By Giani Santokh Singh

The dreadful events that took place at the birth of Pakistan in 1947 are called disturbances by the people of my village.

 The month of August which brought for a small number of people of Hindustan and Pakistan, an opportunity to capture political power in the name of democracy also brought dreadful misery for countless millions. A lot has already been said, heard, written, and caused to be written about it. Here my aim is just to point a hazy picture of the period built up in my then young mind. This division of India has neither brought any solution to problems of Muslims, nor has it brought much peace and prosperity to the rest of Indians. The boundary line beyond Wagha/Attari was just a line drawn on a piece of paper, but for the Muslims who crossed that line and went to Pakistan and the Hindus and Sikhs who crossed this line and came to India it was one of the greatest tragedies of human history, which the people have still not forgotten. After more than six decades the Muslims of Bihar who had gone to the then East Pakistan are yet to find a firm foothold in their adopted country. Those who know will tell you of the travails of those who are trying to surreptitiously sneak from Bangladesh into India, to then cross the border into Pakistan by any means. Besides being robbed by ruthless agents, they sometimes fall victims to bullets of the border-guards. Only the lucky few are successful in entering Pakistan. They are well aware that no aunt of theirs is awaiting them in Pakistan with hot Paraunthas. People had heard that regimes changed, but no one imagined the populations could also be changed.

On the road from Amritsar to Sri Hargobindpur at the twenty-second milestone, and three miles from Mehta Chowk, was our Khooh. There used to be threeKhoohs on this road. One mile from the Nath Wali Khoohi. The first Khooh on the left hand side belonged our Bhaichara, and was called the Sarhak Wala Khooh; a school is stands there now. Next to it is the road leading to the village. Farther on, there were two Khoohs in succession. The first I know was called the Wichkarla and the second by some other name, but somehow the name Botlan Wala Khooh is stuck in my childhood memory. My ChachaJi was walking behind the bullocks which were yoked to the persian wheel by well, while my younger brother Bheero (now Subedar Dalbir Singh), ChachaJi’s elder son Manohar (now Manohar Singh) and I were bathing in the Auloo. (the resevoir of water that receives the output of the persian wheel) Our clothes were drying in the sun. It was a summer noon. We saw a man come running from the direction of Amritsar, shouting, “They are coming; they are coming”. He wore a small kirpan in hisgatra and his face resembled that of my Chhote ChachaJi. His words meant that that a band of Muslim fanatics was coming to loot and kill, and that the people should save themselves.

      Chacha Ji said to us, “Put on your shirts, let us go home”. I said that the shirts were still wet. He said that was even better. I still do not know why he said so. He helped us wear our shirts, lifted two of us on his shoulders and the third on his side and brought us home. All the village women and children were standing on their roofs and looking in the direction of my elder Chachi Ji’s village. A column of smoke could be seen rising from there. Men were going out of their houses, with hurriedly tied turbans, strips of cloth wound around their middles asKamarbands, having drunk water sweetened with Gur. Their destination was village Vairo Nangal. Later, it came to be known that Baloach military had shot down some people there and on hearing the news, a band of marauders from the Muslim-majority city of  Batala were coming this way, causing havoc among the villages in their way. The women standing on roof-tops were exchanging rumours which they had heard in the streets. My mother gave us some Chapatis to eat with sugar and ghee. But this turmoil had killed my appetite. I did not understand what was happening, but whatever it was, my instinct told me was not good.

     Men were still marching out from the village. They were going in the direction where the houses of the blacksmiths and the Mazhabis stood. The village Vairo Nangal was also in that direction. The women on roof tops asked one another, “Will the men go?” “Only those who have horses”, the others would answer. My BhaiaJi and ChachaJi were among those who had drunk the Sharbatand had gone out. If my memory is correct,  my BhaiaJi had a Kirpan in his hand and ChachaJi had a Barchha. Both had their waists tied with Kamarbands andMarhassas around their heads. I think my younger ChachaJi was not in the village and my grandmother also may have gone to her ancestral village Sangojla in the state of Kapurthala, because I cannot remember their whereabouts. But I remember that at the turning of the street leading to our house and near theBhatthi of the Jheevers, swords and Barchhas were being wrought by a blacksmith called from another village. My grandfather’s youngest brother Bapu Ishar Singh had a Gandasa, which he used to keep hidden in the straw kept in a room of the Haveli. Near our Khooh, on the path leading from the main road towards our village, a large ditch was dug in the middle of the road to intercept the enemies from coming to our village on cart or  motor vehicle. More than once, men from the neighbouring  large village Nangal came to demand that the Muslims of our village be handed over to them for slaughter. That village being large and the men powerful, they could not be stopped by force. It could only be done with soothing words and vague promises, such as that we will discuss the matter among members of the Panchayat . But in the end seeing no other alternative to save their lives, they were quietly taken out and left with a caravan of Muslim refugees going to Pakistan. It was thus that the people of our village saved themselves from witnessing the slaughter of the Muslims of our village.

      It was during these days that the women and children of our house went to spend a night at the house of a distant relative at the village Nangal, fearing attack from Muslims. I remember that at night we all slept on the roof top. The blinking of stars in the clear night sky was fascinating. In the morning when I woke up, I found that we were inside the home and it was raining outside. Apparently the rain had poured sometime during the night and we children had been brought down to sleep indoors. The whole of that day we spent playing in the courtyard of the house. When and how we returned to our house I do not now remember.

      This is the hazy description of those momentous times lying in some corner of my mind. Hearing such odd and rambling talk from me, my mother one day remarked, “He talks of the times of Baba Adam.”

From my book 'The days gone by'.

Sydney, Australia