(3)
Both Mr. and Mrs. Nachnani’s parents had migrated to India at the wake of the bloodletting when the British colonial rulers decided to partition India into two nations in 1947. It was their way of saying ‘thank you’ to Gandhi who led the freedom struggle against the mighty empire and whom they hated to the core of their guts. The British lion was wounded badly during the Second World War by the German fighting machine and barely stood ground. Many an Indian would have been glad to see Britain trampled and overrun. Despite the viciousness of the Great War and the wanton massacres that Germans committed, and, the ruthlessness of their own subjugation at the hands of the British, the irony was not lost on them – the biggest colonizer in the world was on the brink of being run over and would have definitely fallen had the Americans not intervened so forcefully and valiantly.
The port city of Karachi, and indeed the entire western half of the Sind province with its majority Hindu population was awarded to Pakistan. It was on the banks of the river Sind that the Hindu civilization had taken roots - the Vedas were written on the banks of this very river by the rishis and munis.
Mrs. Nachnani was several years younger than Mr. Nachnani. Mohan Nachnani’s and Radha Gokani’s parents knew each other for a long time. They grew up in the same part of Karachi. Mohan Nachnani was fifteen years old and Radha was only ten when their parents were forced out of the city that they loved dearly and were flourishing in. First, each family stayed with their relatives in various parts of northern India. Finally, after several years of trials homeless wanderings in cramped, over-crowded refugee camps, they moved on to Ulhasnagar in the outskirts of Bombay. This was an area where a large number of Sindi speakers from Pakistan had ultimately settled - it is said that Ulhasnagar is like a state within a state for the Sindhis in India.
The Indian government provided them with some money, but mostly the refugees were on their own. Mr. Nachnani’s parents were in the garment business in Karachi and started a small clothing store in Ulhasnagar. Radha Gokani’s parents started a grocery business. They worked hard like millions of refugees who had to move from Pakistan to India and the other way around just because of their religions.
Their parents recounted to them the horrors of being evicted. They said that Muslims murdered thousands of Hindus after torching their homes. In many cases they threw out the Hindu families from their homes with nothing but the clothes on their bodies. Later on, Madhuri learnt that Hindus and Sikhs on the Indian side Punjab evicted and killed many Muslims – however, the rest of the country was calm under Gandhi’s leadership. In fact, the vast majority of Indian Muslims stayed back in India while that did not happen with Hindu’s in Pakistan.
Mohan Nachnani had five siblings with two brothers and two sisters. He was the youngest of all. Radha Gokani’s parents had four children – three boys and one girl. She was the youngest.
Mohan received good education in the free public schools, ultimately going to the Bombay University for masters in Chemistry. Radha earned a bachelor’s degree in Political Science from the same university. They had an arranged marriage and stayed with Mohan’s parents for a while as a part of a joint family. They had cramped quarters, just a room for themselves.
In 1968, a daughter was born to the couple. Soon after that Mohan who was working in Bombay applied to the US Consulate for a green card. US were, for the first time, seeking educated immigrants from the Indian subcontinent to make up for the thousands who were sent to Vietnam. Mohan came to the US alone, soon got a job at a pharmaceutical company and sent for Radha and Madhuri. Their son followed in 1972 – they named him Gautam.
They stayed in Queens initially and ultimately settled in Edison in New Jersey. He has been working at a large pharmaceutical company for over twenty five years in its research department. He did not rise through the ranks of the company - which he knew was common among immigrants. But the pay was adequate, they lived in a decent house, took vacations in India every two or three years.
They developed friendship with several Indian families in New York and New Jersey. There was a sprinkling of Pakistani families as well in their circle of friends. Though the Pakistani families were Muslims, there was a similarity in language and also in food habits, except that as Hindus Nachnanis did not eat beef. They used to go to movies in New York’s Columbia University where Hindi films were screened during the weekends.
The kids did well in school. But though they were evicted from Sind because of their religion, they did not push religion on their kids. They would go to the Hindu temple in Bridgewater in New Jersey and the Queens in New York during Diwali and on a couple of other occasions during the year and take their kids with them. However, Mohan and Radha prayed regularly in the morning in front of the small statue of Shiva that they had placed in their family room.
(4)
They went on honeymoon to France and Spain. In France they walked along the broad boulevard of … and along the Seine. They absorbed the spirit of the Eiffel Tower. In Spain they visited the relics of the Moorish culture in the grand structure of Alhambra.
Zeenat and Imran initially moved into Imran’s palatial home in suburban Washington DC. Soon she found a job with a firm in the downtown area and they moved again - this time to their own apartment. They led a normal life - just like any recently married American couple. They visited the museums in the city and basked themselves in the ….during that summer.
Zeenat’s relationship with her own parents remained strained for quite some time. Imran’s sister and mom took her to the big mosque in Fairfax unfailing during the weekend.
Within a year of the marriage, Zeenat and Imran had a baby boy. They named him Altaf after Imran’s grandfather. Zeenat’s parents forgot all the anger when they saw the baby – his face was so pure and beautiful to their eyes. The baby was the soothing palliative that was needed to heal the psychological and emotional wounds. The relationship with their daughter that had completely been severed for over a year started thawing and became normal again. In fact it was Zeenat who called he mom to inform her about the baby’s birth. Her mother loved kids so much that she could not keep the news away from her.
The baby was promptly circumcised under the observant eyes of a maulavi.
A year later, a baby daughter was born to the young couple.
(to be concluded in the next issue)
Jukti Kalita, a marketing professional with a Ph.D. from Columbia university has written several short-stories and translated several Assamese stories to English. First and second parts of this story were published in February and March 2007 issues.
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