A Pakistani Family's Personal Holocaust
A Pakistani Family's Personal Holocaust
A Pakistani Family's Personal Holocaust
The summer of 1947 was no different from previous summers. As usual, we spent the summer vacation in Srinagar, Kashmir with my beloved aunt, Akthar. Most often, I spent my summer vacations with Akthar, a few times with my younger aunt, Khalida. That fateful summer, we were all residing at a beautiful villa called Shanker Bhawan.
At this picturesque location, on the corner of Gagrabal road and Dul Boulevard, my Uncle Hamidullah (Akthar's husband), was also my father's first cousin. Hamidullah was a MP and at that time, acting president of the Muslim Conference, which sat in opposition to the National Conference led by Sheikh Abdullah.
We were immensely enjoying the company of our group of ten cousins. I had become very fond of nineteenth century English classics. I was reading Jane Eyre and translating it to my cousins who didn't speak English well. My cousin, Muna, (now my brother's wife), and my cousin Zarina could see the gorgeous view of Dul lake with floating chakras (boats for recreation similar to gondolas) from the window of our room. At the same time, we could see the Maharaja palace from the other side of the lake.
In July, 1947, we knew that the new independent nation of Pakistan would be created by the partition of India. Frankly, we were very happy about this imminent event. We also knew that it would affect the nation as a whole, but at a personal level, we could never imagine what was to come.
On August 14, 1947, the nation of Pakistan (which means home of the pure) came into existence. India celebrated its independence on August 15. We were still in Srinagar (Kashmir) at that time. Meanwhile, my father was back home in Gujarat, West Punjab, a town midway between Lahore and Rawalpindi. My cousins and I saw the exodus of millions of Hindus migrating to India. My father helped many of his lawyer friends to migrate safely, but he also heard some horror stories of violence as well. My father repeatedly insisted that we should all return home as soon as possible, because things might take a worse turn later on.
Hence, we all returned to my aunt's home in Jammu in early September 1947. By that time, the train service between Sialkot (West Punjab) and Jammu had stopped operating. Responding to my father's request, my uncle Azam (Khalida's husband), who as a magistrate had witnessed the horrors of post partition violence, agreed to bring us all back to Sialkot by road. Azam obtained special permission to drive his own vehicle to Jammu. Uncle Azam's family and mine returned by car. Uncle Azam told Akthar that he would make a return trip to pick up her family.
Unassumingly, Akthar decided that she would stay back for a few days to get the house and carpets cleaned. Around that time, Hamidullah went to Karachi to meet the new President and Founder of Pakistan, Mohammad Ali Jinnah. Thus, his return to Jammu Kashmir was banned. Hamidullah's family was left in Srinagar by themselves.
In retrospect, it's ironic that Akthar's oldest son Anwar had travelled by Tonga (a horse pulled carriage) to see his father in Sialkot. Hamidullah was urging all Muslims to stay with their families; so naturally, it would not look good to ignore his own words in regards to how he treated his family. However, Hamidullah did not want his wife to remain in Srinagar without an older male member. Thus, Anwar, the oldest son, age sixteen was staying with Akthar along with Arshad-thirteen and Amjad-sixteen months. Two of the couple's daughters were also in Srinagar, Iffat-ten and Nuzat-five.
Also staying with my aunt's family were my other two cousins, Muno and Jinno, who were my uncle Hamid's nieces. The parents of those cousins had both died in 1944 and Hamidullah had since raised them as his own children.
October 1947 arrives. Akthar had to leave her own home, which was in a minority Muslim area, and move into a Mahalla (Muslim majority area). Her hard of hearing male servant, Nutto (pronounced Nuth-oh) moved with her. After moving out, my fun loving cousin Iffat broke her wrist while playing on a swing. A seemingly unremarkable incident at the time, this injury would be significant later on.
By the end of October, all of the Muslims who would be soon migrating to Pakistan were placed in a camp that was barely two hundred yards from Akthar's home. Akthar was not allowed to travel to her home to obtain food for her sixteen month old son. Finally, late at night during their first day in the camp, Nutto stealthily walked away and brought back a bunch of almonds which he crushed to make some milk for the hungry infant.
From the camp, the government started transporting the detainees via bus to Pakistan. Unfortunately, Akthar's family could not get seats on the first day's bus which left Srinagar on Wednesday, November 5.
Sikhs who were migrating from West to East Punjab launched their first attack late that night near the border between India and the nascent Pakistan. Consequently, most of the bus passengers were able to flee to Pakistani soil and escape their pursuers. Frustrated that their first attack had been relatively unsuccessful, with a low number of casualties, the Sikhs planned a better coordinated offensive for the following morning.
The fateful day, Thursday, November 6, 1947 arrived. Akthar and her family were able to get seats on the second last bus of the day. The entire family were sitting on the same seat, except for my cousin Anwar. Originally, they were unable to get seats on the bus, but one of Hamidullah's friends helped all the family members, with the exception of Akthar's oldest son, to get seats on the bus. Anwar was sitting on the roof of the bus, along with several other young men. It was quite cool that morning, so the passengers started their approximately two hour journey feeling quite comfortable.
The convoy started on a Thursday morning at about 10:30 am. All buses headed towards Pakistan were travelling on the side of the Jammu canal. Akthar's family's bus had travelled only several miles when the convoy was stopped at about 11 am along the canal bank. Hundreds of Sikhs with machine guns had surrounded the convoy.
Akthar gave the bus driver all her money, including about a pound of gold jewellery to try to persuade him to keep moving, but the driver wouldn't budge. It was unclear whether the bus drivers were in cahoots with the Sikhs and still is to this day. The driver quickly snatched the jewellery, but the bus didn't move an inch.
All the passengers were ordered out of the buses. Arshad resembled his father, so Akthar insisted that he pull his hat down over the top of his face. There were bushes surrounding the canal. Arshad was pushed face down into the bush. Half the bush was inside the canal, half was out. One warrior then sliced through Arshad's back three times with a two foot long sword. Blood gushed out of the youngster's back like a tiny geyser.
As this was surreal scene was unfolding, Akthar was holding Amjad with her left hand; with her right hand, she was holding her soon to be five year old daughter, Nazo. One militant severely cut her middle finger, ring finger and little finger, causing the three appendages to be bent for life. Literally sliced out of her mother's grip, Nazo ran as fast as she could, but was easily scooped up by one of the militants. From afar, a Sikh yelled out, "Don't kill her (Akthar). I'm going to take her for myself."
At that point, Akthar leaped into the canal, still holding Amjad. She clung tightly to one of the bushes with her left hand, grasping Amjad with her right. The water in the canal is cold even in summer, so it was even colder now with a temperature in the mid 50's Fahrenheit. The attack continued until late afternoon. Akthar remained in the water with her infant son for almost six hours.
Akthar felt like she had been in the canal for days. Finally, a helicopter carrying then Sheikh Abdullah flew over the scene of carnage. Abdullah was the leader of the National conference of the state of Jammu and Kashmir. He was also a good friend of India's first Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru. A megaphone blurted out the message: "The attack is over. Anybody who is alive can come out now." Akthar emerged from the cold water and tried desperately to examine the area where Arshad was thrown, but she couldn't see a body. By the time Pakistani officials reached her, all the other injured individuals had been moved to three different camps.
Wet and disoriented, Akthar didn't see anybody whom she recognized. Worse, she had no idea what had happened to the rest of her family. Finally, she caught a glimpse of a body that looked like Anwar. The boy was lying flat on his back with a bullet in his chest. The body was right on the side of the canal. After seeing the body, Akthar said that everything became blurry to her. She didn't know where she was going or who was taking her.
Akthar was taken to a camp where there was nothing to eat except wild plants and grass. There were no medical aids. Everybody slept outside. After a couple of days, the detainees moved. If they had stayed in that camp any longer, Amjad might not have survived. Hamidullah's friend learned that Akthar and her infant were in the camp. Knowing that the child would not survive long in that camp, he recommended that Akthar be transferred to Jammu City Hospital, and the recommendation was approved by Indian authorities.
Akthar remained in the hospital for twenty days until she was finally allowed to cross the border and travel to Sialkot. In just three weeks, her hair had turned from light brown to a solid grey. Meanwhile, Hamidullah had travelled to Gujrat, the family home town, where he would lose consciousness intermittently. After the attack, the first to arrive in Sialkot was Nathoo, the servant, who left Srinagar on November 7.
Immediately, Hamidullah asked, "Where is Bebe?" and Nathoo started crying. At that moment, Hamidullah fainted.
When one of the militants took Muna out of the bus, he pulled her by the hair and asked her "Are you Ramatullah's daughter?" The Sikh thought that Hamidullah's name was Ramatullah. Then, when the females who were targeted for abduction were gathered together, Muna and Iffat saw each other and clung to each other tightly. In a tiny demonstration of generosity, their abductors agreed to keep them together.
A small group of militants walked with the two cousins for many miles before entering a village in East Punjab. One of the militants was initially sitting on Iffat's wrist, which because it had been broken earlier, caused her tremendous discomfort. While with the abductors, the cousins were made to do manual labor including milling with a pestle and mortar to produce cattle feed. Muna used to think that another revolution would have to occur before she could see her family again. Muna and Iffat remained in this village for two months.
Meanwhile, Muna's grandfather had helped many people (Hindus) from a village near Faisalabad to move to East Punjab. One of the beneficiaries of the grandfather's assistance was from this village and notified our family in Gujrat by letter.
Azim went there with my uncle Ijaz and the police to reclaim the girls. Initially, Muno and Iffat felt they were being tricked to go somewhere else. But eventually, the girls returned home and that was a rare happy day.
Jinno (Zarina) fifteen, was the first in the family to arrive, after one week. She had been abducted by a dogra (clan of the Maharaja). The dogra kept her for one night at his sister's place, and then he decided to take her by foot to his house. As she was wearing several layers of clothing, Jinno began feeling warm during the evening walk and threw her sweater to the ground. The dogra kept on picking up things she had thrown on the ground.
A policeman saw the sweater and felt there was something wrong about this couple. He asked the dogra, "What is she to you". The dogra answered, "She is my sister." Zarina said "I'm not his sister, He's taking me away by force" At that point, the policeman took Zarina to a camp, and one week later, she was allowed to cross the border.
At this point, nobody knew anything about the fate of five year old Nazo. My uncle had provided a picture of Nazo to the DIG (deputy inspector general) in Lahore.
It is now 1952, when Mom was in college. Deputy Inspector General Rizvi showed Hamidullah a picture of a girl who resembled Nazo. Rizvi added that the girl's name is Farhanda. A teacher whose doctor friend's five year old daughter was also missing, Farhanda, spoke up and said "Her name is Farhanda." Iffat, Mom and Hamidullah crossed into Jammu with Akthar to get Nazo. Nazo used to have jet bobbed black hair and a fair complexion. The girl we saw had grown perhaps a couple of inches in five years. She had a red sclera in her eyes, which used to be blue. Her hair was dark brown, tied back.
The lady in charge of the camp invited the family group to have tea with Nazo. Mom remembered only that the young girl didn't allow anything to drop out of her mouth. Nazo had a birthmark that looked like a representation of the number one in the middle of her forehead, between her eyebrows. That mark was no longer there. When Nazo was one year old, she had a boil above her nose. A servant took her to the hospital and had her boil incised. At the time, Akthar had been very upset that Nazo would retain a permanent scar because of the incision.
When Akthar asked Nazo, "What happened to your mother after she was attacked," the young girl replied that she didn't remember what happened. Finally, the group decided to leave without the young girl as Akthar finally decided that this girl in front of her was not her daughter. However when Akthar returned home, she would recite a daily mantra to my cousins and I, "Maybe that is my own daughter that I left at the mercy of other people."
With great difficulty, Hamidullah obtained permission eleven months later to return to the camp to see "Farhanda" again. Hamidullah said "Even if she isn't our daughter, at least she'll be better off staying with us than at the camp."
After returning to Sialkot, Nazo started having epileptic attacks. Akthar told my mother,"Why doesn't God give me the love that I should have for my own daughter. How unfortunate am I that I don't consider my daughter my own daughter." Until a few years before her death, Akthar would persist in believing that Nazo was not her biological daughter
Mom used to give Nazo baths. Nazo had very large pores in her legs. Nazo said that she used to have worms in her pores. My mother says that Nazo was a very sensitive child and that is why she was more affected by her years in the camps. Medically, epilepsy is known to occur in individuals who have experienced highly traumatic events in their lives. Also, young children who experience convulsions and high fever are more likely to develop epileptic symptoms later on.
People would exploit Akthar's most desperate desire that her sons still be alive. She would pay people to obtain information about her sons, and they would come back with false stories. One man claimed that Anwar remained in Jammu, and was then sent to a prison in New Delhi when his abductors discovered who his father was.
Her fervent hope that her sons were still alive was so strong, that after a while, she lost all sense of time. Almost thirty years later, in 1976 a young man who Akthar believed was Anwar was living in a large house in Shadara, a town near Lahore. This man was thirty years old. If Anwar had still been alive at this time, he would have been almost fifty years old. Akthar finally confronted this man at his house, believing that Anwar had married a prostitute. It took much convincing from this young man to persuade Akthar that he was in fact not her son.
In 1957, Hamidullah contracted a liver abscess. Within a week, he passed, having received several initial incorrect diagnoses. He died talking to his mother. Hamidullah was only forty eight years old. One of the events that may have taken away Hamidullah's strength to fight illness was the fact that he couldn't abide the notion of his daughter lying helplessly on a hospital bed with lupus. Iffat died at age twenty three.
God had more in store for his servant, Akthar. Her son Shahid was killed in Gujrat on August 22, 2000 by a court clerk. As Shahid exited his vehicle to go to court, he was hit by three bullets and collapsed on the court parking lot. Shahid had insulted the shooter in court the previous week. At the time, Shahid was waiting for approval to immigrate to Canada with his family. He was fifty two years old.
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