‘He would never forgive himself if anything happened to her’

On 14 August 2017, New York Times published a few anecdotes by the survivors of the HIndu-Muslim riots 70 years ago, which killed more than two million people, according to the Wikipedia.

The estimate tracked people who left their homes in India and Pakistan, but never reached the other side, and was based on the census figures before and after the Partition. The actual figure would have been much higher. And the tragedies of raped women, broken families, orphaned children would be far beyond the scope of statistics.

I am sharing one of the anecdotes from the NYT written by Sohail Murad. Please read the story, it reinforces our faith in humanity.

"When partition was announced, my father, who worked for the British Indian Government, was posted in Bombay. He was advised that as a Muslim he would have better career opportunities in Pakistan. He was asked to report to offices in Rawalpindi as soon as possible. He left and my mother, Rosy, who was 20, and their six-month-old daughter stayed behind until he could arrange for their accommodation. Because of the chaos he could not come back to get them, so he asked my mother to take a train to Lahore. On the train a Sikh gentleman noticed my mother alone with an infant and asked her where she was going. When she told him Lahore, he was shocked and told her about the massacres that were taking place on trains going to Pakistan — my mother and father hadn’t known.

"He said he was traveling to Amritsar (30 miles from Lahore) but would accompany her to Wagah, a border town between India and Pakistan, because he would never forgive himself if anything happened to her. He told my mother that if anyone asked, she was his daughter. He thought her name, Rosy, was fine since it was secular. But my sister’s name, Shahina, was distinctly Muslim, so if anyone asked her name was Nina. He stayed with them until Wagah and walked with them to the Pakistani border, kissed them both on their foreheads and told them he wished he could take them all the way to Lahore, but he would not make it back alive.

"My sister, who lives in Karachi, is still called Nina by everyone in the family. My mother insisted on that."

Bengaluru 

16 August 2017