A Fine Family: A Novel (4 page)

Bauji thought about what the guru had said. He was struck by the logical strength of the guru’s arguments; however, his heart shied from commitment. Religious faith was too far away from his worldly temper.

‘Why don’t the two of you go for a walk in the morning?’ suggested the guru to Seva Ram and Bauji. ‘Shall we say at 5. 30. The day breaks early nowadays.’

The next morning Bauji was woken up at four when a gong went off. It was the start of the day at the ashram, beginning with a bath and followed by meditation. The two men, so unlike in physique, met as planned. The boy, shorter and slimmer, wore the working dress of a Punjabi peasant—a thin long shirt and baggy pants held up by a drawstring. Bauji again noticed the boy’s large hands and curly hair. His eyes were innocent and sincere, thought Bauji, but they were also remote.

There was an awkward shyness between the two. Bashfully Seva Ram led Bauji up the river.

‘I suppose you sleep late in Lyallpur.’

‘No, as a matter of fact, I’m usually in my office by eight.’

The boy smiled, and with a laugh Bauji added, ‘Yes, I suppose that is late by your standards.’

Bauji saw a hazy mist rising from the water. The air was not yet warm, and the sun was ascending behind the main dome in the east. The boy led the way and they walked on, making small talk, until they reached a clearing, from which they could see the railway bridge in the distance.

Bauji wanted to ask Seva Ram about his job, his career prospects, and other things appropriate of a future son-in-law. Instead they talked about the guru and the spiritual life.

‘What does the guru teach?’ asked Bauji.

‘To seek the truth,’ replied the boy.

‘And how do you find the truth?’

‘Through meditation.’

‘How do you know when you have found it?’, asked Bauji.

‘When I have become free from the demands of my ego and from the control of selfish longings which bind me to my body and other daily concerns.’

The boy had a natural grace, decided Bauji. It seemed that he had also thought about what he was saying.

After the walk Bauji went to listen to the guru’s discourse. He sat cross-legged on the ground in the impressive hall, which had minarets at each corner. The guru was dressed in a loose and comfortable white
kurta.
He sat slightly higher on a platform, so that he could be seen by everyone. At his side sat another bearded old man, who chanted verses of the medieval saint, Nanak, which the guru elaborated and commented upon. Everyone’s eyes were adoringly fixed on the guru and they listened in rapt attention.

In a low and clear voice the guru explained that the purpose of human life was to merge with the Infinite. He likened Infinite to an ocean and the human soul to a drop of water, which has a natural urge to merge with the ocean. ‘Fortunately,’ he added, ‘the Infinite is within each of us, and by emptying our mind of all thought and concentrating attention at the eye centre, one can journey inwards towards the Infinite. The journey begins with meditation, when the five senses and the mind are stilled and the intellect is silent. Meditation helps the mind to become free from the awareness of subject and object and attain one-pointedness.’ To help quiet the mind, the guru offered a mantra. The mantra, he explained, was merely a set of words, whose meaning was not relevant, but it had to be repeated quietly in order to divert one’s mind from the restless chain of thoughts. The practice of meditation, he added, was helped by living simply, eating only when hungry, drinking only when thirsty, and reducing living to essentials. The guru concluded by saying, that if they didn’t believe him, why didn’t they experiment and find out for themselves.

Bauji was impressed with this logic, and moved by the possibilities of meditation. Sceptical by nature and shy of religion, he was amused to see himself being swept by the guru and the ashram’s atmosphere.

From the mystic calm of the ashram, the guru and the river, Bauji was brutally thrown into the mundane world. On his way home, as he was getting into the train at Jullunder, he found himself trapped in the middle of what the next day’s newspapers called ‘a minor communal disturbance’. The papers went on to praise ‘the speed and firmness with which the police put down the disorder’, but Bauji remembered only his humiliation.

Suddenly, as if out of nowhere, two handsome Muslim boys, scarcely twenty years old, emerged. They confidently walked into his compartment, and with extreme courtesy asked Bauji his name. Bauji gave it to them. When they heard it they spat in his race and turned to run away, but their way was blocked by a gentleman with a suitcase who had entered at that precise moment. The gentleman had seen what had happened. He slapped the boy closest to him squarely across the cheek. The blow was struck with such force that the sound was heard all over the noisy platform. The boys were taken aback and managed to beat a quick retreat. Bauji smiled gratefully at his benefactor, though he felt ashamed. The ironic discovery that his benefactor was a Muslim momentarily diverted him from his own humiliation.

A third passenger entered shortly, and informed them that there had been a communal riot that morning in the area around the railway station. The trouble had apparently started because a Hindu procession had played music outside the Muslim mosque. The Muslims had regarded this as a provocation and had retaliated. The next morning’s papers placed the casualties at ‘four dead, twenty wounded, two shops burned, two cases of rape’. By the time the police arrived on the platform Bauji’s train had started to move. Just as well, he thought, that he was spared the ordeal of publicly recounting his humiliation. Neither he nor the Muslim gentleman mentioned the incident again during the journey.

As the train gathered speed, Bauji’s feelings of shock and humiliation were gradually replaced by calm reflection of what had happened. He was surprised by the clarity of his mind so soon after this unpleasantness. He did not feel hatred for the two boys: they were part of a tide which was carrying the Punjab towards an unthinkable doom. The mischief had been unleashed not by Jinnah alone (as everyone believed) but also by Gandhi.

Bauji felt comfortable with the Congress movement so long as it was led by men like Gokhale, who spoke the familiar language of liberalism and the law. But the entry of Gandhi at the end of World War I had set it on a path of ‘direct action’ and given it a more Hindu complexion. Bauji distrusted Gandhi’s methods of civil disobedience and mass agitation. They caused division everywhere—the biggest one being between Hindus and Muslims. And Gandhi seemed oblivious of it. For Gandhi—with all his fads and fasts, his mud baths, goat’s milk, days of silence, non-violence—was fundamentally a Hindu. Although he claimed to be a ‘Muslim, Parsee, Christian, and Hindu’, who else but a Hindu could expect people to take such a quixotic idea seriously?

Like a true Hindu, who prefers dreams to facts and ideals to reality, Gandhi did not seem to realize that he was playing with fire. The more he succeeded with the masses the more he alienated the Muslims. Where was all this leading to? Today’s incident at the railway station was merely a sign of what was to become of the Punjab. His own life had not been in danger today, but no one had been able to save that poor innocent boy in the Company Bagh last month. In their quest for independence the politicians had ended by inflaming latent communal passions. He could not believe that they would sacrifice the Punjab as a price for gaining India’s independence. He was convinced that dreamers were dangerous and should not be allowed into the realm of public affairs.

The next day was a holiday and the sun shone on a refreshed Bauji. He had just finished a glass of cold, frothy buttermilk, and he sat in the courtyard, feeling pleased with himself, waiting to be shaved. The barber had been especially summoned, not only because Bauji needed a shave but because Bhabo had insisted that his advice be taken on the marriage proposal. After all, her own marriage and that of her mother and grandmother had rested on the counsel of. the family barber who had also acted as a go-between. She was finding this manner of deciding her daughter’s future exceedingly irregular, especially since the groom’s parents were not even in the picture.

Bauji looked in the barber’s mirror and saw the razor cleanly wipe the lather from his face in the luminous stillness of the morning—a calm which was periodically broken by the cry of a peacock in the distance. As he watched the sun’s rays fall at different angles on the gleaming razor, he could not bring himself to share his proposal with the barber; instead he let his mind wander pleasantly over recollections of his favourite daughter, Tara.

He remembered the day she was born. He had wanted a son, and at first he would not pick her up. Bhabo had called him a stubborn fool: it was God’s will that they should have a daughter and they should rejoice in His will. Gradually he got used to her. Even as a child, she had a restless will to succeed which was similar to his. She thought for herself and she acted quickly, but always with a clear sense of purpose.

When she was seven, he recalled that her teacher had asked Tara to bring her buttermilk at midday. Since they lived close by Tara was initially happy to bring a jugful of Bhabo’s creamiest. It pleased her that her teacher really enjoyed it. Soon she realized, however, that something was wrong. The teacher began to take the buttermilk for granted, and even scolded her if it wasn’t sufficiently creamy or cold. Tara also felt guilty, even though the other girls didn’t say anything. Abruptly one day she stopped bringing the buttermilk. When questioned by the teacher, Tara replied that she wasn’t going to bring it anymore. Initially she suffered for this, but eventually the teacher understood that Tara had a mind of her own.

Bauji smiled at the picture of his seven-year-old Tara standing up to her primary school teacher. His agreeable meandering came to a sudden end as he looked up in the barber’s mirror and noticed a handsome, confident and triangular face. It belonged to his nephew, Karan. He did not turn around but pretended to concentrate on the razor’s movement in the sensitive area between the chin and the lips. He knew that his solitary communion with the lather was over as Karan’s arrival was always an event, especially amongst the women in the house.

‘Shh. . . .’, said Karan putting his finger on his lips, ‘an eminent barrister of Lyallpur was seen turning his tonga around at the corner of Kacheri Bazaar two days ago in pursuit of a dubious objective.’

Bauji noticed the sparkling brown eyes reflected in his mirror and the naughty smile, and he realized why this young man was so attractive to women. But he was clearly taking liberties with his uncle today.

‘Really, I wonder who it was,’ said Bauji innocently.

‘That shouldn’t be difficult to find out. I should say that he was tall and well built, with greying hair; he sported a smart moustache, and. . . .’

‘Enough, you insolent wretch! Don’t you have anything better to do?’ This was too much. Bauji felt that he should be offended, but he could not bring himself to be angry at this elegant and confident youth, who was a favourite of the entire household.

Karan became serious. ‘Didn’t you hear, Bauji?’ he said in his slightly nasal voice, ‘Gandhi announced the “Quit India” resolution last night in Bombay !’ The seriousness of this historic news was in complete contrast to the ironic tone of its messenger.

‘How do you know, boy?’

‘It was on the radio this morning,’ replied Karan as he placed his long, self-possessed hands on the back of Bauji’s chair. ‘We are not expected to cooperate with the British government—not until they give a commitment for the independence of India.’

‘No one is going to give Gandhi that kind of commitment—not in the middle of a war,’ burst out Bauji.

There was a pause. Bauji looked into the mirror and saw the mysterious eyes smiling again with subdued irony. Meanwhile, the unmistakable nasal twang was a powerful signal to the rest of the house. Everyone came rushing downstairs.

‘But what does it
really
mean?’ asked Tara, who was the first to arrive. ‘What is going to happen?’ She looked up adoringly at Karan.

‘You are not mixed up in all this, are you my boy?’ interrupted Bhabo anxiously.

Karan gave Bhabo a shy look, and turned his thin frame towards Tara. His light-hearted eyes became serious.

‘It means that we are not to cooperate with the police, the civil administration, and in fact the entire machinery of the British Raj.’

‘Oh, Gandhi’s usual stuff!’ remarked Tara cynically.

‘No Tara, this is different,’ said Karan and he smiled.

At the mention of her name, Tara reddened visibly.

The barber had finished shaving Bauji and was now massaging his face. Bauji sensed a subdued sensuality in the sultry air. He seemed to see his daughter with a fresh eye. She appeared to be visibly affected by the voluptuousness of the moment. Although no beauty, she was attractive enough. She had an arresting face, with a square jaw and a pointed chin. Her dark, spirited eyes were crowned by thick black eyelashes, and surrounded by jet black hair. The colour of her skin was what Bhabo’s matchmaking friends called ‘wheatish’.

Her upper lip curved prettily on her fine oval face. Standing in a white and blue cotton sari under the shade of the mango tree beside her family, Tara presented an attractive picture. A closer look, however, revealed that the same dark brown eyes could be turbulent and resolute. She was tall and generously proportioned, he thought, glancing at her youthful rising bosom. Her smooth skin was framed by a mass of raven hair which fell down to her rounded hips. The immoderate atmosphere reminded him of the stranger in the burkha and it seemed to seduce him too. He felt envious of Karan’s youth and sorry for himself and his missed opportunities. His thoughts began to wander along a decidedly erotic direction, although without a specific object. He continued to watch the two excited people without fully taking in what was being said. The massage stopped and he was suddenly jolted back to reality.

‘The man is mad,’ said Bauji lunging forward and almost knocking down the barber. ‘To launch civil disobedience when the Japanese are at our doorstep!’