Opinion

Childhood Memories of the Pakistan Movement
By Begum Freda Shah
Former Ambassador of Pakistan

There was a flurry of political activity in Simla from 1945 to 1947. We children heard all about the comings and goings of the Congress and Muslim League leaders to sort out the highly complex political issues of those days. My predominant memories are of the family clustered around the radio every evening intently listening to the news, followed by endless talk and discussion about the turns and twists and nuances concerning the political movement then underway in the Indian subcontinent to get rid of British rule, and the demand of the Muslims for a separate homeland for themselves where they could order their lives according to their own Islamic values and culture..
We lived in Simla, which was then the summer capital of India, as my paternal grandfather (Syed Mohammad Ghiasuddin, who had by then discarded his title of ‘Khan Bahadur ‘ in protest against the British rule), had settled after a long and distinguished career in the Foreign and political service of the then government of India. My father, after practicing law for a while, also decided to take up a government job. My grandfather was livid with him for giving up law for a ‘lowlier’ career and did not talk to him for a long time. But the reality was that it was hard in those days even for the educated young Muslims, to earn a decent living as the British-Hindu nexus was heavily weighed against them. Anyway, we children enjoyed the carnival atmosphere when our whole family would shift, bag and baggage, to Delhi in winter and return to Simla in summer. But the dream of Pakistan remained our family’s irrepressible passion and Quaid-i-Azam our unrivalled hero.
My paternal and maternal families were all Muslim Leaguers, body and soul. They loved the Quaid because his leadership was wholly selfless, his every thought and deed geared towards the best interest of the Muslim community, without any hostility or rancor towards his rivals and opponents. . There was a beautiful blend of idealism and realism in his nature, almost in a prophet-like way. He always spoke logically and politely with his political adversaries, never overstepping constitutional and democratic boundaries and remained a thorough gentleman even when battling against political foes such as Gandhi and Nehru and the biased British viceroy, Mountbatten.
When Quaid-i-Azam and Mohtarma Fatima Jinnah visited Simla, the Muslim League ladies arranged a women’s meeting with them in a big hall, with the children sitting on the floor. I remember them entering the hall to loud cheerings and slogans and clapping. The program started with my mother reciting verses from the Holy Qur’an in her melodious voice. My younger sister and brother refused to leave her side and stood next to her on the dais, near the Quaid. When my mother finished the ‘Talawat’, the Quaid patted my brother’s head. (My brother, Fasih Bokhari, later rendered many years of meritorious service in the Pakistan Navy, achieving the rank of Admiral and Chief of Naval Staff). I could not take my eyes off the Quaid, so overawed was I at seeing him right in front of me, such great respect and veneration had our elders instilled in our hearts for him. I still remember the somber and serious tone of his voice even though I was too young to grasp the legal and political details of his speech. It was a day never to be forgotten.
Yet another such day I remember was when my mother and aunt took us children with them to attend Mahatma Gandhi’s public meeting a little distance from Simla. We walked up a mountain slope to reach the venue. Gandhi was sitting on a low dais in his well-known attire with most of his frail body exposed. I clearly remember neat rows of men dressed in white pajamas, kurtas and caps in the distinct Hindu style. I don’t remember seeing many women there. We were close enough to the front to see Gandhi clearly. I knew even at that tender age that something very special was taking place. Gandi’s voice too was very strong and weighty. I sensed that he too was a man of substance, but he was not our Quaid! When the crowd started shouting pro-Congress and pro-Gandi slogans, my little brother thought it was time to yell out the slogans he knew and innocently started shouting pro-Pakistan slogans. We tried to hush him up but, even when the crowd became silent, he continued shouting them. It was a very civilized crowd as no one said anything to us. Instead a Hindu man picked up my brother in his arms and carried him to the back of the crowd to quieten him as he was clearly disrupting the Mahatma’s speech.
How civilized was the atmosphere in Simla those days that two Muslim women, with their young children, unaccompanied by any male member of their family, could attend such a public meeting without any concern for their personal safety. I wonder how many women would dare to move around so freely in the ‘Islamic’ atmosphere of Pakistan today.
A lot of dignitaries spent their summer months in Simla enjoying its peaceful and cosmopolitan ambience. I remember being taken by my maternal grandfather for tea with poet Hafeez Jullundhri who later penned Pakistan’s national anthem. My grandfather, Khwaja Abadullah Akhtar, was also well known in literary circles as he had authored a large number of books on different aspects of Islam, e.g. ‘Mazahib-e-Islamia’, ‘Saqafat-e-Islamia’ and ‘Khilafat-e-Islamia’. It is amusing that a day earlier, he took me and my sister to Simla’s Mall Road and bought us two Western-style straw hats with ribbons dangling on one side, perhaps in deference to Hafeez Jullundhri’s second wife who was English.
Around the beginning of 1947 we paid a visit to my maternal aunt and her family in Jhelum. Her lawyer husband, Muzzafar Hussain Shah, was a Muslim League activist and was actually jailed for the cause of Pakistan. It goes to the credit of Prime Minister Junejo’s government that during his tenure the Pakistan Day parade was held outside my aunt’s house in Jhelum to honor her husband’s memory. My aunt too was a great political activist and a leader of the women’s wing of the Muslim League in Jhelum. While we were there she and other lady Muslim Leaguers organized a ‘jaloos’ or procession. My mother and us children also participated, walking through the streets of Jhelum chanting slogans demanding the creation of Pakistan. As dusk fell, torches were lit and carried by young male students who accompanied the procession. It was all so civilized.
Even Muslim women from old conservative families like ours instinctively knew that they must play their role at this historical moment in time. The cause of Pakistan became their top priority. They, who had never stepped out of their homes alone, suddenly broke all shackles of tradition and came out onto the streets to be counted among the warriors of the Pakistan movement. They did not hesitate to take even their children out into the streets for this noble purpose.
But back in Simla, our sense of security was shaken early one morning when our Muslim neighbors came knocking at our back door, frightened out of their wits. They led my parents to the front of our house. A large black cross was pained on our front wall. They said that many other houses of Muslims had been marked in like manner. It was a dire warning with grave implications, but my father and other family members felt that our family was well known in Simla and no harm would come to us.
As the Pakistan movement gained momentum, so did the differences between the Hindus and Muslims, seeping right down into the psyche of the children. Religious fanatics, rabble-rousers and mob-attackers, with their own dangerous agendas, had started to enter the scene. It had become a sport even for the children to hurl their different slogans and taunts at each other. During the mid-day break in school one day, my class friend Nilofer Butt and a Hindu girl came to blows, pulling each other’s hair because the girl had shouted at Nilofer that ‘you will never get your stupid Pakistan’. All of us children began shouting, instinctively in support of our co-religionist fighter. The teachers came running to break up the fight and punished all of us who were present by standing us up against the long school wall until we were exhausted, besides giving us angry lectures to behave ourselves.
Our childhood games often centered around the Pakistan movement. One day when I heard that the British and Hindu leaders were creating problems for Quaid-i-Azam, I devised my own ‘political’ strategy. My grandmother had once told me that when you get the hiccups it means that someone is remembering you, so I got my playmates to run around shouting the names of Mountbatten, Gandhi and Nehru, thinking it would make them hiccup so much that they would not be able to speak and would stop worrying Quaid-i-Azam.
Around the middle of 1947, my father was posted to Paris, to work in the trade section of the Embassy of the then British-ruled India. We made the long journey from Simla to Bombay by train and then by sea to England, on HMS Strathmore. The ship had been commissioned for carrying troops and supplies during World War II and had still not been re-converted into a commercial liner. So we slept in the bunks used by the soldiers.
After a stopover in London, we sailed to France by Ferry across the English Channel. The whole journey took about a month. Scars of the war were too visible. England, in particular, had been battered with bombed-out buildings everywhere. But the people came across as very disciplined and dignified, patiently waiting in queues to buy whatever was available and affordable. Because of shortages, many items of food and apparel, even shoes, had been rationed by the government and coupons had to be used for purchasing them.
We were in Paris when the Partition of India and Pakistan finally took place. At dawn, on 14 August 1947, my mother woke us up, greeting us joyously on the birth of Pakistan. My father and Mr. Hamid Ali were the only two Muslims in the Embassy and they had both opted for Pakistan. But that day they had a grand duty to fulfill. They had arranged for the flag of Pakistan to be raised above the Embassy building. It was a chilly morning with the autumn leaves swirling in the breeze as Mr. and Mrs. Ali and their three children and my parents and us three children made our way through the Tuilleries Garden and down the Champs-Elyse, and stood on the pavement across the street from the Embassy. Our uncontrollable joy could not have been missed by the passersby. As the flag of Pakistan was gradually raised for the first time over Paris my mother prayed for a secure and prosperous future for our new homeland. My father asked us to salute the flag, and all of us kept our hands on our foreheads until it reached its zenith.
In India and Pakistan rioting and looting had started and we were worried about the fate of our families. After some weeks of anguished waiting, some letters arrived. Mercifully, our family members were safe, although they had reached Pakistan under great hardship with literally only the clothes on their backs. .Their old Hindu shopkeeper came to warn them one night that a gang of thugs and looters was headed towards their house. To bypass the main road, they ran from the back of the house and wound their way in the dark through the narrow mountainous paths to the evacuee camp set up for Muslims. Our family’s houses and all their contents and personal belongings were left behind, never to be seen again. But their lives were saved, and nothing else mattered.
But Mrs Hamid Ali received a different kind of letter from her brother, informing her that all their family members had been massacred and he was the only survivor. Her agony cannot be described in words. It cut deeply through our hearts.
The many precious lives that were lost for the creation of Pakistan seem to have been forgotten, their sacrifices trampled underfoot. The noble values and high principles followed by those who gave their all for the creation of Pakistan have been mocked again and again by the decision-makers and power wielders of this country. Even the sacred religion of Islam has become an exploitative tool in the hands of political charlatans and thugs. When will the Pakistan of our dreams become a reality?

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