In a sense, it was like our whole world had fallen apart. We were a strong unit of three and it was like one-third of it, the epicentre of that unit, was crumbling. Actually, the enormity of the situation didn’t hit us at that moment.
But that night, when I went to Shah Rukh’s room — he was very, very, very close to my father — it really hit me like a ton of bricks. Farah Khan was there too. I told Shah Rukh. He broke down. Then I realised the reality of what was happening, because he wept like a baby. He held his stomach, and he just wept and wept, as if from his core.
He cried and said, ‘I’ve lost one father, I can’t lose another.’
He just kept saying that because he used to treat my father like his own. He used to call him ‘Tom uncle’, you know, with affection. I was so shocked at his reaction; I had gone numb. I couldn’t find the tears, because I couldn’t believe it. We were in an outdoor location, we were shooting a film, and my father was diagnosed with cancer in New York… What was going on?
I had to give my father the right send-off. My father was an Arya Samaji, so he had already told me: ‘When I go, I want the electric crematorium, and I don’t want any fuss.’
What he’d said was in my head. Amit uncle, who’s a very traditional man, asked me, ‘Are you sure?’
I said, ‘Yes, my father asked for it.’
He had wanted it and I wanted to do exactly what he had wanted. Of course, I knew that his ashes had to go to Haridwar, because the entire Johar family has records there, for centuries. But everything was a blur. The only time I think I was really, genuinely aware, was when his body came to the house and there was a fly that was buzzing around.
Then we went to the electric crematorium. We didn’t take my mother because she couldn’t have borne it. People kept saying that women didn’t go to funerals, but I just didn’t want my mother to be there.
I will never be able to do an electric cremation of anyone I love, because it’s like putting somebody into an oven. Putting my father into that oven, the sliding in and sliding out, the insensitivity of that ritual just broke me into a million pieces. I sank to the ground and wept. I kept saying, ‘He can’t go into an oven and come back out like that. That cannot be the end of my father. It cannot be the end of such a life. One of the nicest people in this world cannot just go into a tray and come out like this.’ That was what really broke me, and I kept thinking, is this what life is all about? That you live, you put so much of your heart and soul into your work and other people’s lives and relationships; you create this equity that is outstandingly powerful and earnest and sincere, and you amount to this? This is what happens to you in the end?
When you have a funeral pyre, there is something pious about it, but this electric cremation—I kept saying, ‘No, this cannot be, you have to come back. You have to come back and say you’re more worthy than what just happened. No, you can’t go.’
That’s what happens when lives go, you cannot believe it. Death is such a finality. In the end, you just amount to dust. Bones and dust. Spiritually, you go into a realm, to a soul space, but that’s not something that was visible to me. My father was finally dead and gone, and I had to deal with it with all the strength that I had built up in those ten months. That shield I had worn to protect my mother and myself had just crumbled. It just fell apart.
I remember coming back to the house, and there were people I had to meet, but I just went into my room. There was a tiny closet there. I went inside, closed the door, sat down and wept. I just wept and wept. I think it’s the last time I’ve ever cried like that. People were banging on the door outside, but I said, ‘Leave me alone, please give me twenty minutes. I don’t want to meet anybody.’ It was like a shriek. I was clutching my stomach tightly. I just couldn’t believe what had happened. I don’t think his death made me feel like that; but that ritual, that electric cremation, just broke my heart. It made me realize that it can be so trivial, the end, you know. It can amount to absolutely nothing.
Eventually, I stepped out and went to Mum.
It’s been over ten years now, but she’s just degenerated, she’s an emotional mess. She’s always shaking and vulnerable. Her health has taken a turn for the worse in the last decade. She’s never been able to get over it. I always say that when you get a marriage right, the loss of a spouse can be much worse than the loss of a parent. You get over the death of a parent, but you cannot get the death of a spouse out of your life.
It’s so strange how marriage today has taken such a beating as an institution. But that generation got it right, my parents became each other’s soulmates, companions, each other’s strength, support, everything. I really feel that my mother is half of herself today, because she feels she’s lost a part of herself with my father. A big part of her spirit died when my father died. Her zest for life, her excitement for things… I don’t think I can ever repair that, because
for me to repair that, I would have to get my father back. And that is not a possibility. So I think I lost two parents on that day. I lost my father’s body and I lost my mother’s spirit.
Excerpt from ‘ An Unsuitable Boy’by Karan Johar with Poonam Saxena, published in Shobhaa De Books by Penguin Random House India
