Lahore is a fabled city beyond our reach in India. I had lived there as a child when my father, who was in the army, was posted in the city. That was a long time ago. But Lahore has always remained in my memory, as my mother died there; her ashes were immersed in the Ravi. I never expected to see Lahore ever again until...
Last June, I found in my mailbox an invitation to a literary event to be held in Lahore from January 10 to 12, 2020. This was magical. The invitee was Yaqoob Khan Bangash, Director, Centre for Governance and Policy, IT University of Punjab, Lahore, and curator of the Afkar-e-Taza ThinkFest. In the lengthy invite, Yaqoob outlined its purpose (“New ideas”), and mentioned a list of distinguished past invitees. I accepted immediately. I was invited to launch my social history travelogue/ memoir, Empress of the Taj, In Search of Mumtaz Mahal .
Fingers crossed
Through several emails, we discussed that elusive document, The Visa, to that forbidden country. It’s availability depended on our countries’ mutual relationship at the moment of application. Under the two current governments, the situation did not look hopeful. We both had our fingers crossed over the months of correspondence and political uncertainties, made more intense by November. Yaqoob sent the link for the Pakistan visa forms; I was to get a conference visa. Both the Pakistan and India governments will not issue tourist visas to each other’s citizens. Yaqoob and I thought this was insanity but those were the edicts. I wanted my wife to accompany me: as an Australian, she could possibly get a tourist visa.
I filled in the forms, added many passport-size photos and sent the documents to the Pakistan High Commission’s visa office in Delhi late November. Yaqoob wrote: “Just a couple of weeks for the visas”. Then, we waited. And waited. The silence was deafening. December, Christmas and then the new year. No visa still, with Yaqoob chasing from his end. By January 6, we were resigned. I would never see Lahore again.
On January 8, 5 p.m., Yaqoob sent the message, “Conference visa granted”. I had to pick it up on January 9. Then another message — my wife’s tourist visa was cancelled. Yaqoob asked me to call the chancellor at the High Commission. It was 9.30 pm. He did answer, was very friendly, consulted papers, and said my wife’s tourist visa was reinstated.
Tit for tat
I spent half the night booking flights for us, first to Delhi, then to Amritsar: from there we would cross the Wagah border into Pakistan along with the other Indian invitees. I wasn’t told for how many days I would get a visa. I decided to return on January 13.
On January 9 afternoon, we met the courteous Pakistan staff in the visa office who disappeared with our passports. We waited two hours. They returned. Our visas were valid for seven days, and only to Lahore. India does the same — both governments keep themselves busy playing tit for tat, like children. We met the chancellor, Mr. Saeed Ali, also courteous, laying out tea and biscuits, conversing and wishing us a good journey. The next day, on the Delhi-Amritsar flight, we met the five other invitees, including Mani Shankar Aiyar, a friendly man and a great raconteur. He arranged taxis to the Wagah border.
Warm welcome
Crossing was both an emotional and physical journey. I was returning after many years. Passports were minutely examined, the details noted in ledgers and computers by at least eight officials on the Indian side. Finally, stamped. We walked across the border, passing the crowds filling the small stadium for watching the daily display of strutting soldiers.
In Pakistan, the same minute examination of passports, notes entered in ledgers/ computers, also by eight or nine officials and the police. Stamped. Their welcome was warmer and more courteous.
Finally, I met Yaqoob waiting for us: a charming man with the distracted air of someone hosting over 150 invitees from all over the world and Pakistan. My first questions to him was, “Where is Lucknow Road, Lahore Cantonment?” That was our home address then. He had never heard of it, nor had any Lahori I asked. Road names had changed, they said. It was there under a new alias. I would never find it.
At Lahore Fort
In the hotel, the first familiar face, Sir Venkatraman (Venki) Ramakrishnan, whom I had met at The Hindu Lit Fest. The welcome dinner, on a bitterly cold night, was at Lahore Fort, first built by Emperor Akbar in 1575, with his descendants adding their flourishes — Shah Jahan the marble pavilions and Aurangzeb the massive battlements flanking the main gate. It was the chance to meet the others, including Mark Lyall Grant, ex-U.K. High Commissioner to Pakistan, and the historian Kim Wagner, whose book on 1857 I had read recently.
Also, there was my host for the book launch, Dr. Nadhra Khan, Associate Professor, History and Art, Lahore University. A bright, attractive woman who had not had enough time to read the entire PDF manuscript of my book (Indian books are banned in Pakistan and vice versa). The great feast took up two long tables, with the lit-up fort as the backdrop. Venki had a hard time finding vegetarian food, the only offering being pasta.
The conference venue was the Alhamra Arts Council. On January 11, the first speaker was Grant, on ‘International Governance and the Future of the State’. He tried to reassure us by saying there was hope despite the rise of right-wing nationalist governments around the world. The talks by the others covered every subject, from politics, history, books to governance.
Same people
As I had written my novel, Taj, with Jahangir as a character, I had to visit his tomb in Shahdara, in the outskirts of Lahore. In the afternoon, Maureen and I headed off first to see Lahore Fort in daylight. The roads were wide, smooth for the most part, no sign of garbage, and the shops, including Anarkali market, crowded. When we reached the fort, the crowds — families with children, all in their finery — were overwhelming.
Many went out of their way to say a ‘hello’ to us, others waved as we passed. As many Lahoris I met commented, “We’re all the same people.” And I agreed. We found everyone — drivers, shopkeepers, even the police — courteous and friendly.
Lahore Fort is similar to Red Fort, but grey granite and twice as large. On our way to the tomb, we crossed a bridge. The driver pointed down to the river Ravi. I looked at the cold waters, struggling with memories.
There were few visitors to the tomb, the garden was huge. Jahangir’s tomb was at one end, and far at the opposite end, Mehrunissa’s. She had designed both. We could take photographs inside. But there were signs of neglect too. On the way back to this exuberant city, we discovered that Delhi and Lahore have matching traffic jams. You could read War and Peace waiting for the traffic to move.
That night, we had dinner in the striking Haveli Barood Khana in old Lahore. The neighbourhood resembled old Delhi.
On January 12, the first talk was by Sir Venki on the gene machine. We heard others — on the Amritsar massacre, a Chinese world order, Savarkar and the origins of Hindutva. At my book launch with Nadhra, a retired professor of English from Lahore University spoke glowingly about my book.
I woke up on January 13 panicking. I had booked the Amritsar flight for 12.45 p.m. Mani cheerfully informed me that I would never make it through Wagah in time for the taxi to the airport. It was pouring rain as we raced to the border. At least the porters knew the routine. Same show of passports to everyone. On the Pakistani side, we were welcomed, ushered through with a quick stamp, and the immigration officer shook hands. We crossed the no-man’s land in the rain, dragging our suitcases to India.
There was a bus and we waited in it to take us to the Indian immigration and customs building. Time was flying. More passport checks, finally out by 11.15 p.m. We had 45 minutes to check in. We called for a taxi and the one that came was an ancient Maruti van. The old Sikh driver started off: his van did not have wipers and he drove by sheer instinct, as we could not see the road in the rain. We reached the airport with five minutes to spare.
In those few days in Lahore, none of the English language newspapers had mentioned India, in any context. The first Indian newspaper I opened headlined a comment by our PM on Pakistan.
The writer is a novelist and playwright.
