Payback

Year 1984

Delhi,Paharganj

Sara looked at the spiraling smoke from her roof top. The flames seemed to leap up to the sky turning it almost beautiful, the gray mixing up with orange and yellow, like a sublime painting by a new age artiste. The white dome from which the flames were shooting was early sheen fast and receding into the same shade of gray as the sky.

On the adjoining terrace, her neighbor was whimpering, holding her dupatta to her mouth, tears streaming down her eyes. Her son was watching her wide-eyed and scared, too small to understand his mother’s anguish yet comprehending that something was amiss and was tormenting.

In the street below, the electronics shop was being shut down by its turbaned owners. But while they were doing that there was a loud shout from the end of the street. A number of boys holding sticks, swords, iron rods, cans and torches started running towards the electronics shop. The owners, petrified, ran towards their car standing near and made their getaway.

The shop was not spared. The hooligans smashed open the locks and shutters and soon TVs, VCRs, Two-in-ones started pouring out of the devastation. The boys were joined by some elderly men who watched all the looting with calm satisfaction for some time. Soon, they would rally some more young men, scavenging for free goodies, seeking to kill and rape to satisfy their dark nature, which would not have found a reprieve otherwise; all in the name of revenge.

Sara’s frail Granny kept on wringing her hands and muttering “It’s 1947 again, it’s 1947 again.”Meanwhile, her mother had sneaked in the neighbors and their precious belongings via the terrace. Sara could not understand why her mother was bringing in these people when the entire world was against them right now. Perhaps she felt bound ,because her maternal grandparents were of the turbaned variety, now in America, the land of Mars and Snickers. She looked down again, where the boys were taking out electronic games now. Maybe if she went down, she could also get some.

Her grown up proposal to do so, was met with a resounding slap across the cheek, by Mom, for thinking of cashing in on others’ misery. Humiliated and resentful of the hostile stares of the neighbors’ children, she skulked off to her room. God knows what good her mother would get by saving these people from the boys.

After a couple of days, the neighbors left, taken off to a colony inhabited by their kind, by some more friends. Sara heaved a sigh of relief. Although they were not allowed to play out anymore, her Mom had allowed her to go and visit her friends in their homes. She had been hearing stories of “those “people being hunted down by people like dogs and burnt alive, from her friends. The general consensus was that “they” deserved it. “They” had become far too rich for their own good and balance had to be brought in, somehow.

Year 2002

Mumbai – Surat Highway

An exhausted Sara and her husband slumbered in their air-conditioned SUV. The pre-paid taxi which had picked them up had been right on time, thankfully. The driver had already been waiting holding Zahir and Sara Sorathia’s placard. The drive from Mumbai to Surat would tire them out further. But, they would soon reach Zahir’s ancestral home in another hour and pay their respects to his dying grandmother. Zahir’s mother had insisted that they come down for her. Hence the long journey from New Jersey to Mumbai and then Surat.

This was almost like home where the cabbies were mainly Sikhs. So was their cabbie right now. As Sara mused to herself, Zahir snored softly. The cabbie met her eyes in the rearview mirror and she looked away hastily. Years of living in Delhi had taught her not to trust any men outside her family. They may take any kind gesture, even small conversation to be a sexual proposition of sorts.

While they waited at the petrol pump for the gas to be filled, Sara’s phone rang. It was her mother-in-law, spending an exorbitant sum of money to call her international roaming number. Frowning and slightly irritated, she cut off the connection and was about to step out looking for a PCO, when her cabbie stopped her from alighting. There were riots in the city and were spreading fast to the villages. Blood thirsty mobs were hunting for prey. People with obvious signs of faith were being burned alive, veiled women were being defiled and children smashed against walls.

Memories almost 20 years old gagged up against Sara’s throat. She looked fearfully at the cabbie. Maybe he was wrong and it was all a hoax to burgle them or something. Loads of NRIs travelled this way and were waylaid by robbers. Almost as if he could sense her hesitation and resentment, the cabbie drove out of the petrol pump and pulled over after 500 meters or so, down the road. Now scared out her wits, she shook her husband awake. As Zahir jerked out his sleep, she whispered what the driver had said and hastily added her own misgivings. Completely bewildered and barely awake, her husband could not fathom her fears at all.

And then the taxi-driver turned and held out his cell phone to her. Confused, she looked at him as he explained that she could use his phone to call their relatives. Trembling, she dialed Zahir’s residence number and then handed it to him. She needed to keep a watch on the cabbie while he deliberately engaged their attention with the phone ruse. Zahir’s grim profile told her that the cabbie was right. They had been warned not to approach Surat, which was already burning, like a pyromaniac’s dream.

But they did not look like conventional Muslims and in fact she was a Hindu so maybe they did not have anything to fear, she tried to allay Zahir’s worry and hers too. But then the cabbie revealed that the mobs were undressing the men at random and looking for circumcisions and the women were being raped at the slightest doubt.

Revulsion and dread slammed against her chest. And then he invited them to his home, which was in a majority religion area. He would tell anybody who asked that they were relatives from US and God knows that he had ample of them there. Sara’s innate suspicion now made her bristle – Why would a complete stranger save them from imminent death when he could easily take their possessions and leave them be? She said so aloud and then the look of pity in the driver’s eyes shamed her into silence.

Years ago, when he was a kid, in Paharganj, Delhi, his kind neighbor had saved him and his family during ‘84 riots and imminent death. He was just paying back kindness, in kind. Sara’s eyes misted over with gratitude for her mother. Maybe this person was the same, maybe he was not, but it was the fruits of her benevolence that she was reaping here. Zahir and she sat back in thankful silence, as the cabbie drove them to their haven.