1987: Of Courage and Cooking Pots

-Sharada Banu

As I got home after school I was nerving myself. I crept past the ground floor flats, keeping to common space, crossing no margins. Aunty would not catch sight of me. Uncle Avtaar would probably be asleep. I wasn’t ready yet.

I walked quietly to the first floor. I let myself in, washed my hands and gulped down the grub.   My mother had been working for some time now and I had got used to not seeing her, but the empty house I was facing for just the last month.  The whole of last year our ground floor neighbours, Mr. And Mrs. Avtaar Singh had been there. I wished I could be back there. Aunty would insist I wash and change and the food mother had left would be heated and served on a plate laid for me, over a neat little mat. Often, there would be a small surprise - one of her aloo tikkis or a roti with paneer mutter.

And then Hindi tuition with Uncle. He was an old man and he didn't take anyone for tuition, except me. He wouldn't take money from Amma, because we were neighbours. He had a son, who managed a hardware shop and my mother wrote the accounts for him. She would sometimes send down some mysorepak or omapodi to reciprocate the hospitality they generously gave.That was really how we had that awful blow-up that messed up everything. Last Diwali she bought a large box of sweets and took me along to greet Uncle and Aunty. Somehow, I had felt uneasy.  "Amma, they're Sikhs, I don’t suppose they have Diwali."

 "Ruku, I have my social obligations. Just keep quiet and come along". It went even worse than I had feared. There was a nasty little silence, when Amma wished them a happy Diwali and produced the sweets. Then they really gave it to her. They were not celebrating Diwali. They had no heart to rejoice. So many boys had died in Punjab, "shahids" for their motherland, for Khalistan. Mother was astounded. Yes, there was political unrest, what did that have to do with Diwali, here in Chennai? And everyone shared sweets.

"Mrs. Ramesh, I will not touch these sweets. The blood of thousands of Sikhs has been shed." I had never seen Uncle so excited. "We’ve lost a Prime Minister and quite a few Hindus have died too,” said my mother, now herself angry. Uncle just got up and left the room. We walked out and Amma stopped my tuitions. She said they had gone mad. For my parents, politics was something that happened hopefully, elsewhere; something to be confined to the newspaper and T.V. while sane people got on with their lives.

 I just missed the little stories Uncle used to tell. My Hindi had really improved in the year I had gone to them and never had I needed his help more than today. I had gone and done something crazy — I had said I would take part in an Elocution competition in Hindi, of all things. I couldn't even think about it without a sudden sick turn in my stomach. The competition was the next day; I had no speech ready.  I sat at the table, pulled out my file, wrote Guru Nanak Day Oratorical Competition. Rukmini Ramesh. Then the date, 5/11/1987. After which I stared at the blank sheet in despair. With my limited knowledge and defective Hindi what could I say about Guru Nanak and brotherly love and one God? And what a farce, thousands dead owing to revenge and religious unrest in the country and as for family, we were not even on talking terms with our neighbours.

Last chance. I could go to Uncle now. But… I hadn’t taken mother’s permission to go there again. I felt scared, too. Supposing he just said "No"? Or walked off without talking, like last time? Now, before I lost all heart. Cross the dividing line, Ruku. Now…  Come on, move…

Uncle was at home. He barely nodded when I tried to speak my piece.  I nervously explained. "Everyone will probably speak on Guru Nanak. So if I choose someone different I'll stand a better chance."

Suddenly he warmed up. “Come, I will help you prepare a wonderful speech. I will coach you on Guru Tegh Bahadur.”

He didn't sound angry anymore. Some inner force was animating him.  Now he was full of enthusiasm as he pulled out books and started talking. “Guru Tegh Bahadur was the 9^th Guru of the Sikhs. It was the seventeenth century and with the increasing hostility of the Mughals, Sikhs were realizing that they had to defend themselves. He was named the Valiant Sword ’Tegh’ after his gallant fighting on the battlefield. Hordes followed him, drawn to the Sikh message of equality and One God in all creation. Charitable and compassionate, he fed the hungry; he liked saying he should have been called ‘Degh’ (cooking pot) rather than Tegh (sword) as he set up free kitchens wherever he went. Yet, he found the time for religious poetry and his verses are  part of our Holy Book the Guru Granth Sahib. So great was the respect for his piety that Kashmiri Hindus threatened with forcible conversion by the Mughals pleaded for his help.”

“Who was the ruler then,” I asked.

“Aurangzeb” He had to that one. I felt a jolt of misery. I could feel the end to this story already.

Uncle went on: “Tegh Bahadur challenged the Emperor to convert him or failing, cease to force Islam on others. Aurangzeb tried. His companions were tortured and killed in front of him. Tegh Bahadur stood firm. When his head was cut off they found his last message, “I renounced my head but not my faith. Our Guru died for Hind and for Hindus. We call him Hind ki Chaadar.”

 I couldn’t bear any of the rest —the secret cremation of the headless body, the desperate flight with the head, the Hindu who lost his own life so the last remains could reach Tegh Bahadur’s nine-year old son—it was all grisly, revolting. And all for nothing. As though Aurangzeb, who had murdered Dara Shikoh, his brother and imprisoned his own father was going to stop forcible conversions. I found myself crying and brushed away the stupid tears, three hundred years too late."Why didn't he fight, gather his men and fight like Shivaji,” I asked at last.

"Battles are lost when one side believes they are finished. That they may as well obey. Survive, if they can, their spirit is crushed. He was trying to save a nation from this, beti. It took our Guru’s death to inspire generations to resist tyranny,” Uncle answered quietly.

  Everyone thought of Sikhs as fighters; or as scary terrorists. I couldn't connect any of it to this Guru at all. Suddenly I blurted out, "Uncle do you think he would have liked Sikhs killing Hindus to fight for Khalistan?” As soon as I said it, I was horrified. How could I have been so tactless? I felt sick with fear.

Uncle looked shocked; there was a long pause. At last, he said, "No, beti," very quietly. "But ordinary people are not saints."

“I think he was a great man too, Uncle. I'd like to talk about him, " I said at last.

Uncle smiled again. "Now you will write the speech, then I will see it."

It was five o'clock when I left. Mother would be home in an hour. Would she be angry that I had gone without her permission? Or just relieved we were friends again with our neighbours? I would have to wait and see.  I could go over my speech again with her though I felt I knew it quite well already. Somehow, I was no longer straining to win; the prize didn’t matter, or even my performance.

 I had a great story to tell. This was a man whose saga of love deserved to be told again and again. He had shared food and poetry. He hadn’t ignored politics, just risen above it, affirming the human family. He hadn’t seen any dividing lines at all. Those Kashmiri Hindus were one of us, worth dying for. All are One., because the One is in all. ‘Hind ki Chaadar – yes, he deserved the title.

 I began to feel hungry. There was a packet of Rava idli mix in the fridge. I poured the dough into the pans, lowered the whole into the cooker.  As I waited for the idlis, I reflected on how useful a cooker was. Glory be to peace and food.  No question about it, Tegh Bahadur had had a point; cooking pots were marvellous - in fact one simply couldn't manage without them, whereas most of us could get by without swords. With luck, and riding on the courage of those who had gone before.

About the Author:

Dr. Sharada Bhanu taught English Literature for over thirty years at Lady Shri Ram College, Delhi and Stella Maris, Chennai and retired as Associate Professor. Her thesis on Advaita and Children’s literature explored the surprising connections between Indian religious philosophy and western fantasy fiction for children. She has published three collections of mythological tales and is the author of a novel for children, several short stories, poems, book reviews and articles in national and international journals.