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Why did I come back here again?
This was the thought that repeatedly came to Fazal’s mind. This is not my home. It is just a few tiles of roof given by the government. The post by local bamboo poles, bamboo pipes and bamboo peels without a door. No partition wall in the middle. There is no other soul in this house. The cow shed is inside the house. Even the cows don’t graze well. Do they get some smell? Why did l do have to bring the cows from Rameshwar Nepali’s house? And what about the new plough brought from Bhaluka-what dumbfoolery! The old plough and all rest are burnt. Is this the same old piece of land? Or is it a new house in an old piece of land. Fajal is there in the same house. It was the one with the two bundles of tin roofs. There he lives on one side and the pair of cows on the other inside the same house. The pole on the lean local bamboo is spread across ten pieces of tin roof as the ceiling. The other tin tiles are the walls of the house. There is no cow shed or kitchen. Everything co-exists below the same roof- man, cow, pan, saucepan, utensils. A pitcher full of water is also there in an earthen pot. There are no boxes or stuff. The bamboo shatter is the bed--- there is no mattress, pillow, mosquito net. Perhaps all the mosquitoes in the village have been burnt to ashes. He slept with his torn vest, a kurta and one of his two lungis was his pillow. Sometimes he could sleep and sometimes not at all the entire night. Mattress and pillows didn’t matter much. It was not even a small thing to be sheltered inside a tin roof. Infact the floor of the school was not that bad, at least it wasn’t damp. Mattress or pillow was not there too, it was foolish to ask for those in a relief camp. There was one more thing that was not bad. The curry was not to be cooked by oneself, but the taste of public kitchen cannot be measured. The irksome hunger was the only reason for eating, or else nothing was edible in the same styled rice, pulses, and two pieces of potato and a bit of salt.
Fazal could not eat rice without some fish. And his hands were good at angling. Fishing net, hook or …the fishes can’t resist his catch. Even without net his hands were enough to get Fazal all varieties of black fish like snake heads, cat fish etc from muddy splashes. People in the village called him meseka or fisher because of this. But who will feed him fish in the relief camp? The watery lentils and rice was more than enough. Those who were not chopped down had ran and hidden in the forest, when they could not remain in hunger and came out assuming a change in the situation, they too were cut down. It would have been better for them to be killed in the war in the village. Fazal was not at his house during the bloody feud. He had gone to the Lalung or Tiwa village on the other side of the river. Guluk Mudoi from that village had borrowed Rs150 from him the previous year. He had to get the money back. Bhaluka Badoi had promised to make a plough and pail with wood from jackfruit tree. He has to get that if it was made and would see if the lake to the west of the forest between the two villages is dried up or not.
His family members had forbidden him to leave village during the troubled times.
His wife forbade him. What to ask from them? Our people are cut down and killed wherever they are seen. They have guns, bullets and machine guns. Not one or two, in thousands. The fire can’t be burnt down to be extinguished. Their lawyers and officers have shown the way – to kill our people. Don’t go far away from the house…
The children too persistently forced Fazal not to leave home. With a wry sarcasm Fazal would say “You don’t have to make me understand. If they are sending away, if they are killing and butchering, it is only the foreigners. We are not foreigners, are we?”
The elder daughter had said, “Was Jalil’s village a foreign village? That is said to be an even older Miya village than ours. Still all the people in that village have been butchered and finished. All the houses have been burnt. No need to go anywhere.”
However, Jalil was also butchered and killed. Jalil had often visited Fazal’s home. He had an eye over Fazal’s daughter. She too didn’t dislike Jalil.
But he too was cut down.
“You all are unnecessarily apprehensive. All the families in our village are so old everyone knows that. Our Firdousi Ali High School has been set up for more than fifty years now. Akram Ali’s grandfather donated his land and had built the school. It is not that anyone is teaching Bangla here?”
“Did they leave without burning the ME School at Hasim bazaar? Was that not an Assamese school set up by our people?”
Fazal said “Don’t worry about me. I will go today and return tomorrow you all act as the village folks guide you. If there is any danger do what others do.”
After two days Fazal returned to his own village.
He could not find anyone after his return.
The village had vanished.
He tried to find out where his house was situated. All the houses had been burnt down and turned the same colour of charcoal ashes. The old people and the little children also turned into ashes along with the houses. There was no difference in the ashes of all the burnt down houses. He walked over those ashes and loitered here and there.
There was the place he owned where his house stood once. The leaves of the four coconut trees are burnt. The fire might have risen to a great height. The leaves of the two mango trees and the palm trees have also been burnt.
He felt sad to walk over the boundary of his burnt house. It was buried in ash. His two small children have also been burnt down. His 6 year old girl had run out in the courtyard. Someone cut her down in two pieces in a single blow. Another one threw the two pieces of her throbbing flesh to the burning fire and laughed monstrously and went off to butcher others.
Fazal had only heard of these terrible facts.
The ashes could have been the ashes of his children. He could not walk over them.
A few policemen with guns stood afar. They were guarding the ashes.
Fazal was thirsty. The sun was harsh. He went ahead and sat in the shade of a half burnt tree. A few vultures were flying leisurely in the sky. A few crows barked in the bamboo grove behind the bank of the rivulet. A foul smell emitted out of the wet land from the heart of the ashes. Fazal’s limbs became numb.
The policemen looked at him and talked amidst themselves while smoking cigarette. They too seemed to Fazal like some half burnt trees.
He had forgotten about his hunger. He was more tired than hungry. His throat was dry. He couldn’t open his eyes properly in the heat of the scorching sun.
Two policemen came towards him. He stood up from his sitting position at their sight. He wished for some water to quench his dry throat. He looked towards the pond dug together by some villagers, there was water, but it was too deep. The water of the pond had dried.
He wanted to walk towards the pond. A policeman said “Don’t drink water from that pond.” Fazal stared at his face---he could not understand what he meant.
“Many people are thrown in it after being killed. The corpses are rotten in the water and people have cleaned their blood speared weapons in those waters. All the water has turned blood red.”
The police seemed to plead to Fazal. Fazal couldn’t properly understand his statements.
“I am very thirsty” --- he feebly sighed.
The police took him aside and offered him water from the tube-well at their camp. He drank four glasses of water one after another. He could feel a raw smell in the water. A smell of dried blood! He felt nauseated.
The policemen took an account of all his whereabouts and sent him to a relief camp. While going to Bhaluka’s village he had carried an extra lungi, kurta and a vest besides the ones he was wearing. Now those extra clothes have been handy for him.
Certain things in the relief camp had made him restless.
The people in the camp were from several villages. Most of the people remained silent, and didn’t talk much. As if what they would speak would be spied upon and conveyed elsewhere against them.
Nobody trusted anyone. They seemed like animals in a circus---they were waiting to pounce upon one another in the absence of the ring master.
The food remained same, devoid of taste. It was a punishment to consume the same kind of tasteless food every day.
The way of existing by eating and sleeping without any productive work was tedious for Fazal and many others. Having no work to do is a punishment.
Without having an idea of the place of return and the condition if returned everyone in the camp were anxious to return back.
It was not a refugee settlement--- a concentration camp. A heavy storm had come with thunder to destroy and sweep away all trees and houses. In the darkness of the dark none could see the face of the other. The people fought some war in the dark. A lot of people died--- nobody could recall the number. The number of deceased could be ascertained only when they can return back to their lost homes. There was no use to count the number of dead ones by being at the camp.
Everything has gone awry.
All is shattered and lost.
The living had died.
The villages full of life have now become a graveyard. There are ashes in the face of the sky.
After 54 days the camp shared by Fazal and others was taken off. The people went back to their own places. Some are lost-not in the camp, nor in the hospital, or found in forests. A bus took Fazal and others to the burnt village and stopped at the borders. The roads in the village could be commutated through bullock-carts not by buses or trucks. The road was narrow and not even high. The monsoon rains flowed over these lanes. The bridge near the village was burnt. There is no replacement.
The bus stopped.
One after another eleven people got down from the bus. Fazal too got down. He felt like coming to a far off unknown place from another far off unknown place.
The bus left after dropping them.
Fazal opened his eyes wide and looked everywhere. The place seemed completely unacquainted to him.
The sun blazed mercilessly. It is the onset of the sunny days in the month of sout. He removed his tattered kurta and put it on his shoulders. He took his small bundle of clothes along with the stuff of whole-grains like rice, lentils etc from the camp and slowly followed the others. He felt no emotion of joy in returning back to his own home.
The familiar smell in the air was gone. In other times like this in the month of sout there is a sweet smell in the morning air. The wild flowers bloom in the river bank. A soft smell emits from the buds of the trees.
A dry putrid smell met Fazal’s nostrils. The smell of cremation grounds, the smell of graves. He never smelt such an odour ever in his life. He felt breathless.
A few living people have come back to the burnt village. Most of the people have been butchered. The women and small children are all dead. From a month old baby to escaping toddlers to the pre-teens of 10-12 year olds to old men and women everyone was killed. Only a few strong young men and along with them a couple of young daughters and wives somehow could escape from being cut down. Some blind-folded jumped in the river, swamp and ponds. Those were killed there in the waters by being repeatedly pierced with spears. Some were lost.
Lost means vanished. They were nowhere to be found as dead or alive. They too were counted as dead. The village is a graveyard.
Those who were brought back to the village had lost their voices. They too were living dead. Some skeletons with life sit, stand, walk, bend, straighten, and mumble something although their lips don’t quiver. The people newly brought by the bus from the relief camp were looked up with half open eyes by the ones brought earlier as if they didn’t know each other.
Fazal too looked at them in the same way --- he didn’t say a word.
Fazal was a rustic by character. Spoke less, nor interacted much with others. His cows-goats, poultry, wife and children were his only intimates. Being an early riser he used to go to the mosque near his house to offer the Fazr namaz. While he was at home, he used to offer the evening prayers too if he had time.
He was like an earthworm or bug obsessed with the soil. He used to till the land in the fields for the whole day. By selling rice-lentils-jute, potato-mustard etc he could just not feed his family alone but also helped others with his money.
But now he is the only one left in his family. His wife and children must have rotten somewhere beyond recognition. The ones who returned from the hospital are also beyond recognition-some doesn’t have a hand, some a leg, some without nose and ears, while some have a huge bandage over their face and torso.
Only after coming back to his village Fazal realised that he has lost his old familiar world. The familiar faces are no longer there. All the people have turned into a long unending cry of elegy. It seemed to him while sleeping on the cold floor of the (single-day constructed by some dealer) tin-walled house he too was dead and was without his limbs.
He thought that the others might not have lost everything like him and have become absolutely lonely. They spoke of something in the dark. They might have worried over something as well.
In the deep of the night when his eyelids closed with slumber he could feel the people and the children would come out from the heart of the floors or the courtyard of the houses. They were without any clothes on their bodies, completely naked. They look for somebody in the darkness of the night. He felt that those bodies moving in the dark are incomplete and only moved in parts. One as a head, one headless while one without limbs and head. Even the headless torso looked around for somebody. May be its head itself. The head might have been looking for its own body.
Amidst these moving human parts Fazal looked for the face and limbs of his own family. But he couldn’t recognize any face.
Fazal spent many days with this recurring nightmare. Sometimes he felt as if he never had any family, no wife no children. He never built a house, never tilled his land, never brought the reaped paddy to his home and separated the haystack, never married, or had anyone, he never had anything, he never was anything, he wasn’t---- he never existed---
After some days he realised that the people living in the graveyard started to think of living like other living humans by the money given by the government or by arranging for cows to restart agriculture. Those who were dead are gone. Those of us who are alive have to eat something to live. What will we eat without farming? The government will not feed us forever.
These discussions made Fazal laugh in the beginning. For whom will he grow the crops? Will you all die if none grows crops? So many have died what is the harm if you all die too? I feel I have died long time back.
From a far off village Fazal’s brother in law came to enquire his tidings. The grieving for the whole family ‘s demise has become a routine, he didn’t ask much about those who were gone rather focused on knowing his future plans, if he plans to stay there or move to some other place, whether he had any savings etc. The money given by the government had to be utilized. Fazal stated.
“We are farmers what else do we have to do to feed ourselves? What else can we do? What else do we know? Will the pair of bullocks remain idle? Will you keep your own piece of land barren?” His brother in law advised.
“It’s just one mouth, I will feed it somehow. Just to keep my physical frame living I don’t want to splash the muddy water in the fields.”--- Fazal said.
“How will you spend the days without doing anything? Such a life will be a burden.”
“Yes, that is true. The fight is just two months now, this way of existing without work is also tedious. There is no scope to move around for business. Nobody knows who is hiding somewhere to attack. It would have been better to have had butchered together with the rest. I would have been buried together in a common pitch. Now if someone cuts and throws me away who will find out? The scavengers will feed on me---“Fazal said.
The spring rains are here, there are no village children to jump and play in the rain waters or in the rain soaked fields. There is none to catch the black fishes like kawoi, magur that effuse from the overflowing ponds.
Still the fresh rains before spring bears the tidings of the new start to the harvesting season.
“There is no single duck-hen, cow or goat left in the village. People cannot stay so lonely without the animals. The whole place is arid like a leafless dry, motionless tree in winter during the month of Magh”.
“All the harvest tools- nangal (plough), juwoli (the wooden/bamboo tool for joining the animals),moi,(harrow) have been burnt with the house.”
“It is a very ill omen you know. Even if the poles of the house may be burnt the plough should not have been burnt, you will see, the goddess lakhimi will curse them.”
“You are talking of the burning down of plough, harrow and other tools alone. Weren’t there a Quran Sharif in each house? Quran is the voice of Allah. They have burnt everything. Why will Allah ever pardon our sins? Some of us have been saved but we couldn’t save Allah’s message.”
“The hindu villages that have been burnt have also been burnt along with Kirtan- Dasham- all the religious scriptures have been burnt to ashes. After all these sins all Hindus and Muslims alike will go to hell. Allah will not forgive anyone”.
“If the government give the rice seedlings, don’t stay without harvesting. At the earliest prepare your plough, joining craft and harrow and start tilling your own land or else the land will be given away to others---.”
Fazal saw that the other living souls in the village have also started preparing for harvest. But he was not excited at all to start the process, after all for whom shall he toil so hard? All his children have been butchered, their mother too is killed, and he couldn’t even get to see their faces. Whether they were burnt to ashes or thrown in the river after being chopped, or buried in the some pitch nobody could tell him clearly. He tilled his land, he moved for trade, he built his house, his own garden – for whom? Just for his family. And now for whom will he break his bones with such hard labour? Just for himself and his family he had gathered so much land for harvest now let them snatch it away from him. Let the government take it away. It was all for the land that they killed each other.
Fazal had all these thoughts in his mind but he didn’t say anything. Without much interest he prepared his plough, the joining craft can be arranged later. One evening without being sure of going or not he went to his field, it was still there. It lay as it was earlier. The roads have broken so the rain water had not gathered in the paddy field. The soft grass has grown on his land. He walked in his fields---the land was soft. When a plough is run in such soft land the bullocks are not hurt.
The burnt village, the dead village showed no sign of living. All the remaining people are just breathing dead bodies. No laugh, no cry, no clamour, no conflict. There was no women or small children—no cry of a baby. The stables, coops, barns and granaries have all burnt to ashes. There was not even a mouse or a rat. The dogs have gone away somewhere because there was no one left. They must have not eaten the flesh of the people they have been acquainted to. They might have gone in the search of food elsewhere.
The things which were a burden to him earlier are now no more, but to live without them was a punishment. He wished to leave this deadly silent graveyard of a village and move to some city filled with people with whom he can scream and talk.
If I stay some more days like this l will turn completely mad.
A long house has been built with tin roofs. The old mosque is burnt. The new long tinned house is built in the same boundary of the mosque. Now it is the mosque. The people in the village who are alive gather there for namaz. Earlier the imam of the village mosque was Ajimuddin Maulavi. He too is murdered. All the religious scriptures kept in his house- Quran, Hadith, all Assamese or Bangla books are burnt. The Khutba , a book used for Jumma Namaz is also burnt.
Fazanur Munshi is the only one who can lead the Jumma prayers. Some of them could offer namaz with a few surrahs they have in memory, but can’t say the Khutba for Jumma. Currently Fazanur is leading the Jumma namaz. Munshi’s wife and small children have been killed. Munshi had taught Urdu- Arabic to small children in the Moktab. Now there is no need for a Moktab. The Moktab is burnt down with other houses. All the children too have been murdered and burnt to ashes. The Munshi lost his job. Now he makes a Jammat with the few remaining people who gather for prayers and lead namaz with them.
Fazal too goes to the mosque.
All the people are vanished. If Allah too is vanished how will you exist? Even Allah’s house the mosque is burnt. We must have committed some enormous sin. There is no use now blaming others for everything.
The helpless state for accepting circumstances is an ancient dictum of consolation. The death of a three month old baby is also the outcome of parents’ former sins.
That night there was a heavy downpour—blustering, splashing, rapid rain! The rainfall seemed to resound a bit louder on the tin roof of Fazal’s house. He lay with closed eyes with the sound of the rain in his ears. It seemed someone is lamenting a sombre mournful cry all around—the cry of lament came from the heart of the village through the banks of the river spreading away to far off places. Is it a rainfall or a lament or is it a melancholic howl or a downpour-Fazal gradually lost his sense of comprehension. He just kept saying to himself that he has no need to toil hard to death and restart harvesting. Whom will he offer with his harvest? Who will eat? So what if it is the onset of spring and there are rains or there is the land. He won’t do anything or splash the muddy paddy fields again. He consoled himself.
He didn’t realise when he fell asleep.
In the wee hours of the night the sound of the azan made Fazal restlessly get up from his sleep. He kept aside the horizontally laid tin sheet; the rains receded but have not totally stopped. It still drizzled. There is no umbrella or japi in the house. Still he went out of the house towards the mosque.
Suddenly his eyes caught sight of the plough in the threshold. The other tools hanged with the plough. He went towards the pair of bullocks. The sleeping cows in their stable knew the approach of their farmer’s step with closed eyes. Some cows excrete in the stable, while some move out of the stable to excrete.
The cows given to Fazal didn’t litter in the floor of the shed. Once the gate of the shed is opened they immediately move out. The animals kept for ploughing know each other. They also know their farmer, his temperament, his footsteps, whether he is angry or happy-his mindset. All the more they know his love for them. The more he would use his cane to lead them through the plough or keep tilling the land till late in the day he would be sad when they are hurt, and none understands this better than the bullocks. If the pair of bullocks at the plough remains hungry the farmer becomes even more restless.
The seeds of the paddy never speak of not growing. If the pair of bullocks refuses to walk in dissatisfaction in the middle of the field it is a sign of danger. They don’t fear to work with an acquainted farmer.
Only before a couple of months Fazal had a shed full of cows. There were bullocks for ploughing, cows for milk, while male and female calves ran around in glee with upright tails. Feeding them was an added task for him. Earlier it was enough for him to have looked after only the bullocks for the plough and the milking cows. A cowboy did all other duties for his rest of the herd. Now he had no more cows.
Fazal was with a pair of bullocks.
The pair was not his old one. The whole lot of cows of his shed are now nowhere or he did have any idea where they disappeared or died. One of the cows from the existing pair was brought from his sister’s house in a far off village, the other one was brought from the local market. Though the pair of bullocks resembled in shape and size, their age and temperament differed. But Fazal knew the art of running two different bullocks together as a pair for ploughing since a young age.
There was a heavy downpour at the night. The only foundation for his current house is just about four inches of swampy soil. Water entered the house after a heavy rainfall and it became muddy inside. Now the rain has receded. He brought the pair of bullocks outside; the bullocks too seemed to have been waiting for him. They stopped in the middle of the courtyard.
Fazal went inside and took out his bidi and matchbox from underneath the lungi which he had made into a pillow. He lit one bidi and held it with his teeth and tucked the rest in the fold of his lungi and went out.
There was still a slight drizzle. There was a faint glimmer of the morning light. Nothing much could be seen through a distance.
Fazal took his plough, harrow and other tools and led the bullocks with a cane in hand.
In a mode of former habit he talked to himself--- “Here I come---”.
He led his bullocks through the lane of the mosque drenched in rain.
Kafanur Munshi could not return home after the Fazar Namaz due to rains, he was waiting in the veranda of the mosque when Fazal passed. “Are you out for the paddy fields”?
“Oh Yes! The rains are here, so thought of beginning to till the land a bit”.
“ Very good! Move forward. Have you heard the news?”
“What?”
“Gafur’s middle daughter in law who was lost has been found---only a leg has been cut. She is saved. A baby is born last night-a boy. I heard last night. You if get time do pay a visit. She is at Dilnur’s house. All her kith and kin have died.”
Without saying anything Fazal led his cows towards the field.
Suddenly for an inexplicable reason Fazal’s mind was lightened. He will pass through Dilnur’s house as he would move to the field. Isn’t it the cry of Gafur’s daughter-in-law’s baby? Yes it is. It is the cry of a baby born last night. Dilnur is at least alive without being chopped off. I will pay a visit while returning back. Or else I will be late for the paddy fields.
Both his steps and the steps of his bullocks accelerated.
The eastern sky is clearer now. The rain is falling heavily. The bullocks are walking fast.
Fazal said to himself, “Gafur’s middle daughter-in-law. She lost a leg but she is alive. She has a baby. They have to be kept alive. If I don’t plough my land what will I eat? What will the new born baby and the mother eat? Someone has to earn to feed someone else”.
He walked more rapidly.
The sound of the rain echoed his ears and he started hearing the faint cry of the baby of Gafur’s middle daughter-in-law born in the night ago.
Fazal’s mind was filled with an undefined happiness.
The feel of the rain drenched soft land below his feet yielded a soothing moment of his life.
He stepped in his own paddy field outside the borders of the burnt village. It was brimming with the splashing water from the fresh rains in the first day of the month of bohag, the harbinger of spring.
Translator’s Notes:
Meseka: One good at angling
Lalung: belonging to Tiwa tribe in Assam
Magh: 10th month in Assamese calender
Sout: 12th month in Assamese calendar
Bohag: 1st month in Assamese calendar
Nangal, juwali, moi,: harvest tools used by farmers in Assam
Moktab: Primary level school for learning Arabic
Jumma: Friday afternoon prayers by Muslims
Fazar Namaz: Morning prayers by Muslims
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