Zafar couldn’t take his eyes off Salman. Salman was the only person he knew who had come back alive from there. He looked at Salman from head to toe and asked incredulously, ‘But, tell me, Salman, how did you escape?’
‘How did I escape,’ he mumbled. For a moment he felt like spewing out his entire tale in one breath. He looked around, then said, ‘I can’t tell you in a few words; it requires a marathon storytelling session. You will lose your senses if you hear the details.’
‘You are right, my friend. The little that we have heard is horrifying, whereas you – you have seen it all with your own eyes.’
He drew a long breath and sighed. ‘Yes, yes, I have seen it all with my own eyes.’
Countless macabre scenes danced before his eyes. ‘I have seen so much that … Let’s just say I have seen it all.’
‘Tell me.’
Once again, Salman wanted to spit it all out, but he looked around and checked himself. ‘I have a lot to tell you, but how can I … standing here like this?’
Zafar paused to think, then asked, ‘What are you doing in the evening?’
‘Morning or evening, nothing matters to me … they are the same.’
‘Then come home this evening.’
‘All right, I’ll be there.’
‘I’ll call Aslam. He’ll come too.’
‘Aslam the Argumentative. Is he still around?’
‘Nothing ever happens to people like him; they are spared both living and dying. Where will he go?’
‘What about Zaidi?’
‘I’ll call that big-talker too. So, are we fixed for the evening?’
‘Yes, we are.’
Zafar reached home and quickly dialled a number. ‘Hello? Aslam? Yaar, it’s me … Zafar. Yaar, Salman has returned.’
‘Salman? What are you saying, yaar!’
‘Yes, yes. He has returned.’
‘You mean, he has escaped from there? Alive? But how?’
‘Come home this evening and ask him yourself.’
‘I’ll be there.’
Then he called Zaidi at his office. ‘Hello, Zaidi … Please call Zaidi … Hello, Zaidi? It’s me, Zafar. Can I tell you something?’
‘Tell me.’
‘Salman has come back.’
‘Salman! No way, man!’
‘Yes, he managed to get away.’
‘What a thick-skinned bloke! Where is he now?’
‘Come home this evening. He’ll be there.’
‘I’ll come.’
All four friends met in the evening. The three looked at Salman in utter amazement and Salman looked at them, equally bemused. Aslam expressed their collective astonishment at his escape, then spoke of his sorrow at the state of affairs there. As he spoke, his anger grew. ‘How they have tortured people over there … They have killed and maimed the old … children … women … barbarians … animals … If I had my way, I would …’ He gritted his teeth.
‘They should have done precisely this,’ Zaidi announced.
‘Done this?’ Aslam spluttered in angry disbelief.
‘After what we have been doing to them for twenty-five years, this is precisely what they should have done,’ Zaidi said.
‘And what have we been doing? What did we do to them?’ Aslam shouted.
Then he launched into a long tirade on all the atrocities committed by them, his knowledge gleaned from several sensational newspaper reports. Zaidi countered each of the allegations and, in turn, listed all the cruelties they had been perpetrating against them. Salman yawned. Zafar looked at him and asked, ‘What do you think, Salman?’
Aslam pounced, ‘Yes, let’s ask Salman. He has lived there for so many years. He has seen everything with his own eyes. What do you think, Salman?’
‘I think …’ Salman said and fell into a contemplative silence.
Zafar became impatient. He prodded, ‘Yes, come on, tell us. Say something.’
‘What shall I say?’
Zaidi sneered, ‘Scared of commitment?’
‘Commitment?’ Salman gaped uncomprehendingly.
Aslam spoke forcefully, ‘Let’s hear what you have to say about the situation there.’
Somewhat uncertainly, Salman said, ‘Yaar, I don’t know what to make of it.’
Zafar looked daggers at him. ‘The last time you were here, you had picked my brains clean going on and on about that place.’
Salman simply gazed at Zafar, then spoke in a muffled voice, ‘At the time I thought that I understood the situation.’
‘Forget all that. Tell us what happened there.’
‘Yes, that I can tell you,’ he spoke with complete conviction. ‘I have seen a great deal there. If I begin to describe all that I have seen, you will break out in goose pimples,’ he said, then fell silent as though he were preparing to launch into an epic. The three friends sat in rapt attention. They waited for him to continue. But he just sat there. When he didn’t utter another word, Zafar prompted, ‘Yaar, you haven’t told us anything yet.’
‘Yes, yaar,’ he fumbled, ‘Yaar, I don’t know what to say. I can’t remember anything.’
Both Aslam and Zaidi glared at him, then turned away and started talking among themselves as though they didn’t know him.
They talked and argued and squabbled among themselves. Things began to warm up. Tempers rose. Volleys of sarcasm jetted back and forth. Resounding abuse burst from Zafar, sometimes about people on that side, sometimes about those on this side. Salman looked at one friend, then the other. He listened without saying a word. His eyelids began to droop. Once or twice, he nearly dozed off. Then he pulled himself up and tried to listen attentively to every contentious word that was being said. Again, his lids grew heavy and his eyes began to close.
‘Bastards! Democratic dogs!’ Zaidi banged the table with his fist.
‘Bunch of bloody traitors! They are all Indian agents!’ Aslam hissed. Salman looked at them with drowsy eyes and drifted back to sleep.
He opened his eyes when tea was placed before them and Zafar nudged him, ‘Salman, here’s your tea.’ He woke up with a start, looked apologetically at his friends and sat up straight. Softly, he ran his fingers over his eyes, then took a sip of tea. As he drank the tea, he could feel the sleep leaving his eyes. Now he felt refreshed as though the doors and windows of his mind were opening. He said, ‘The way I dozed off just now reminds me of an incident from those days. That night I hadn’t slept a wink.’ As he spoke, countless terrifying visions began to dance before his eyes and a subhuman scream ricocheted through his brain.
‘Which night are you talking about? Was it before the fall?’ Aslam asked.2
Salman thought for a moment, then said, ‘I can’t remember which night it was, but those nights were all the same, except that …’ and he fell silent. Aslam, Zaidi and Zafar had been listening closely. Disconcerted by their attention, Salman skittered, ‘I forgot what I was about to say. Anyhow, after that, I wasn’t able to sleep all night.’ He paused, then said, ‘And after that, sleep became a rarity. Perhaps, I haven’t slept at all ever since. Or, maybe, I have on one or two occasions …’ Aslam, Zaidi and Zafar listened listlessly. Then they became engrossed in their own conversation. Back and forth the arguments raged – did people from the other side exploit them or did our own people betray us? Salman just sat there, trying to recollect whether he had slept at all during any of the endless nights. He couldn’t remember. And what about since he had come here? He couldn’t remember that either.
Tired of his futile calculations, he tried to concentrate on the argument raging between Zafar, Zaidi and Aslam. He kept listening, until a yawn caught him unawares and he looked at Zafar with sleep-drowned eyes, and said, ‘Yaar, I am feeling sleepy.’
Zafar gave him an insipid look and said, ‘So why don’t you sleep?’
‘Yes, I am going to sleep,’ he said in a muffled, somnolent voice as his eyes began to close. He slipped down the sofa, rested his head on the headrest and put his feet up
on the table. With one worn slipper resting near Aslam and the toe of the other nudging Zaidi, he began to snore.
Captive1
g
‘So … tell me how things are out here.’
‘Here? What can I tell you about things here?’
The question was actually quite unexpected for Anwar. Perhaps not consciously, perhaps unconsciously, he had already made up his mind that whatever will be, will be. He was probing about things out there, yet when he was asked about the state of affairs here, he was caught off guard.
‘What happened here?’ Javed asked again.
‘Here?’ he repeated wonderingly and got lost in thought. Finally, he said, ‘Yaar, but nothing happened here.’
‘Nothing?’
‘Honestly! Nothing happened. Compared to what you saw there, nothing happened here.’
‘Really! There we were thinking that a lot must have happened here as well.’
‘Yes, yaar, nothing happened here, nothing at all.’ There was shame and sorrow in Anwar’s tone.
‘But there was a war here, too, wasn’t there?’
‘Yes, the war happened,’ Anwar’s voice was subdued. The conversation ground to a standstill. The enthusiasm with which Anwar had begun his questions had cooled off. Javed had made an idle query. There wasn’t sufficient curiosity and eagerness behind his questions.
Anwar spoke up again. ‘Actually, there were no outside forces at work here. Whatever happened was wrought from within.’
‘Nothing ever happens because of factors outside,’ Javed said in all earnestness. ‘Whatever happens, happens from inside.’
‘No, not always,’ Anwar said with some heat. ‘Most of what happened there, happened from outside. Whereas, here, whatever happened was a purely internal matter. That is why most of it happened after the war.’
‘Really?’
‘Yes.’
‘But what exactly happened?’
‘Strikes, lockouts, marches, protests, street fights, students’ unrest, arrests …’
Javed picked up an illustrated magazine from the table in front of them and began to turn its pages. The magazine had been lying on the table since the morning, but either he had not had the time to look at it, or he hadn’t felt like reading it. But now, the magazine pulled him towards itself irresistibly. He loved the photographs in it.
‘Something like a domestic war broke out in the university. Barricades were put up, sten guns were brought in and the sound of bullets could be heard all night.’
‘That’s good.’ Javed smiled.
‘What?’
‘This cartoon, here…’ Javed turned the magazine towards Anwar.
Anwar glanced at the cartoon moodily and muttered, ‘It’s nice,’ and lapsed into silence.
‘Let’s go out,’ Javed suggested.
‘All right.’
‘We will talk in circles all night if we stay at home. There will be a constant stream of visitors; everyone has the same questions and the same answers. It is the new definition of captivity. Let’s go, yaar.’ He jumped to his feet, walked towards the inner door and called in a loud voice, ‘I am going out with Anwar.’ And the two stepped out.
‘Yaar, did you hear about the riots in Sindh?’ Anwar suddenly remembered how damaging and tragic the crisis had been. It was important to inform Javed of it.
‘You couldn’t have learnt much from the radio bulletins. Some truly amazing things have been happening here. Scores of people died, so many became homeless. You must have seen Liaqat Market. It was such a huge market. It was razed to the ground; not a soul escaped alive …’
‘Yaar, what are these squares on the stomach and thighs?’ Javed asked and stopped in his tracks.
Anwar stopped mid-sentence and looked in the direction in which Javed was staring, transfixed. There was a poster hanging in front of the cinema hall showing a half-naked woman. A grid of squares was drawn on her well-rounded thighs and stomach. This poster that Anwar was wont to gaze at with some diligence every time he passed it now offended him greatly. ‘Forget it, yaar,’ he said and the two walked on.
‘Will you have an ice-cream?’ Anwar stopped in front of a shop.
‘Okay.’
While eating his ice-cream, Javed’s eyes fell upon a girl who was wearing flappers and huge round goggles. He continued to inspect her minutely till she left the shop.
‘Yaar, Anwar, the bell-bottom seems to have disappeared during my absence.’
‘And tight pants too.’
‘Yes, tight pants and tight shirts too … Yaar, you still haven’t told me what happened here.’
‘You can see what happened here,’ Anwar said slyly, eating his ice-cream. ‘The bell-bottom has gone and the flapper has come in.’
‘This is no small matter,’ Javed said.
‘No, it is a huge, huge matter.’ Anwar’s tone was loaded with sarcasm. He stopped, then asked, ‘So, what are your views on this huge matter?’
‘Yaar, I have not quite been able to reconcile myself to this flapper business.’ He finished his ice-cream and dumped the empty cup in a trash bin. ‘Shall we go?’
‘Yes, let’s go.’
They walked on.
Anwar was no longer in a serious mood. But seeing Javed’s curiosity regarding several small, insignificant matters, he couldn’t resist asking, ‘Now that you are here, what is your reaction?’
‘Reaction? My reaction? What do you mean?’
‘I mean, after your long years in captivity, now that you are here, what do you feel?’
‘You know, it is strange…’ Javed stopped in his tracks again.
‘What happened?’
‘Look at that young man… he is wearing a pink salwar and, if I am not mistaken, it is silken.’
‘So what?’
‘You mean nothing is wrong? Really?’ Javed fell silent for a while, then said, ‘Do the youth favour such colours and fabrics nowadays? I have seen other young people wearing bright colours and silken salwar-kurtas.’
‘Yes, it is quite common these days. Listen, do you want to eat kadhai gosht?’
‘Kadhai gosht?’
‘Yes, yes, it is almost dinner-time. Why go home? Let’s eat kadhai gosht and then go for a long walk.’
It was crowded. Cars were parked on both sides of the road. Tables and chairs were laid out on the lawn and the footpath. All the tables were taken. Beneath a gigantic picture of a goat, rows upon rows of entire roasted legs of mutton were strung. The ovens were roaring, hissing and spitting sparks.
‘Yaar, the place is so crowded.’
‘Don’t worry; we’ll get a table soon,’ Anwar said and spied a far-off table emptying. He pounced on it. The table was on the footpath. A car was parked nearby. The bonnet of another car parked close beside it was being used as a tabletop. Balanced on it were a couple of kadhais laden with meat and bent over them a few girls and boys. ‘Yaar, this too must have happened after I left.’ Javed looked around at the other diners.
‘What?’
‘This business of kadhai gosht.’
‘Yes, this is the newest dish in town.’
Javed looked around once again. He took in the rows of cars, the tables, the chairs, the diners … ‘Yaar, this used to be a very quiet part of town.’ He stopped, then added, ‘And the strange thing is that everyone is eating tikka kababs and kadhai gosht. There weren’t so many shops selling tikka kababs, were there?’
Anwar was clearly not listening. His eyes were fixed on the tandoors. ‘It has been so long; our food still hasn’t come.’
Javed looked around lingeringly. Young and old, male and female, delicate young girls, pot-bellied men – everyone was engrossed in eating. At a table nearby, a robust-looking individual, drenched in sweat, was attacking his food with a single-minded ferocity. At another table sat a suited-booted man and a nubile young woman daintily wrapped in a sari, with an empty kadhai between them. There was a heap of chewed bones on the lady’s plate and she herself was
sucking heartily at a bone. All around there were tables laden with meat-filled kadhais and giant-sized bites entering gaping maws, and everywhere there was the clamping of jaws, munching, chewing and chomping. Javed could imagine the jaws becoming bigger and bigger. His surprise was fast turning into horror.
‘Yaar, Anwar,’ he said in a worried voice, ‘people have started eating rather a lot now.’
Anwar barely heard him. The kadhai had reached their table. ‘Come on, let’s dig in.’
Javed put a morsel in his mouth and thought, ‘My jaws are gigantic.’
‘You are not eating, yaar!’
‘I am, I am.’
‘No you are not. It won’t do being polite here. This is kadhai gosht; it must be eaten caveman-style.’
He took several large bites to please Anwar, but soon he slowed down. His thoughts began to wander. ‘Yaar, how is Khalid? I still haven’t met any of the others.’
‘Khalid?’ Anwar’s hand stopped in mid-air where he was reaching for another giant-sized bite. ‘Didn’t I tell you about Khalid?’
‘No, you didn’t.’
Anwar swallowed, then spoke softly, ‘Yaar, Khalid is no more.’
‘Really … him too?’ He was lost in thought. ‘Yaar, you have been telling me of the passing away of so many of our friends. So many people have died in these two years!’
‘People have died very quickly in these two years.’
‘And everyone has died in their beds,’ Javed spoke in a tone of mild wonderment.
‘What? What do you mean?’ Anwar was shocked.
‘Out there, people die differently. We didn’t know about their traditional way of dying.’ He paused, then continued, ‘That is why we found Rasheed’s death so odd.’
‘Rasheed? He’s dead? Didn’t he live in Rajshahi?’
‘Yes, he did, but towards the end he had fled Rajshahi and come to live in Dhaka. He stayed with me for a few days … then he died … lay down on the bed and died.’
‘So, Rasheed too is dead,’ Anwar muttered, half to himself, in sorrow.
‘Yes, we gave him a proper shroud and a decent burial.’
The Death of Sheherzad Page 3
