While the country is preparing to celebrate the 70th anniversary of Independence on August 15, it is time to refresh our collective memory and look back. Seventy years ago, the joyous day of Independence had arrived accompanied by the Indian version of Holocaust. The subcontinent was divided into India and Pakistan and horrendous communal rioting had torn the social, political and cultural fabric of the country asunder, giving rise to the biggest transfer of population in human history. While no accurate figures are available, it is generally assumed that over 15 million people were uprooted from their soil and migrated from India to Pakistan and vice versa. Murder, rape, looting and arson took place on a very large scale and between one to two million people were slaughtered and hundreds of thousands were left wounded. The scars of those days are yet to heal fully.
It is rather intriguing that while many fiction writers in Hindi dealt with the historic event of Partition in their short stories and novels - Yashpal’s two-part magnum opus Jhootha Sach (False Truth), Bhisham Sahni’s iconic novel Tamas (Darkness), Rahi Masoom Raza’s poignant narrative Aadha Gaon (Half Village), Krishna Sobti’s Zindaginama (Life’s Chronicle) and Krishna Baldev Vaid’s Guzara Hua Zamana (translated into English as Broken Mirror ), to name just a few - Hindi poets mostly displayed an inexplicable indifference towards it with a few exceptions like Sachchidanand Hiranand Vatsyayan ‘Agyeya’ who penned an eleven-part poem “Sharanarthi” (Refugees) between October 12, 1947 and November 12, 1947 while himself being in transit.
Krishna Sobti
The fourth part of this long poem is subtitled “Mirgi Padi” (Epileptic Fit) while the sixth part is subtitled “Samanantar Saanp” (Parallel Snakes). These subtitles make it clear that ‘Agyeya’ found the whole subcontinent in the throes of an epileptic fit and parallel communalisms of the Hindus and the Muslims. In Urdu, Faiz Ahmed Faiz too was expressing his disappointment by crying “ Wo intezar tha jiska, ye wo sahar to nahin ” (This is not the dawn that we had been waiting for).
Rahi Masoom Raza
Cementing nationalism
It was only in the final years of the 19th century that the national unity forged during the revolt of the 1857, described as the first Indian war of independence, started receiving blows from the growing and competing communalism among the Hindus and the Muslims.
Bhisham Sahni
One was reminded of this by a magnificent collection of patriotic songs and poems written at different points of time in the history of the country. The collection titled Azadi Ki Agnishikhaen (Burning Flames of Freedom), was brought out by Indian Farmers’ Fertiliser Cooperative Limited (IFFCO) to celebrate the golden jubilee of Indian independence. Very wisely, IFFCO had invited well-known Hindi critic Shiv Kumar Mishra to edit the book and he performed his task with painstakingly collecting poems right from the Rig Vedic age up to the 20th century and offering a panoramic and comprehensive view of the patriotic poetic tradition.
Besides the Rig Veda, the first section of the book contains extracts from hoary texts like Mahabharata, Bhoomisukta and Shrimad Bhagavata Purana. It also makes us familiar with a kavitta of Tulsidas in which the saint-poet describes how it is so difficult to be born in India as a human being. And, if one fails to make use of this rare opportunity to devote oneself to the worship of God, it’s like yoking Kamadhenu (the celestial cow that fulfils all our demands) to sow poison seeds in the field. The second section’s offerings include songs and poems related to the great revolt of 1857 and includes a few stanzas of Nawab Wajid Ali Shah ‘Akhtar’ and the last nazm of the last Mughal Emperor Bahadur Shah Zafar.
In this section, the national song of the Indian soldiers who had spontaneously risen against the British as one body is worth quoting. Beginning with “ Ham hain iske malik Hindustan hamara, Pak vatan hai qaum ka jannat se bhi pyaara ” (India belongs to us and this sacred country is dearer to us than even heaven), the song ends with the declaration “ Hindu Musalman Sikh hamara bhai-bhai pyara, yah hai azadi ka jhanda, ise salam hamara ” (Hindus, Muslims and Sikhs are all dear brothers. Ours is the flag of freedom and we salute it.)
Embracing Muslim king
It must be noted that Hindu soldiers formed the bulk of the independence-seeking soldiers but they had no hesitation in accepting the Muslim king as their supreme commander , with no trace of any communal bias among the Hindu, Muslim or Sikh soldiers. This secular nationalism was forged while soldiers united to fight the common enemy. It’s a sad story that within a span of 90 years, this unity gave way to the Partition.
The book makes us familiar with the patriotic tradition of not only Hindi but also of Urdu, Rajasthani, Bengali, Bhojpuri and several other languages and dialects. It also reinforces our belief in the secular conception of nationhood.
