Of Smokeless Fire A.A. Jafri (books to read to improve english TXT) 📖

with no intermission. He wanted to leave his shack; he wanted to leave Bhangi Para; hell, he wanted to leave the country. There was no dignity in the scutwork that he did. For him, the only way to make a clean break from the bhangihood he was born into, was to make a clean break from Pakistan. His new fascination was Bombay, a city where no one would know about his life as a bhangi.

So one day, when his mother informed him that she had asked Farhat Begum to give her a raise, and that the begum had agreed without any arguments, Joseph dropped his bombshell: he was going to Bombay to work in the Indian film industry.

‘Did you smoke bhang today? Or did you get bitten by a mad dog? Son of a lunatic! Where will you get the money to go to Bombay? From your father’s inheritance?’ his mother demanded.

‘I don’t know,’ he said.

‘And who is going to take care of me?’

‘You should come with me. What is there for you in this damn country anyway? You are an achoot, an untouchable, and you will always remain an achoot here.’

‘Do you think that you will not be an achoot in Bombay? Listen, putter, I left my home once when your father dragged me out of Amritsar. I don’t want to leave my home again. And this damn country is my home.’

She burst into tears as she said that, and Joseph put his arms around her shoulders. But she quickly shrugged him off, saying, ‘You are good for nothing. All day long, you just sit and cook imaginary pulao.’

Anger seared through his body as Joseph looked at his mother. Her flash of cynicism felt like a punch to his gut. Beaten down by life, she could never see herself as anything but a sweeper, nor could she imagine any other future for her son. His mind was now firmly made up. He wanted an escape, a permanent break from the work that generations of his family had done.

Unfortunately for him, his dreams of going to Bombay were shattered by the outbreak of hostilities between Pakistan and India. In their chequered history, the two impoverished nations went to war with frightening fervour, confident that they could casually bomb each other into oblivion. Blood was spilled, cities were shelled, children were orphaned, women were widowed and nothing was achieved—in the end, it was another meaningless war that wasted the lives of so many.

These useless motherfuckers; I will show them, Joseph thought, seething with anger as if he were the sole target of this insane, obscene war. That evening, he went out to unleash his rage even though people had been warned to stay inside their houses. But Joseph did not care. Death would be a better alternative compared to the shit he was living in. A scrawny dog trying to find some dinner in a reeking rubbish heap became the unlucky victim of Joseph’s anger as he bent down, picked up a large stone and hurled it at the dog. Bullseye! It hit right on its head. The dog howled in pain, curled its tail between its legs and scudded like a bullet. ‘Motherfucker, get out of this shithole!’ Joseph yelled in Punjabi.

Darkness draped Karachi as the blackout snuffed out any remnants of nightlife. Every window was covered with dark-coloured papers: black, blue and green. Any gaps around the windows were sealed with black tapes. In the blacked-out city, artificial light underwent house arrest.

Joseph should have been going home, but instead, he kept walking, roaming aimlessly, his head bowed, his foot kicking anything it could find, his vacuous eyes lost in hopelessness. Suddenly, he heard the stabbing noise of warplanes approaching, followed by a flash of red and then the concussive sound of a bomb that had fallen. The blaring air raid sirens followed languidly, making a mockery of the early warning system. Suddenly, the starry sky was lit up by the fires of ack-ack guns. The loudspeakers of several neighbourhood mosques reverberated with the muezzins’ calls for special prayers. Joseph stayed put, watching the lit-up sky. It was as if he was watching a dazzling display of fireworks, far removed from death and destruction. No one would bomb Bhangi Para, not in any war. It had no strategic value.

*

That night, it seemed as if the nation had a collective dream. It was a story repeated so many times by so many people that it became a fictive reality. The tabloids published it, the mosques relayed it and the people believed it as if the tale was solidly backed by undeniable evidence.

They said that an army of semi-invisible giants (now you see them, now you don’t) made their divine intervention on behalf of the country. Dressed in flowing green robes, their effulgent faces dulling the blazing flames from the incendiary bombs, they shouted, ‘God is great.’

So loud were their slogans that they muffled the noise of the enemy planes as they caught the bombs with their bare hands, blunting the attack and stunting the attackers. Then they drew their heavy swords from their scabbards and sliced the enemy planes, like cucumbers. The enemy planes that were piloted by Muslims were spared; the pilots were admonished to never kill their brothers again. An infidel air force pilot, who watched the miracles happening from the cockpit of his plane, converted to Islam instantly; his aircraft was safely escorted by these mysterious beings to the nearest Pakistan Air Force base.

People climbed on their rooftops and chanted:

Victory nears if God’s help is included.

Victory nears if God’s help is included.

The Greatest Slogan: God is great.

The Greatest Slogan: God is great.

The next day, people stuck bumper stickers on their cars: ‘See you at Delhi’s Jama Mosque next Friday!’ and ‘Crush India!’ and ‘Victory Celebrations in Delhi.’

The newspapers’ headlines bellowed every day:

War till Victory!

Enemy Planes Destroyed!

Attack Repulsed. Heavy Enemy Casualties!

Houses shivered, heavens trembled, myths continued and delusions grew. People clasped on to these myths indiscriminately to repudiate the