"Talashnama" by Ismail Darbesh

But Riziya’s Chhoto Mami had resolved to recite the Koran today. That made her think of Riziya. After studying with Maulana Tahirul, if nothing else, she had picked up the correct pronunciation. Riziya applied that pedantically on her too from time to time. She used to say, ‘Maima, in Arabic “sheen” and “seen” are pronounced differently.’ She used to enjoy that teacher-like conduct of Riziya.

The people in the family were worried about Riziya. They couldn’t figure out what her ailment was. She wasn’t saying much to anyone either. Her Chhoto Mami didn’t even feel like asking Riziya to help with some chores. After all, how long could one tolerate it if she was just lying in bed, or sitting somewhere, in a bout of depression! She had given Riziya a sermon yesterday, but Riziya had not responded to that either. That made her wonder whether this was the effect of some jinn or ghost. She had spoken to her husband many times about getting an amulet. But he had paid no heed to that.

Although Salaam Miya had said time and again, ‘It’s nothing. Just her plucky mind! She’ll get over it soon’, he too had his doubts. He had spoken to her just last night. The lively girl looked withered now. Starving and sleep-deprived. She wasn’t the Riziya of before. She seemed to be a stranger from some other house. Had Salaam Miya hurt her very badly? There were many reasons for his keenness in regard to getting her married to Raqib. But did anyone else know about those reasons? No one did. It was only Riziya’s Chhoto Mami who knew about Salaam Miya’s intentions. Although her husband was illiterate and headstrong, he was very fond of Riziya. They had taken custody of Riziya after having been childless for six years. But just two years after that, she got pregnant, and then gave birth to her son. Salaam Miya had told her, ‘The girl is a blessing for you, you know! Rizi has blessed this household. Our destiny has changed with her arrival.’

‘Of course! But Boro Bubu says, “You’re raising Rizi only for her property.” Whatever you might say, Boro Bubu is very jealous of us.’

‘Forget it. That woman is like that! After all, I’ve seen her from the very beginning! Why do you think we brothers fell apart? Wasn’t it because of Raqib’s mother?’

Riziya’s Chhoto Mami knew that Salaam Miya was adamant about not getting her married to someone from outside and sending her far away. It wasn’t just the allure of property, perhaps there was also a deep feeling of kinship. But Riziya didn’t realize that, nor did anyone else. Raqib was his vagabond nephew. Perhaps he could have been a bit disciplined too. And most importantly, Raqib’s mother’s notion could have been altered. He could have shown her that an outsider could become one’s own. It was after much consideration that Salaam Miya had stubbornly decided that Riziya would get married only to Raqib. But he had run away. Raqib was a footloose boy, there was no accounting for the number of times he had left home without telling anyone and gone off somewhere. But his disappearance was just as well. To tell the truth, Chhoto Mami was simply unable to accept this marriage. She could never stand Raqib.

As soon as she rose after reciting both the Zuhr and Asr prayers together, she spotted Salaam Miya. He needed to go out every evening. As he put on his panjabi, he asked, ‘Do I need to get something, dear?’

‘No. Are you going out now?’

‘Yes. Why do you ask?’

‘Won’t you look at the girl even once? She’s withering by the day! Not a word out of her. I can’t understand anything. Shouldn’t we call Maulana Saheb?’

‘What rubbish you say! Why are you asking me to call Maulana Saheb now?’

‘Why? What’s wrong with that? Is there anyone better than him in the area when it comes to amulets and suchlike? People from so many villages come to him!’

‘I know that. But…’

‘Why the “but”?’

‘I feel awkward to call someone when I myself forbade him from coming to our house.’

‘So what? Go and call him. For Allah’s sake!’

That night, Salaam Miya was sitting on a mat he’d spread out on the veranda just in front of Riziya’s room. A small table had been laid there. He had rutis for dinner. He suddenly thought of something and rose. He entered Riziya’s room and found the night lamp burning there. Riziya was lying in bed. Salaam Miya asked her tenderly, ‘Won’t you eat something, child? Come, get up and have a couple of rutis with me.’

Riziya was silent. It was clear that she was awake. She didn’t respond to anything Salaam Miya said. He thought this was merely the stubbornness that came with her age. At this age, one considered as one’s own whoever one took a fancy to. If she had been raised here right since her infancy, this girl would have considered him to be her father. She would have respected him like a father. But the fact was that he was not her father, only a distant relative. Salaam Miya heaved a deep sigh and continued. ‘Rizi, just before your Ma died, she entrusted you to me. Do you think I wish you ill?’

Salaam Miya had no idea when Chhoto Mami appeared in the veranda. But when he noticed her, he rebuked her angrily. ‘You sent me unnecessarily to him. If he really liked Riziya so much, he wouldn’t have insulted me so badly.’

‘Did you go to Maulana Saheb?’

‘Yes, I swallowed my pride for the sake of the girl. There’s no need for me to tell you what he said.’

Riziya stirred now. Over the last few days, two names that were associated with much of her ambivalence hovered around her head – the brute Raqib’s and the revered Tahirul’s. It had occurred to her many times that she would tell Tahirul about the outrage that had befallen her. She had failed to speak about it to Reshma Bhabi, despite wanting to. She had turned back. She had constantly been waiting anxiously for Tahirul. She also had a suppressed sense of hurt. It had been almost a month since she last met him. And they had been incommunicado since then. Yet she thought that Tahirul would come to meet her, he would certainly come. Could he bear to not come! As soon as she heard his name mentioned now, a liveliness overcame her. She suddenly sat up. She gaped at Salaam Miya, without embarrassment.

Chhoto Mami asked, ‘What does Maulana Saheb say? Did you tell him that Riziya’s very unwell? That it’s a matter of jinns and ghosts?’

‘I did. I told him everything. He just ignored me. He said, “Take her to a good doctor. She’ll get well.” Apparently he has no time to come by. Besides, he has stopped making sudden visits to people’s homes.’

‘What are you saying, my dear? How could the man who used to come here every day say something like that? Didn’t he want to come after hearing about Riziya’s illness?’

‘That’s what he said. He said, “Going to your house is simply out of the question. After all, it was you who forbade me.” I told him, “Please forget about all that, Hujur. Jhar-phunk may help.” But he said there’s nothing he can do. He asked me to take her to Maulana Kader Ali in Hooghly.’

Riziya was stunned as she heard their conversation. She couldn’t believe her ears. Had Hujur actually said that? Had he refused to come even after learning about Riziya being unwell! After her Mama and Mami left the veranda, Riziya felt terribly restless. She lay down. And then she rose again. Maulana Tahirul was supposed to be an alem who had accomplished the powers to control jinns. It suddenly occurred to Riziya that Hujur may have learnt about her defilement through a jinn! She wanted to believe fervently in his supernatural powers. But the very next moment, she realized that she was sinless, there had been no sinfulness on her part – he was certainly supposed to know that too. So why was he ignoring her? Why had he insulted her Mama, saying he couldn’t come!

It was most commonplace for an unmarried, inexperienced, stricken woman to fall into delusion. In these last few days, Riziya had only been thinking about the outrage inflicted upon her. She blamed herself for her foolish trust in Raqib. She had gone on pondering over how she would tell Tahirul about the calamitous incident. She had never imagined that the shocking thing that had happened to her would throw her into greater complications.

She had hyperacidity on account of having gone to sleep at night without eating. She had acute heartburn. She was hiccupping. The moment she felt nauseous, she wondered, what’s the date today? She looked at the calendar. It was the twenty-fifth. Why wasn’t it ‘the time of the month’ yet? She should have had it on the fifteenth of this month. Riziya was stupefied. Was she fertile now under the inexorable edict of her menstrual cycle? She switched the light on. Dark circles seemed to have formed around her sleepless eyes. She stood in front of the mirror. Unbeknownst to her, her hand moved towards her navel. A mumbled plea emitted her mouth, ‘Oh Allah, let it not be what I think.’ She collapsed on the floor. She prostrated herself and wept. She was the sole witness to her plea to Allah. She kept wondering, if she had guessed right, what would she say to the community? How would she face the flagbearers of religion? What would she say to her beloved Tahirul? Muslims revered only one woman who bore a child out of wedlock. She was the mother of a fatherless child. That was Mother Miriam. Riziya wished a miracle like that would occur in her life. Let a divine voice emanate from the heavens. Let it declare, like a clap of thunder, that Riziya was innocent. So that everyone would believe her. But was that possible, given the matter of cause and effect? After all, she wasn’t the great Mother Miriam; she was just an extremely ordinary woman. What was Riziya to do? But the very next moment, she thought, no, something like this had happened to her many times before. It had been delayed by eight or nine days. She had taken Dr Zaman’s homoeopathic pills so many times. Should she pay him a visit now?

She had stayed up all night, hadn’t slept a wink. But she didn’t even feel drowsy. She wanted to be out of the room. But where would she go? She hardly went anywhere, other than to college. She took her bath in the morning and got dressed; slipped her college bag on her shoulder. Riziya’s Mami pestered her time and again, ‘Where are you going? Aren’t you unwell?’

The girl had a dreadful look on her face. A kind of alarmed, perverse demeanour. It frightened Chhoto Mami, and so she didn’t say any more. Salaam Miya was not at home. All Riziya said was, ‘Don’t worry, whatever else I may do, I’m not going to kill myself. I will be back all right,’ and she rushed out.

She could have avoided going past the mosque. She could have taken the direct route, along the main road. But it was along this circuitous route that Riziya advanced silently. She did not have a borkha or hijab on. As if she had come out solely to show Tahirul her face. The mosque compound was usually vacant around ten or eleven in the morning. As she went by the mosque, she glanced at Tahirul’s room. Seeing the door locked, she turned her face away and walked on. When she reached the main road, she took a Trekker, and then a bus. She had no idea where she was going. Once she boarded the bus, she felt her sense of suffocation lessen. The seat beside her was empty. Tahirul had once been beside her on such a day. She had felt at peace in the cool breeze over the Howrah Bridge. But no one was beside her today. Where would she go all alone? Did Tahirul really not think of her any more! Did he really not want to visit her after hearing that she was unwell! Lost in the stream of her thoughts, she had no clue when the bus reached the bus stand near Howrah Station. She got off. She moved with the advancing crowd of pedestrians. She descended slowly down the subway. A winding path, countless people. When she climbed up the stairs at the subway exit, there was the Howrah Bridge. Riziya continued walking. Making her way through the throng of porters and vendors, she walked along the pavement of the bridge. When she was midway along the bridge, she suddenly halted. Her loose hair near her ears blew in the gusty breeze over the river. She held the railing of the bridge and gazed at the vast waterway. The country- and motor-boats looked so tiny, as if they were the paper boats one floated in the rainwater as a child. The boats had no boatmen, no sails or rudders. They just floated along with the current. Riziya gazed unblinkingly at the river. How insignificant a tiny life was to the river. Riziya, too, yearned to flow along in the stream of time.

fifty-three

‘Ibrahim Khalilullah, the Prophet of Allah, fell into great distress. He had dreamt that he was offering his beloved son, Ismail, in sacrifice. He woke up. He couldn’t sleep any more after that out of worry. The dreams of prophets were also a kind of wahy, a revelation, a message sent by Allah. So Prophet Ibrahim sacrificed a plump camel after he woke up in the morning. But it was not accepted. He did it again. This time, too, it was the same. He did it once again. But no sacrifice of his was accepted. Ultimately, he realized what he ought to do. So tell me folks, what had Allah signalled to Prophet Ibrahim to sacrifice? Do you know?’

Tahirul used to ask the audience questions in the middle of his sermon. But he did not wait for an answer after that. He provided that himself. Addressing the listeners in the front, he said, ‘His child! Oh yes, the most beloved thing to parents, the heart of their hearts. Isn’t that so, brothers? What do you say? Ismail, born of Bibi Hajera’s womb, the firstborn in their dotage, was his most beloved. He had been commanded to sacrifice that child with his own hands! What a harsh test Prophet Ibrahim was about to take! His son Ismail was a little boy then, and he too became a prophet later. Prophet Ibrahim hesitantly said to him, “Ya bunaiya, inni ara fil-manami aanni ajbahuka, fanjur ma ja tara.” (O boy, I dreamt that I was slaughtering you! Tell me what you think about that.) Just imagine how grievous Allah’s test was. He instructed his dear friend to sacrifice his son. And what did the son do? Was he afraid? No, he wasn’t afraid. He was a worthy son to his worthy father. He spoke out clearly: “Ya aabati faal ma tuumar, satajiduni inshaallah minas sabirin.” (O father, do whatever you have been commanded to. You can certainly count me among those who are patient, God willing!) Meaning, the boy Ismail, too, gladly submitted to God’s command. Say after me, Subhanallah! Marhaba!’

A lot of people were listening to Tahirul with full attention. All of them chanted, ‘Subhanallah! Marhaba!’

Tahirul smiled, and then resumed. ‘So the father of our Muslim community, Prophet Ibrahim, was tested by Allah. He laid his son on the earth and held a sharp knife against his tender throat. But no, let alone Ismail’s throat, he didn’t cut a single hair. Because Allah, the incomparable, most beloved Creator who dwelt in the parents’ hearts, was most compassionate. He was pleased at the incomparable firmness of Prophet Ibrahim’s faith. He returned the son to his father’s bosom. A dumba was sacrificed instead of Ismail. Do you know what a dumba is, brothers? A creature like a sheep that eats grass. That’s why, my brothers, this sacrifice is essential for all those among us who are well-off. The sacrifice is a major act of worship. All of you know this story, I’m not saying anything new – yet I say it. It’s the time for the Eid of sacrifice. All of you will undertake the sacrifice. Bahimatul an’am, meaning grass-eating creatures, must be sacrificed through ritual slaughter. Cows, goats, camels, buffaloes, dumba, or sheep. In our country, it’s cows and goats that are most easily available. That’s why we sacrifice those. Keep in mind that the blood and flesh of the sacrifice cannot reach Allah. It is your faith in Allah that reaches Him.’

Tahirul’s speech was very clear. He could not make speeches in a continuous singsong delivery like professional speakers, although he wanted to very much. He wished to stop speaking and present naats instead. But melody eluded him. He had accepted that too – after all, not everyone was adept in everything. However, many people would admit that Maulana Tahirul confined himself to the Koran and the Hadith, and never spewed out fountains of irrelevant words. That’s why Tahirul was not really popular as a speaker. He was invited only to the neighbourhood events and gatherings.

The annual religious gathering at Kalim Mirza Saheb’s house was held on the first Wednesday of the holy month. This was their hereditary tradition. It was an age-old event. Earlier, it used to be held with a lot of fanfare. But it wasn’t like that now. The reason for that was the division of property. This milad was held in memory of his great-grandfather. It was Kalim Bhai and Nazir who upheld the tradition now. Nazir was a poor man, he laboured for a living. But the fact was that Kalim Bhai’s great-grandfather was also his great-grandfather; they were branches of the same tree. The imam of the mosque was invited to be the main speaker. That brought down the cost considerably. After prayers, and salutations to the Prophet, the milad concluded with a monajaat. But the event did not really conclude with the imam’s speech. The youths of the neighbourhood took over the mic. They sang ghazals even though there was no audience in front of them. They presented songs. They cracked jokes, narrated anecdotes, and generally had fun. Among the elders, only Alam Bhai was present then. He was crazy about the mic! Maybe he didn’t like Maulana Tahirul’s speech, or didn’t agree with him. It could also be that he was entirely unaware that this song that he had learnt went against Tahirul’s opinion. Everyone pressed Alam Bhai to sing a ghazal. The funny thing was that Alam himself instructed someone in advance to make the request. Otherwise, Alam Bhai felt somewhat dejected, he felt embarrassed. Alam Miya burst into a spiritual song about sacrifice, although it was a song from the Bangladeshi film Matir Moyna (The Clay Bird).