looked wide eyed at me. So did everyone else present there. They all had that ‘poor her’ expression on their face, which generally Pakistanis had in 1970s, when their austere Indian cousins visited them.

“You don’t know this?” someone asked.
I was regretting to have guessed. It wasn’t the regret of having annoyed the aunt, but of those piercing eyes that were focussed on my ignorance of the dish.

My husband came to my rescue, “Phupho Amma, she isn’t very fond of non vegetarian food. So perhaps she doesn’t have any idea.”

My younger brother in law and a friend teased: “Yeah, bechare Indians don’t get to eat gosht so often, and beef is absolutely a taboo for them. ”

PhuphoAmma charged on me in a mother-in-law tone, “Tum kaisi Dilliwali ho, tum Nihari nahin janteen” (What sort of Delhiite are you, you are not aware of Nihari?)

I screamed before I could check my volume, “Nihari? This is not Nihari.”

Before I could blurt something else, I saw my husband giving me a look to shut up. And like an obedient new wife, I did, but with a huge turmoil within.

Back to our room, my husband assured me that perhaps this was homemade and hence not as delicious as the Khan ki Nihari famous in Karachi. Over a period of few months, we tried Niharis at several places, but I could not find what we in Delhi called  Nihari.

I admit I wasn’t very fond of Nihari till then, nor was I really conscious of Nihari being associated with Delhi. In Delhi, I had heard from my father that Nihari is a Avadhi delicacy, from Lucknow.

Anyways I wasn’t a foodie especially for non vegetarian delicacies, nor a culinary expert, nor did I have any ambitions to be one. It was an open secret at home that I had chosen to be a medical professional, so that it would save me from domestic responsibilities, especially cooking. (It turned out to be an illusion, though. But, that’s another story to tell, anyways)

Knowing very well that I was marrying a goshtkhor( meat-eater) Pakistani who was fond of good food, and who’s mother was a culinary expert, I had made it pretty clear to him that I don’t like to cook.
He had in all sincerity reassured, “Anda to fry karna ata hai na? Kaafi hai.”

But as we hunted for the real Nihari, my craving for Dilli ki Nihari became stronger.

After an year and a half when I first visited my parents in Delhi, apart from the million other things on list, one on the top was to go to Jama Masjid and relish ‘the’ Nihari, which is sold right at the corner of Matia Mahal, just a furlong from Dadi Amma’s house.

As the tradition goes, Nihari is cooked  from the special shank meat of the beef, with trots in over two dozen spices, the most dominant being the saunf (anise seeds) which gives it the aroma. on slow heat and takes  several hours to get tender.  Hence usually over night as shab degh. The degh( a giant round bottomed pot)  is opened at certain times only –mostly at dawn around 7am or now, even at dusk (at Maghrib). And one has to be there at the right period of time to be able to grab it, otherwise degh lut chuki hoti hai.(It gets sold out fast).

 True to its name ‘nihari’ means pertaining to daytime, it is usually eaten at breakfast, at dawn.
Many a times I had seen Dadi Amma or any of the phuphis in the household send one of the shagirds ( disciples who come to her for learning Quran), a night earlier, to keep the pan with the shopkeeper. And as the cook would  the degh early next morning, the he would kept aside some in  her reserved pot.

The mere mention on phone of my desire to eat Nihari was enough, Dadi Amma promised to keep it reserved for me. I remember her doing the same for us with Shaadi ka Qorma and sheermal whenever any left overs arrived from a kin’s wedding, knowing that we craved for it. (Aah Dilli ka Qorma is another delicacy, not seen anywhere, which deserves another blog).

At first opportunity, we went to see Dadi Amma and others at our ancestral home in Purani Dilli.

Dadi Amma’s place, is a  house, typical  in the walled city. There is a sehan ( courtyard) at the entrance which leads to a room inside another , both of which used to have spic white chandnis spread wall to wall, and no sign of any furniture.

In addition to sleeping over, eating at Dadi Amma’s place had always been a fascinating experience. With a dastarkhwan( sheet to lay the food)  laid on chandni( the spotless white spread on the floor to sit) covered floor across the length of the room. I wonder why, but as kid, I remember vying for a place at the corner of the spread. Some of the senior family members, referred to the plates, in salees-shusta Urdu, as rakabis. And although it had since long become a routine to use glasses for water, there would always be a couple of silver plated copper katoras sitting on dastarkhwan. (Drinking water in katoras (wide bowl) was an old tradition of purani dilli).

That day too, we sat at the dastarkhwan all set to enjoy Nihari. My agenda was personal, while others were eager to see my husband’s response to Nihari. (Thanks to my negative publicity of Karachi Nihari)

With red glazing, aromatic nihari in sight, we waited till the boy brought in hot crispy nans wrapped in newspaper straight from the tan door in the gali, just a few steps away.

The first bite was like a dream come true to the nerve endings of my olfactory and taste buds. But in just a couple of seconds to my tongue, it was a reign of terror unleashed. The poor tastebuds caught fire and laid their arms in the next few bites. As if in a bid to dampen the fire, the eyes started to pour water. But I had to put a brave front, and no matter how hot the tongue burned, the ego stood firm to confirm, this is the  true “Nihari”.

All ears, including my red hot ones, were dying to hear my ‘Pakistani’ husband’s reaction on the ‘Indian’ dish. Being courteous, he remarked, “It is delicious, but a bit hot for my liking.”

However, later when we went home, he revealed lightly, that he still preferred his Karachi ki maghaz Nihari. I was devastated, absolutely.  But soon rationalised that, perhaps his tastebuds, and his brain cells were conditioned to call that thick curry as Nihari. His loss not mine, I consoled myself.

My ego wanted to have this Nihari more often, though a bit less spicy, so I got keen to get its exact recipe. My mother could not believe her ears that a cooking rebel like me was asking for a recipe. She and a phuphi had their recipes to offer, but they all admitted not being experts in the dish.

It is generally a tradition in purani Dilli that women do not cook Nihari at home and when needed, they just get it ready made from outside. Probably apart from convenience, it is because of the non availability of beef and also that it needs to be cooked overnight. In Delhi we have gas cylinders, not gas through a pipeline like in Pakistan. (In the days I lived there, cylinders too were rationed).

My Dadi Amma’s wisdom guided me to go to Rehmatullah (the cook and owner of the restaurant) and get the recipe from him.

Being in a flourishing business, Rehmatullah, was unwilling to part with his secret recipe. However, knowing that I wasn’t living there, he was kind enough to offer some from the readymade mixture of spice powder, that he prepared for his recipe. He was generous, and his masala lasted almost an year, till my mom found a place which sold indigenous masala.

Repeated cooking over the years for friends and family has given enough expertise and repute of being able to cook what most taste buds recognise as good Nihari.

Now I can claim to have mastered the details of the difference between the maghaz nihari they make in Karachi and the nalli nihari that we Dilliwalas have in Delhi. (However, I wonder, if there was any difference in them, earlier).

And now that the froth of my ego has flattened quite a bit, I am able to accept the Karachi one as a different version of Nihari, which acquired its own distinct character after crossing the border.

Unfortunately, now in Delhi, even the Muslims residing outside purani Dilli do not seem to yearn for Nihari during the breakfast, while in Karachi, Nihari seems to have taken the place of a national dish which is available at any hour of the day and at every corner of the city. But it still manages to retain the tag of being a Delhi dish.

Interestingly, instead of suspecting some secret readymade masala, most of my kin and friends from Pakistan attribute ‘my’ Nihari flavour to my Dilliwala origins.

Even more interesting is the secret, that it was in Pakistan that I was made to realise for the first time that I was a Dilliwali. And thanks to the Dilliwala tag that was thrust upon me , I now love it and quite often brag about it.

PuraniDilli- sketch by Shilpa Wadhwa

Category:

CULTURE, Down the memory lane.., Food, India, Pakistan, Personal

Footprints, theirs and ours


Published in two parts in  Dateline Islamabad  as an Op-Ed  on 12 and 13 August 2011

Part 1

AUGUST 7 was the 70th death anniversary of Rabindranath Tagore, and I remember his Nobel winning poetry which begins thus:
Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high

Incidentally, I found myself reading something similar in the spirit of this poem — Kamran Rehmat’s eloquent piece Meeting Jens Stoltenberg on the simplicity of Norwegian PM’s life and the minimal security he keeps (Dateline Islamabad, July 28). His rendezvous led me to the memory of the news in 1986, when Olof Palme was murdered while walking back from a cinema at night in Sweden.

“Prime Ministers walk back home?” — that was my instant reaction, then.
There is a reason why Nordic countries are considered the safest places to live. (I wonder if the recent Norwegian episode and its root cause will change that, but that’s beside the point here)

Reading through, one instantly compares them to the traffic standstills or detours one has to face when our politicians are passing.

The instant pop-up in my Third World mindset is — “Come on, those are developed nations and we are merely ‘developing’.”

It takes me back to what I gleaned from the movie The Last Emperor, in 1990, where they showed when the king passed through the streets of ancient China, the common man was asked to turn away their gaze  because their poor eyes weren’t worthy of seeing the emperor.

Perhaps, our politicians in power, too, are emperors in their own right, who live not in forts or castles by name — but their abodes are bedecked no less than castles and protected no less than fortresses. And the feet of the poor common man aren’t worthy
of treading the same street when the emperors pass through it.

But hold on.

I have two personal experiences from this very Third World where the high and mighty navigated with the same freedom and minimal security as the Norwegian or Swedish premiers.

One of them is none other than Mahathir Mohammed of Malaysia. (You might say that Malaysia is not much of a developing country but the reason why they have surged ahead is because of this very man about whom I will narrate a personal
anecdote.)

My family had been visiting Malaysia as tourists in 2002. This is during the last days of Ramadan and we chose to travel to Malaysia to see how their
Muslims celebrated Eid.

On the day of the festival, we went to the Central Mosque in Kuala Lumpur for prayers. Not sure of the timings, we reached the mosque way early and  my husband and son sat in the very first row, right behind the imam.

Meanwhile, I settled with my daughter in the first row of women’s area — ensuring that our men folk were well in sight.

After an hour or so, when the mosque had been reasonably full — no mad rush, mind you — a few men walked up to the front rows and some others started to make way for them. My husband was asked to move a little to the side, which he did. But to his utter surprise, the man for whom his space was being vacated was none other than President Mahathir Mohammed.

Having seen that my husband gave space to him, Mahathir smiled at him. My husband stepped forward, shook hands with him and introduced himself as a Pakistani, who had come to see Eid festivities in Malaysia.

After the prayers, he again turned to my husband and invited him to visit Putrajaya (president’s residence) and partake the open feast which the president hosted each year for his compatriots.

Our joy had no bounds — we almost thought that we were invited to a personal lunch with the president.
After a few hours of strolling in the Eid bazaars in Bukit Bintang (street), listening to the beautiful melodies of Salamat Hariraya (Malaysian Eid greeting), we dressed in our best and headed for Putrajaya.

It was a huge congregation, with tents put up and thousands of Malaysians, of all ethnicities, in a picnic mood and enjoying the ethnic food the Malays serve
on Eid. (To continue)

 Part 2 : 

MY family and I arrived at the Putrajaya (president’s house) and were told by someone that this was the last time the open Eid feast, which enabled the commoners to meet the president, would be held as Mahathir Mohammed had announced to step down.

We saw what looked like a hopelessly long queue on one side of the tent, leading to a door. We were told this was for those who would like to meet the first couple and give their Eid wishes to them. We joined the queue.

My husband told one of the guards that we were from Pakistan and President Mahathir himself had invited us, in an attempt to jump the queue. But the policeman just gave a hospitable smile and no more, which was signal enough for us to stay in the queue. It was a two-hour wait and my kids used it to make a small card out of some paper envelope, with a blue ball point sketching a flag of Pakistan and an Eid greeting.

Finally, our turn came. We shook hands with the first couple and to our utter surprise, he himself told his wife, “They are Pakistanis and have come to see our Eid.”

My kids gave them the card. We hugged them, Pakistani-style and were handed a plastic Tiffin on top of which was inscribed “Thanks from Putrajaya” with traditional Malaysian sweets inside. We got exactly the same box as everyone else and approximately, the same two or three minutes of chat as other locals.

To cut a long story short, in a fortnight’s stay in Malaysia, we happened to meet their president twice, and that, too, without much difficulty.

The second incident was in Kolkata (then- Calcutta), in late 1979, when I had been visiting the city with my parents, who were attending some conference. My parents chose to commute in bus as that was the most convenient mode to travel in the overcrowded metropolis.

In the middle of one journey, my father turned our attention towards a lean and thin dhoti-clad man who had climbed the bus. That man was Jyoti Basu, who had become the chief minister of West Bengal, just a year or so ago.

My father mentioned it to some of his friends but they weren’t surprised, for it was common knowledge that Basu sometimes boarded buses just to stay connected with hoi polloi.

Basu continued to win the people’s confidence for the next two decades (from 1977 to 2000). A CPI(M) member, he went on to introduce land reforms, giving opportunity to the poor to have their own lands. He brought political stability to the state to the extent when the whole of India was burning— once after Indira Gandhi’s assassination in 1984 following the Operation Blue Star, and the other at the demolition of Babri Masjid in 1992, his administration did not allow any rioting in his state.

Hence, it was not just a coincidence that we saw these men roaming free in public — years of commitment for the common man had made them fearless.

With this chain of thoughts, my mind shifts to the recent switch on-and-off that goes on in the killing fields of Karachi. It does not need a vision of 6/6 to see who all are behind these killing fields.

By all I mean ALL — none is above it. I wonder, with this track record and with the mess that the stake holders of ‘peace’ create, can they have the courage to sail freely among their own public like Mahathir and Basu?

No wonder our streets from Islamabad to Karachi come to a standstill when they sail fearfully on them.

And tragically, it is the common man, who gets labeled as hateful, narrow-minded and divided on ethnic and sectarian lines.

In conclusion, I want to revert to the closing lines of Tagore’s poem, which may serve as a prayer to us:

Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake.

The writer is a gynecologist, health activist,
and m-Health entrepreneur, of Indian origin,
married to a Pakistani

Category:

India, International, Pakistan, Peace, Personal, Published

The cost of crossing the ‘love’ border ~Indo-Pak Visa Part 2


Published in Aman Ki Asha blog by The News/Jang Group on August 03, 2011 http://www.amankiasha.com/detail_news.asp?id=509

For years after the Indian Consulate in Karachi was closed down, a cousin of mine (an Indian married to a Pakistani) whose parents live in Jaipur, followed the following trail year after year. She would travel from Karachi where she lives, to Islamabad to obtain an Indian visa. If successful, she would travel back to Karachi to pack up. She and her family would then travel to Lahore by train, and cross the Wagah-Atari border. They would then take a train from Amritsar to Delhi and then another to Jaipur. With 3 children, she could not afford air travel every year. 

The entire ordeal required her to travel over 4600 kilometres and several days in summer vacations, when in reality, the smallest distance between Jaipur and Karachi is only 1066 kilometres (through Khokrapar Munabao) and the train journey is just a 3-4 hours long.

I understood the real nightmare of this struggle some years ago when I had to travel from Karachi to Islamabad to get a visa for my father-in-law for his medical treatment in India.

My husband and I sat outside the Indian consulate in Islamabad for two days, sharing benches with people who had mostly come all the way from Karachi or Hyderabad. Most had been sitting there every day from 9 am to 5 pm for as long as 15 to 20 days at a stretch. The majority appeared to be daily wage earners, the poor and with no resources to take short cuts, like us, to obtain a visa – we had the parchi (‘slip’) that would expedite the visa process.

A lady and her husband, a carpenter hailing from Lalukhet in Karachi, had been sitting there every day for almost 20 days, from morning till the consulate closed in the evening, without any clue about whether they would be granted a visa or not. The embassy issues a limited number of visas each day. Names come up on a given day, their luck as unpredictable as a lottery. The more resourceful among the applicants jump the line, pushing these poor people to the back of the queue.

This couple had spent so much money on the travel from Karachi to Islamabad that they could not afford even a cup of tea from the tea stall outside the embassy, which caters to visa seekers. Every day the carpenter and his wife brought with them homemade rotis and pickle for lunch. I asked the woman how long she would sit there, and she replied with certainty: “When the money runs out, I will go back home whether I get the visa or not”.

She had applied after hearing that her mother was on her deathbed and had asked to see her one last time. She had been married for over twenty years but had been able to visit her native Hyderabad, Deccan, only once, and that too 12 years ago.

Her marriage had been a stroke of fate when her husband, a cousin from Pakistan, visited them. The poor family had been facing tough times, and found this as opportunity to make their daughter’s life better, as the cousin’s family was more prosperous. (How was she duped into marrying an already married man is another story for another time). 

This story is all too common to many families in the lower middle class strata who marry across the border; their girls are hardly able to visit their parents a handful of times in their lifetime, mostly due to not being able to afford the time, expenses and resources involved in obtaining the visa.

They resign themselves to their fate and learn to live with just memories of home. It is only when another sibling is about to get married; or a parent is ill; or dying, that they gather all their means and courage to try to obtain a visa to go to their erstwhile homeland.

The procedure has been somewhat modified now, so that people in other cities can apply for Indian visas through a courier service, without having to travel to Islamabad. But applicants still have no idea how long the process will take. A friend who wanted to attend her parents’ 50th wedding anniversary celebrations in India received a reply after an anxious six month wait, saying that her application papers were incomplete. Some don’t hear any news for a year or more; others don’t get any response at all.

Over the last two decades I have seen a see-saw situation. Things seem to move towards easing the procedure, then suddenly something occurs and the whole change is reset from the start.
A silver lining is that the Khokrapar-Munabao line, suspended since 1965, has been revived, reducing unnecessary distance for many.

I hope and wish that the latest news about easing of the borders does not remain restricted to the artists who travel on exchange programmes or businessmen attending conferences, but is extended to this voiceless, resigned group of poor, invisible women who marry across borders. I am afraid they are the group most likely to be forgotten when the categories are laid down for easing visa procedures.

Most will never be able to raise their own voice and will resign to their fate of seeing their parents or first of kin, barely a few times in their entire lives, after they cross the ‘love’ border in matrimony.
On their behalf, I beg the authorities concerned to hear the silent wails of these women and to ease the visa process making it easier for them too, so that they may see their parents and families more often.

Ilmana Fasih

The writer is an Indian gynaecologist and women’s health activist, married to a Pakistani. She blogs at https://thinkloud65.wordpress.com/

Category:

AmanKiAsha, India, Indo-Pak, Pakistan, Peace, Personal, Published, Social Issues, Women

Cross-border couples and their visa travails ~Indo-Pak Visa Part 1


Published in Aman ki Asha blog The News/Jang Group on July 27, 2011

“A marriage license doesn’t come with a job description or a set of instructions. There is definitely some ‘assembly’ required. In fact, putting together a marriage can be likened to assembling an airplane in flight” – Patricia Love

Every marriage needs a lot of reassembling in social, psychological and emotional terms. But when marriages take place across the Indo-Pak border they also involve a lot of political reassembling.

Indo-Pak marriages are different from other cross-border marriages – such unions between people from these two neighbouring countries are far tougher and more challenging than marriages across oceans between people with vast cultural differences. The distance between India and Pakistan does not entail crossing oceans or even cultures but one has to cross huge mountains of hurdles in terms of legal and bureaucratic formalities.

With the pendulous political love-hate relationship that exists between the two countries, marrying and staying happily married across the border (‘pyar border paar’) is no small feat. It takes a tough mind and resilient heart to brave the challenges.

There are personal challenges involved in every marriage. But the additional challenges in Indo-Pak marriages include taking certain decisions which may be painful. As a patriotic and a proud Indian, it was hard for me to surrender my Indian passport and apply for a Pakistani. Not that I had any grudges against the latter, but to give up your national identity is an experience you have to live, to know how it feels.

You might ask why would an educated woman change her nationality? The answer is simple. No one coerced me. I did it for the desire to have a peaceful family life and for the sake of our children (who were to arrive later).

My British, Canadian and Filipino friends married to Pakistanis live without any problems in Pakistan, using their original passports. But for an Indian this is not possible.
I did quite a bit of homework before taking this life-changing decision. I knew of instances where people in this situation had retained their nationalities, leading to many practical and political challenges. Most of them advised me to swallow this bitter pill and make the change, but finally, it was entirely my own decision.

In Pakistan, the ID cards of both parents are required to obtain documents for children like B-form, passport, and ID card. A mother with an Indian passport would mean inviting trouble, with more errands from office to office, or one section officer to another, to get ‘no objection certificates’ or NOCs.

Obtaining a visa to visit family across the border is any case a Herculean task if you don’t have connections in the high offices. And for a family like ours living in a third country I would, if I had maintained my Indian nationality, have to go through the gruelling process of obtaining a Pakistani visa each time we were to visit Pakistan. By giving up my nationality and becoming a Pakistani, I thought at least we have to struggle for the visa on one side only, when my children and husband want to visit India.

Unfortunately, my having been a born Indian, lived there for 23 years, and having parents still living there, does not mean that my husband and children will be given any extra consideration when they apply for an Indian visa. I know this is also the case for Pakistani women who are married and live in India. The visa policies work on a reciprocal basis.

Our visa troubles are not a once in a while exercise, but an annual struggle. The struggle which I have been undertaking for the past twenty years, almost each year, to visit my ageing parents exactly the way any married woman aspires to visit her family. As the time nears for the visa application, I always shudder with the apprehension of “What if…”

Families like ours have no choice but to face this ordeal every time they want to visit ‘home’. Visas may be sometimes facilitated and expedited for artists going on a cultural exchange or for businessmen but the procedure, the requirements, the scrutiny, the hurdles are all exactly the same for people like us. We have to stand in the same queue as those applying for a visit visa for a conference or meeting (there is no ‘tourist’ visa between our two countries), to visit to meet distant relatives once or maybe twice in a lifetime.

Each time I stand in front of the visa submission window of the Consulate of the country where I was born, which I still love and own as I did then, I feel as if I am being punished for my audacious decision to marry across border. My counterparts across the border must be feeling the same, I am sure.

Once, I was exceptionally lucky: I obtained an Indian visa while sipping a cup of coffee in the office of the Consul General, when the Consulate was in Karachi. The CG turned out to be my father’s student. We followed the usual application procedure of course, but he expedited it. Then, as we left, a plainclothes official intercepted my husband and asked for our purpose of having visited the CG’s room. He said that our car’s plate number had been noted and that we must not repeat this again.

All told, in the 21 years of my marriage I have been lucky that despite the hurdles and the painful waiting times, I have not faced any serious disappointments in ultimately obtaining a visa for India.

The only time I faced a major setback was after the Kargil war, when tensions were so high that I could not visit my parents for three years, despite running from pillar to post, pulling various influential strings. Then, not even ‘high connections’ were willing to go out of their way to help me. However, for a vast majority of women from India married to Pakistanis, especially those living in Pakistan, it is by no means a smooth sailing.

Ilmana Fasih

The writer is an Indian gynaecologist and women’s health activist, married to a Pakistani. She blogs at https://thinkloud65.wordpress.com/

Category:

AmanKiAsha, India, Indo-Pak, Pakistan, Personal, Published, Social Issues, Women

Dreaming of a world without hatred


The day for me, yesterday, began with the news of Mumbai blasts. Being an Indian origin who migrated after having married a Pakistani 20 years ago, first thing that occurred to me on hearing the blasts was that again the Indo-Pak peace talks shall be stalled and the same cascade of blame game, public statements from both sides, mudslinging, demanding ‘do more’ shall start. All it will serve to do is to reset the peace talks from the scratch. Spurts of cortisol laden with anxiety were rushing through my veins. As the mound of dead in the blasts were piling up, so was my fear in me, that a statement would come blaming Pakistan directly or implying of some group trained there. I knew it would be a sleepless night for me, following every minute of the TV coverage.

Later in the evening, Mumbai incident instantly vanished. There was an instant focus on the venomous words wagged by a rabid tongue. What was tragic was the cascade of events that took place, not just on land but on the walls of various Face Book friends.

It was not just the streets and the vehicles which were torched in anger, but many of the FB friends came out in the open, on their walls, in agreement with these insane words and splattered their share of fuel to the fire, against a whole community.

Within a couple of hours, one could see virtual borders drawn between the various ethnic groups, on a borderless virtual world of Face Book.

The frenzy of mindless hate did not spare me either. As I heard the statement, there was a severe convulsion of the ethnic Urdu speaking aka Muhajir in me. As if all of a sudden a sleeping immigrant woke up overpowering the ‘me’ in me, who till a moment ago took pride in rising above all kinds of differences. I never felt so much rage in me as at that moment. The hate in me wanted to avenge him.
I could sense the positivity drained out of me and replaced by an intense negative feeling of hate and loathing for this man. I would be lying if I would say that my mind did not wander trying to attempt hate for the community to which this mad man belonged. But thankfully, I still had intact memories of wonderful friends and great personalities from the same community and they kept my hateful sentiments in check. However hateful thoughts of this man kept jolting my head. I wanted him and all the ‘virtual’ friends on FB, who agreed with him, to be taught a ‘real’ lesson.
As if commenting on their walls wasn’t enough, I wanted to burn down their walls. In a couple of hours there was so much of energy drained out of me that instead of having spent this night in insomnia ( which is generally the rule when anything like the Mumbai blasts occurs) that I lay listless, and did not realise when was I lost into sleep. It was a restless sleep with visions of fire and blood splattered all over , on streets, on the FB walls. For a change these images did not make me sick. It did not make me feel good either, but it certainly wasn’t a sick feeling.

As I woke up in the morning, I reflected on my thoughts. I did not feel myself. This certainly was not me,.The monster of hate had engulfed me, last night.
After ages, I wept like a child. I cried how 25 years of my upbringing by staunchly secular parents and the rest 20 years of my own strong conviction in humanity as one were undone in a fraction of a second by the blurting of thoughtless statements by an insane man. I could see clearly now that it was a racist slur by a singular man not a community. I was grateful to my conscience, that the ‘me’ in me , who is blind to any color or creed, is taking control of me again.

I now realise exactly of what we read in history, of how passions go out of control, when incited with hateful words.

I also know now, first hand, how the feeling of intense loathing weakens a person physically and mentally in contrast to the strength of soul one gets in loving the whole humanity.

I also know now, first hand, how much of a sense of right vs wrong is blurred when one is overwhelmed with hatred.

I know now that my dream of a world without borders and a world without wars, on which I grew up, shall only be realised if we dream of a world without hatred.

I know exactly what do Pakistanis need, they need to shun hatred of all sorts.

Ilmana Fasih
July 14, 2011

Category:

My world, Pakistan, Peace, Personal, Social Issues, Uncategorized

When kids teach us lessons.


I know not what the name of this boy is or how old is he. But this picture, speaks a million words about his dreams and aspirations.

The comment along with this pic on Facebook, apparently written by his father, said:
Load shedding Schedule in Lahore: 01:00 am to 02:00 am 09:00 am to 10:00 am 02:00 pm to 4:00 pm 08:00 pm to 10:00 pm.

My son wrote this without any assignment. No one asked him to write but he expressed his feelings. He didn’t know that the power is a federal issue…oh! May be he’s right after 18th amendment. This phenomenon of electricity is leaving a deep and darkened effect on a child’s psychology. They can’t have sound sleep. Especially when they used to come back from school at 2:00 pm there is no electricity so they can’t have their lunch properly and same is at night when it goes from 8:00pm to 10:00pm. It also cut down somewhere in midnight in very hot conditions. From poverty to terrorism & economy to education it’s a root cause of many ills & evils but the stone heart leadership is silent on every public issue.

Perhaps good news and Pakistan aren’t friends any more.

The hope-hopelessness curve keeps convulsing with its aberrant spikes and dips in every heart .

After reading the note,jotted by these tender hands, the flame of hope rekindles. Kids are simply amazing. They teach us a million lessons of endurance and hope amidst adversity.

It is their aspirations and faith in their future which is perhaps the only flicker of hope left for us.

Syed Sher Ali’s (the boy in the picture, aged 8 years and a 4th grader–I come to know later) scribbling screams aloud the optimism, that millions of other kids like him whisper each moment.

I just wish that he remains as firm and steadfast in his resolve for all times to come. Let the whip of time not corrupt him, like it has corrupted us. Let the lashes of life not make him a pessimist, like it has made many of us.

Havent we, the grown ups, let them down by what world, what environment and what history we have offered to them?

What have we given them?
Nothing but misery and suffering.

And what do they give us?
Nothing but hope, hope for a better tomorrow.

The picture reminds me of the first half of Kahlil Gibran’s poem on Children:

Your children are not your children.
They are the sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you,
And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.
You may give them your love but not your thoughts,
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow,
which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.
You may strive to be like them,
but seek not to make them like you.
For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday

Category:

Pakistan, Peace, Personal

The Violin


The bow of my thoughts,
Glides hard
on the strings
Within the chest.
Triggers a convulsion
Fatal fibrillations ensue.
‘In arrest’ go
The pulsations of peace.
The notes scatter
helter skelter
Vexing with cramps
Of violent agony.
Music, is it?
Or cacophony perhaps?
Even I can’t decipher
From the violin
Of my heart.

Category:

MY POETRY, My world, Peace, Personal, Poetry