CITRUS

Enmity at the border | Amity at heart

BIG STORY OF THE FORTNIGHT

INDIA-PAKISTAN FRACAS FOR 67 YEARS

Having suffered the same fate 67 years back, and after being at the receiving end of the whims of then political leaders, India and Pakistan have put up quite a juvenile entertainment at the border for the world to watch, for the last nearly seven decades. Ironically, the people have been more mature and are the best of pals! They love each others' cricket, cricket stars, cinema, music, food, clothes, even movie stars, TV soaps and singers. At the eve of Independence Day of both the countries (Aug 14 & Aug 15 respectively for Pakistan and India), Mohsin Maqbool Elahi from Karachi and Debraj Mookerjee from New Delhi reflect upon the people's love which makes the run-down political strategy a little erroneous

August 1, 2014

INDIANS and Pakistanis have a lot more in common than just watching cricket matches played between their teams. The Indian and Pakistani diaspora living in the US, Canada, England, Singapore, Hong Kong and anywhere else you might be able to think of, love nothing better than being in each other's company on festive occasions.

Once during Diwali in November 1984, while studying at Richland Community College in Dallas, a Bangladeshi friend and I were invited by some Hindu-Gujarati friends (from Ahmedabad) to celebrate the festival of lights with them. We immediately jumped at the opportunity. I am sure we must have enjoyed the scrumptious edibles. But what really got us excited was when we were asked to do the dandiya raas with them. It was a first for me. Each of us we were given a pair of dandiyan (sticks) for the dance. I was in a daze as we clashed our sticks like swords with the beautiful womenfolk, while the music played. The latter truly gave me a tough time keeping up with them.

In May 1985, Lata Mangeshkar and Kishore Kumar were giving a one-night concert in Houston. A friend of mine, his mother and I were definitely not going to miss it as we all loved listening to Indian film songs and watching Indian films, both mainstream and parallel cinema. Soon we were in the auditorium which was jam-packed with Indians and Pakistanis. When Kishore invited people from the audience to dance to Eena Meena Deeka, (a famous Bollywood number) about a dozen youth, mostly Pakistani girls in their early teens, were soon on stage. It was a stupendous concert where everybody had a rollicking time.

The first time I watched a film at a theater outside India was in Frankfurt on Eid-ul-Azha aka Bakra Eid in October 1980. My elder brother took his Turkish wife, his son and, of course, me for the screening. It was the Feroz Khan blockbuster, Qurbaani. There was an equal number of Pakistanis as well as Indians in the cinema hall. Everybody had mile-long smiles on their faces as they exited the theater. Nobody needs to be reminded what a smash hit Nazia Hassan's Aap jaisa koi meri zindagi mein aye was, from Karachi to Calcutta, and from London to Los Angeles. It was THE song that was on everybody's lips — be they Indians, Pakistanis or Bangladeshis.

Tailpiece: I have three times more Indian friends on my Facebook than do I have Pakistanis. And I feel mighty proud to say that I share an excellent rapport with most of them. So who says Indians and Pakistanis can't be the best of friends!?

Dawn staffer, Mohsin Maqbool Elahi has been a journalist for the past 23 years. He loves reading, creative writing, word puzzles, watching films, listening to music, and, of course, travelling. He also loves writing book reviews for Dawn's Books & Authors' section. He also writes occasionally for The Shillong Times.
Mohsin can be reached at m.mohsin.e@gmail.com

August 1, 2014

Frankly, I felt no thrill run down my spine as I took the final step across the Attari-Wagah border, headed for Lahore. I was with a theatre team from India, invited to participate in a festival organized by Government College University.

The porter, working inside our border, wore blue. The porter across the border wore blue. Same shades, same loose fitting uniforms, with the same tired looks on the faces. As the Indian hefted his load onto the shoulders of the Pakistani, the symbolism behind the transfer of burden was not lost on me. We have the same history, we have the same inheritance, and we share the same lack of human dignity.

Lahore is a little like Delhi and yet not quite. Delhi represents the trajectory of India’s post-Independence story. While in India, power has been transferred to a professional middle class, in Pakistan the real power was, is, and will possibly continue to be, wielded by the feudal elite. In Delhi you’ll find rows upon rows of apartments. In Lahore there is almost none. You have old colonial homes, and you have the walled city. Of course there are the odd stand-alone homes, newly done, betraying that same tacky architectural ‘brutalism’ that defines north Indian sensibilities.

The most startling similarity between Delhi and Lahore, of course, is the influence of the Punjabi way of life. The retail trade is bustling. Women make it a point to be well-groomed in Pakistan. Across classes, no more than one in 50 women sport the burkha; probably five sport a scarf, not one bit functional, in fact, very trendy. The mullah’s dictates are accepted with a huge pinch of salt at best; most times he is seen as irrelevant. At the theatre festival I was amazed to see an Islamia University show parody the antediluvianisms of an on-stage Mullah. The liberal gloss that binds quotidian the existence of the Lahori is in great measure the contribution of Panjabiyat. ‘Khao piyo mast raho’ (eat, drink and make merry) is the Punjabi way; the Lahori way.

Lahore does not sleep. I have done my fair share of travelling, but nowhere have I found two-year-old kids freaking out on joyrides at 1.30 am. Joy Land, an amusement park with awesome rides shuts at 2 am. Nearby, Big Macs roll out until three in the morning and women’s stores are choc-a-block while the rest of the world sleeps. Eateries, smiles, loud chatter, the peals of laughter define night life in Lahore.

Not just consumerist Lahore, inside the Walled City, the winding lanes, describing a thousand tales of life being lived to its fullest, is awake. Kebab shops are bustling until three in the morning. Mesmeric strains of qawwali from Mazhars (shrines dedicated to Pir Babas or sufi saints who practiced the path of the mystic, and therefore were a bane to orthodoxy), pierced the night sky that hovers over never-ending canopy of squat rooftops set cheek-by-jowl.

On an open stretch of land there is a night cricket tournament on, complete with commentary and the ubiquitous tape ball (a tennis ball wrapped in a white tape; incidentally, Wasim Akram learned the tricks of the trade with just such a ball!).

The Punjabi influence manifests in strange ways. A table fans rotates fastest when the knob’s turned to ‘one’; ‘three’ is the lowest setting. This rule holds for most things in Pakistan. Bikes are inevitably 70 cc, and Chinese. There are clandestine night races along the canal that works its way into Lahore from India. And yes it is quite a sight seeing someone do a wheelie on a 70 cc bike!

Debraj Mookerjee is an Academic and Commentator, and is the
Associate Professor at University of Delhi.
He can be reached at debraj.mookerjee@gmail.com