Time seemed to have stood still. There was rhythmic sound coming…..like a drum beat, slow, steady, and ever quickening. Was it how death approached….. sure, steady, and an ever quickening pace. I could hear every sound, every rustle of the curtains, and every whisper of the winds round me. As time stood still there was a flash outside, and in that flash I saw a face, was it the face death had chosen for me….. a face so known to me, once so dear to me. Our eyes met, locked and in that frozen moment of time, it froze just a bit more as we both remembered.
I am Subho…..a tailor by profession, Hindu by religion, and lover of songs by vocation, a small man in a small town in Bengal. My life has had its share of tribulations, but it has also had its share of joys these last 40 years. Till that day of 1992, that cold December day when to make a house for Ram, they broke a house of Rahim.
As I had grown up I had learned to love music, I learned to sing to the Maulah for peace, as I did to Krishna for love. The earth of my land infused her rhythm in me as I let loose my voice in prayer to the tunes of my qawalis. She infused tunes of the hearth when my head bowed while singing my bhajans. An orphan at the age of 10, I learned my tailoring form Baba Asif Beg, my father for all purposes, my teacher in profession, and my mentor in music. Working in his small shop there were many days that master and apprentice plied their trade even as we were drowned in the music to the Lord. Many a song to capture the naughty lord in our hearts were sung, many a song begging to become one with the Malik were sung.
At the age of 21, when Baba passed away I was orphaned one more time, and took up his shop to run, for that was the right thing to do. Songs still hummed in the shop, some new many old. All for the Lord true but everyone now more in memory of Baba.
It was an early morning in ‘78, a cold December morning, a day of memories. Baba had left me 5 years earlier that day, and as I made my way to the shop from his grave, I saw a boy, sitting on a heap and singing. They say the Lord stays in a child, and when I heard Him sing, I knew that if not God, at least my Baba was in this boy. A child orphaned in the emergency of ’77 this 4-year-old looked at me with eyes wiser for his age, eyes that had seen his innocence be ravished as his house burned with his parents inside, while he hid in a well. Ghafr whose name meant forgiveness had wandered from Sahibganj in Jharkhand to my small town of jangipur. 2 years of foraging begging and surviving this 130 km journey had hardened this boy, but there was still purity in his voice as he sung his song to the naughty Lord. As our eyes met, I heard Baba singing ‘tomai hrid majhare rakhibo jete debo na’ (I will hold you in my heart and never let you go), only it was Ghafr singing. Asif which also meant forgiveness had probably found his way through Ghafr to his old shop. Did apprentice now become master, and master became apprentice, I know not. I do know this but that as Ghafr immersed himself in learning the trade his songs became heartier, his hunger lesser and the pain in his eyes were often replaced by the twinkle that accompanied merry laughter.
A devout Muslim, Ghafr never missed his namaz, never cheated on rojas, was ever charitable in his zakhat. As his songs were woven in prayer, I sensed a greater dedication to his prayers. I found it heartening to see a boy not yet a man so humble in his prayer, so absolute in his benediction to the Lord. Little did I realize what was cooking underneath. At the age of 16 he bade me to go to the madrasas in murshidabad for a week of learning and prayer and who was I to deny him. It was 1990, and there was chill in the air, a rath yatra had started and there were murmurs amidst those wearing saffron and those that wore green. As the juggernaut for Ram’s home trundled, so did probably death start his first steady step towards me, silent and soft, but steady for sure.
Ghafr came back more devout in his prayers, often with a tear n his eye as he sung for the glory of his Allah, but he returned back to me still the son who had left to learn and pray. The murmurs in the meanwhile started to rise, and on that day of December, the day Baba had left me, Rahim was forced out of his house in ayodhya to make a home for Ram. Nestled in jangipur amidst friends both Hindu and Muslim with whom we had grown up with we were fools to think we were insulated.
When it comes to Ram and Rahim, brothers forget brothers, hands that had eaten of the same plate now tried to cut of those very hands. It was a wildfire, and soon within hours India was burning in its flames. It was night at 9 when my shop and house by it was set afire. I ran and hid in a shed for goats. In the filth and stench of the shed I felt time slow down. The goats accustomed to slaughter waited and so did I, one not accustomed to this. It is then that I saw the familiar face of Ghafr.
Ghafr the forgiving one looked at me and in his eyes I did not see the love of God that twinkled when he sung, but a cold hatred, the frenzy of blood. I looked at him beseechingly trying to search for the 5-year-old who had held my hand as we made our way that cold December day 19 years ago. Death had made his first step to me that day when I came back from Baba’s grave. As I saw the sure step of death come to me, for a second I saw a flicker in his eyes for they were not the eyes of Ghafr, but Baba Asif….
