It was not only the menfolk among whom Tahirul’s audacious courage became the talking point, the womenfolk discussed it too. As Salekha’s mother was narrating it to Tanzila’s mother, Riziya was crossing the road regally with her bag on her shoulder. She was heading to college. She could hear their conversation clearly. Hearing mention of Hujur, she slowed down. She wanted to prick up her ears and hear every word that came wafting her way.
‘Really, after all these days, Maulana Saheb has done something worthwhile! What do you say, Bubu?’
‘Yes, you’re right. I’ve never seen someone with such guts. It’s been forty years since I came as a bride to this village. I never heard of a Maulana Saheb suddenly climbing on to the stage and protesting!’
‘You want to organize a programme, do so, but does that mean you get women to dance like that? Such things never happened earlier!’
‘It takes money to bring those commercial types. Did people have so much money then? Rafiq Ali Sheikh is a leader now. Does he lack money? But our Maulana Saheb has broken his pride.’
Riziya felt an indescribable pride as she heard them. She inwardly applauded Tahirul’s courage. She hailed him. At various times, she, too, had felt like protesting in this way against all the lawlessness and injustice in society! But she was a woman. Could anything come about by merely thinking about it? But what Hujur had done yesterday – Riziya thought that if she got such an opportunity, she would do it too. One could spend one’s whole life in the company of such a man of resistance. Hujur’s standing up to wrongdoing was imprinted on Riziya’s mind.
Rafiq Ali was Chhappa Haji’s first cousin. It was Chhappa Haji’s power that enabled him to win in the elections and become the deputy chief of the Panchayat. And it was because of this post that he was known as a political leader of the locality. Old Congressites had supported Rafiq Ali simply to oppose the CPI(M). Or else could Rafiq Ali, who had not even seen high school, have become a leader? After becoming the deputy chief of the Panchayat, he had granted many favours and opportunities to Chhappa Haji. Thanks to that, he built up a nest egg too during his three years in office. Now he was a Haji. He told everyone, ‘No more politics, it’s only the prayer party for me now. What is the point in getting involved with useless things! After all, one has to go to the grave one day!’
There were lots of complaints against the deputy chief as well. Discrepancies in relief supplies, dues owed to the road contractor for earthwork, nepotism … Rafiq Ali’s name had come up in connection with all of these. He was better known as ‘middleman’ Rafiq, rather than ‘party member’ Rafiq.
Land values were the highest in Sadnahati. A new settlement had come up even on the uncultivated land outside the village precincts. Getting the mutation done for all such lands and filling up ponds illegally were the tasks of the ‘syndicate’. Most of the buyers were non-Bengali Muslims from Bihar. The syndicate had come up to buy and sell these plots of land. Nobody could sell even the land they had inherited without the syndicate’s approval. Rafiq Ali could not handle all this by himself. That’s why some lackeys followed him around night and day. If Rafiq issued instructions for someone to be intimidated, they went and thrashed him a bit.
The day after Eid, there was a secret meeting at night in Rafiq’s party office. One of them said, ‘I don’t care if he’s a maulana or whatever, just give the orders and we’ll go. We’ll go and find out who the puppet-master behind the dancing Maulana Saheb is!’
Rafiq heard him in silence. He was in deep thought now. If things continued like this, his kingdom would be in jeopardy. He thought that perhaps it would not be correct to go against the Imam Saheb. But … Just then, another of his henchmen said, ‘Dada, shall I grab Maulana Saheb by his collar?’
Rafiq suddenly became furious. He snarled, and retorted, ‘Just stop that! Why should you grab Maulana Saheb’s collar? Did he do anything wrong? It’s we who did wrong. Do you think you’ll bring whores and have fun, and Maulana Saheb will remain silent? Whatever he did was right. Actually, we should apologize!’
Why did Rafiq Ali suddenly change colours? Everyone was silent. They could not figure out what to say. One of Rafiq’s lackeys was a bit intelligent. He was beside him all the time. Addressing him calmly, Rafiq told him, ‘Sadek, isn’t our Imam Saheb involved in some movement for a dole to be provided to imams? Find out about that and let me know by tomorrow about it. Find out the name of their organization, how many members it has and so on. I need to speak to Mihir Da.’
twenty-nine
The grandfather of one of Suman’s students died today. He had been very fond of Suman. Whenever he saw him, he would say, ‘You’re the son of a teacher, and now you’ve become a teacher, son! That’s very good, I’ll pray that you become very successful.’ He was actually Suman’s father’s childhood friend, Kamaal Lashkar. Suman addressed him as ‘Kamal’ Jethu. He never said ‘Kamaal’. Although Suman’s father was no more, he was still close to the family. That man had died today.
Suman used to be in for something come the month-end in his tuition class. The gentleman used to arrive exactly then to reminisce. He used to talk about how idealistic Suman’s late father was, how close they had been since their childhood. He used to say, ‘Do you know, son, your father and I used to roam around together, play together. No one could figure out who was Hindu and who Muslim. He continued his studies and became a teacher, and I sat with the sewing machine so I could feed myself. In the Upper Primary examination, your Baba came first and I was second.’ And as he said that, he laughed heartily. Then, at an appropriate moment, he proffered his granddaughter’s fees in his clenched fist. He knew that the fees in his fist fell far short. He would say, ‘Things are very bad for my son, Teacher, there’s no work! Please take this.’
Suman used to laugh. That was because he knew that the entire monthly fee had been given to him at home, but Jethu used to deduct some amount from that. He had paan, tea. Among the parents and guardians of the students, he was the one who visited regularly. Besides, since he was his father’s childhood friend, he went now and then to Kamal Jethu’s house too. So, Suman felt a bit sad at his death. He wouldn’t go anywhere today. He would only go to Kamal Jethu’s place. To see him for the last time.
Kamaal Lashkar had taken ill in the middle of the night. He died around dawn. It was a heart attack. There was no chance of taking him to hospital. Any dying creature would surely die, but it was difficult to accept the sudden departure of a person, who left his name and identity behind and lay transformed into a cadaver. In the morning, there was a big crowd of people who had come to pay him their final respects. Suman could not enter the house on account of the crowd. He was standing at an elevated spot. He suddenly remembered another death. It struck him that his father too had gone in the same way, all of a sudden. Suman was in school then. He remembered everything clearly. The expression of his father’s lifeless face. As soon as he remembered his father, his eyes became teary. The eager inquisitiveness of some people standing beside him … ‘Hey! Why is Suman crying? Isn’t he a Hindu? But the person who died was a Muslim!’
Despite living in Sadnahati, Suman had not been able to reach the innermost core of the Muslim community. After all, one couldn’t enter any space simply because the door was open! Just as the consent of the head of the household was required, the stranger too needed to possess a keenness to make his way inside. He never had that; it had never formed inside him. There was a barrier somewhere. He used to think, after all, what’s there to see!
Having come to this house today, Suman realized something. So much about the neighbours living so close by remained unknown. He had never been curious about the rituals undertaken by Muslims when someone in their community died. He observed the proceedings all morning. The plaintive wails of the womenfolk of the house, the spontaneous consolation offered by the menfolk – he observed it all. The empathy shown towards the bereaved family by relatives and friends – although Kamaal Saheb was no luminary in the community – touched Suman.
He learnt that Kamal Jethu’s namaz-e-janaza would take place today after the Zuhr prayer at midday. Suman knew that Zuhr referred to the noontime prayer. The ceremony was preceded by gosol, the ritual bathing of the dead body, and then swathing it in a kafon, or shroud. Through the day, he sought to learn about everything.
As the morning advanced, some musulli prepared to bathe the dead body carefully. Suman took in from afar the sight of the bathing, with bucket after bucket of water being poured. The body was adorned with perfume and kohl. It would be shrouded in a length of white cloth. That was the kafon. Suman knew that. But he didn’t know about the skill that went into cutting the length of cloth for the kafon. Not everyone could do that. The muezzin, Rahmat Saheb, could cut the shroud cloth. He was called. Rahmat prepared such a magnificent garment with three folds, devoid of any stitching, that it left Suman overwhelmed.
The cemetery of the Lashkars was close to the house. Suman was very keen to witness the digging of the grave. He walked there slowly. The moment he entered the cemetery, the notion he had had since his childhood made his hair stand on end. As a boy, he believed that when a Hindu died, his soul turned into a ghost, and when a Muslim died, it turned into a jinn. People had divided even the soul into Hindu and Muslim. As the thought occurred to Suman, he smiled inwardly. A sense of fear, or terror, was associated with the cemetery. So he never cast his eyes even at the small cemetery to the west of the bamboo grove that lay near his house. His Ma used to say, ‘Don’t go to those parts, Suman, there are evil spirits there!’ And whenever he caught a chill, his Ma would run to the Imam Saheb of the mosque to collect blessed water. And how astonishing! As soon as he drank the blessed water, his fever vanished, the terror passed. In his irrepressible curiosity today, that fear had vanished even without any blessed water.
A part of the forested land had been cleared to make way for a road. As soon as he removed his shoes and went in, he spotted Maruf. Suman felt emboldened to see him. There were about ten youths there. All of them had bathed and purified themselves before they started digging the grave. By the time Suman reached there, most of the digging had been completed. A narrow hole in the ground in which a person could lie on his back. It couldn’t exactly be called a hole. It was a rectangle, which was quite long. And it was about one-and-a-half-arm lengths wide. It was supposedly three-and-a-half-arm lengths deep. He couldn’t ask whether that referred to the dead man’s arm. There was such unthinkable care even in the digging of the grave. The walls on the four sides were absolutely smooth, not even a blade of grass inside. The immaculate cleanliness made the final dwelling place of the corpse sacred. Laths of bamboo of equal length had been cut and placed on the sides. Those would be used to cover the shrouded body. Earth would then fall over that. He found out from Maruf that each person would throw three handfuls of earth into the grave, and they would recite a prayer from the Holy Koran.
Meanwhile, preparations were under way for the funerary prayer. Suman attended that as well. It was a gathering of hundreds of people. Rows of people were standing in the Eidgah field. Everyone had caps on their heads. So many people, but no commotion, no shouting. Everyone stood shoulder to shoulder waiting for the namaz-e-janaza to commence. Suman wished he, too, could stand in the row to pay his respects to his father’s friend, Kamal Jethu. But he was Hindu. So he stood apart, at a distance, and watched. A powerful thought seized him. When people had taken his father for cremation, they had boozing parties near the crematorium precincts. Even his relatives had gone on a drunken spree. No one seemed to have any feelings. The boy who had just lost his father had been astonished at the sight. It had pained him immensely. The religion of the Muslims, however, was so full of restrictions! Despite having so many moral leashes, why were they like this?
He had grown up hearing so many negative things about Muslims since childhood. That they were bad-tempered, filthy, they consumed beef. The moment they got the opportunity, they were ready to slaughter Hindus. But, in reality, that didn’t seem to be true to him. Yes, they consumed beef, but nevertheless, he could find no evidence of what he had heard. Rather, they seemed a harmless and gentle folk. After all, it was to him that they came for filling up forms pertaining to the ration card, bank, etc.
Yes, there were some families where illiteracy and poverty seemed to have become a tradition. Generation after generation had been unable to escape this curse. Suman had seen for himself their acute penury. Besides, on account of illiteracy, they did not plan their lives. No financial planning, nor any family planning either. As if they lacked that sense. Their sense of hygiene and cleanliness was limited. Yet they were Muslims, Islam was their religion. And it was this religion that taught one cleanliness the most.
When he was in school – it must have been when he was in Class Eleven or Twelve – quite a few Muslim boys used to wash themselves after urinating. Many people used to laugh at them. Some of them used a clod of earth. Everyone used to annoy and tease the Muslim boys. But Suman could never support them. The more unyielding they were, the more Suman felt a sense of guilt within. He used to gaze helplessly at his Muslim friends then. They used to argue that if one washed oneself with water after urinating, one stayed clean and avoided infection. Modern science said the same. But their science was confined only to them. No one wanted to hear about it.
Suman remembered another funny thing. In order to purify oneself, if water was absolutely unavailable, one resorted to earth. That was called kulukh. Among the Muslim boys in his class, Hakim was a bit of a rogue. One day, several boys pounced on him too. ‘You have to tell us. What do you do with the clod of earth?’ Suman would never forget the answer the annoyed boy gave. He said, ‘Listen, after all we eat cow fat, that makes us terribly horny. From time to time, we hit the rod with a clod to calm it.’ Everyone stared wide-eyed and speechlessly at him. Having lost in regard to masculine bravado, their faces had turned ashen. And Hakim had looked at all the Muslim boys, winked, and smiled faintly. They never had the guts to ask the question again.
This was where Suman stumbled. He was just not able to figure it out. Why was there such a difference between theory and practice when it came to a particular people?
The namaz-e-janaza was over. Following the shouldered bier was a procession of people. Some remained behind. Maulana Tahirul, the imam of the mosque, and quite a few others. Seeing Suman standing motionlessly, Tahirul waved at him. Suman went up to him. He said, ‘He was a really nice man, you know…’
Sensing sadness in Suman’s words, Tahirul said, ‘What were your relations like with Kalaam Chacha?’
‘Good. He was my Baba’s childhood friend. Achchha, what do you think? Will he go to jannat?’
‘If he was a believer, he’ll surely go.’
Suman pondered. He said to Tahirul, ‘This matter of faith seems extremely puzzling, you know.’
‘Why? Why do you think that way? Allah is one and unequalled. He has no heir. Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) was a messenger sent by him. That’s it. Accepting this is called faith.’
‘Does one go to heaven if one accepts that? In that case, none of your Muslim folk will go to hell. After all, all Muslims accept that, and believe it too.’
‘No, it isn’t as simple as that.’
Observing Tahirul and Suman conversing, Maruf suddenly appeared beside them. Addressing Suman, Maruf said, ‘Hey, it’s afternoon. Did you have your bath? Have you had lunch?’
‘I don’t care for lunch. But I’ll have to bathe. Would Ma let me enter the house otherwise?’
