Non-Fiction
An exclusive club . . . and passing time
1956 was another momentous year for me. It was the year I was inducted as a life member of a most exclusive club. I was giddy with pride at my self-importance of this unique distinction. I was the only life member. Even those who conferred this honour on me were just ordinary members of the same illustrious organisation.
My immediate older brother and his friends had banded together to form a club. The very idea was quite alien. There was no precedent of such an organisation in our rustic environment. Even the concept and the brainstorming sessions which followed were considered somewhat revolutionary. The 'conspirators' had hushed discussions amongst themselves. I tried to eavesdrop on their conversations, starry-eyed at the unfolding drama and resentful about my exclusion from the making of local history. Eventually, the younger kids were given a brief glimpse of the grand plan. The 'grown-ups' were going to establish a club and they were looking for a suitable name. Suggestions were welcome; even youngsters could participate.
After much soul searching I came up with the name 'Ghorasal Shishu Samity', which I passed on to my brother. I was still a child and my imagination could not go beyond my childish circumference. My brother did not dismiss my proposal altogether, but I can now understand why the word 'shishu' would be anathema to him and his compatriots who were on the threshold of their teens. I do not remember what other names were suggested or who came up with the eventual winner: Kishor Ashar. Looking back, it was indeed an inspiring choice because the name reflected what the organisation was all about.
I am absolutely sure that none of the Kishor Ashar leaders had ever heard of Karl Marx or other political thinkers at that point in their lives. Their teenage political philosophies were largely shaped by oral history passed on by their elders. My father began his university life as a Gandhian and in the traditions of the time wore a dhoti to university, for which he was once reprimanded by the venerable Dr. Shahidullah. The encounter with the culture-conscious professor did not persuade my father to change his dress code; he simply changed his travel paths around the university corridors, looking out for the diminutive but conspicuously bearded pundit and avoiding a chance encounter with him. However, the 1920s and 30s were periods of great political flux and my father along with many of his generation switched his allegiance from the Congress to the Muslim League. It is up to historians to evaluate the root causes of this seismic shift - whether it was the demagoguery of a clever non-practicsng Muslim lawyer from Bombay or the refusal of the Congress leadership to address some fundamental issues or perhaps a bit of both!
Coming back to the nascent political thinking of the Kishor Ashar leadership team, I would have to conclude that they were intensely patriotic Pakistanis without being overtly religious,which in hindsight may not make a lot of sense. But that was the reality. However, what was quite extraordinary was the egalitarian organisational structure of Kishor Ashar - it was an organisation without a formal leader. It was a team of equals and if someone was more equal than others it was only through his actual output in delivering a result. The club premises were located in a corner of a 'Bangla Bari' of one of our cousins. An almirah (an ornate wooden cabinet) was donated by another family which was to serve as the library. Books, mostly works of fiction, were donated or euphemistically borrowed (stolen) from different households and a rigorous system regulating borrowing rules was established. Anjali fufu, then a spinster in her late 20s, became the official librarian; and she was quite merciless in enforcing the fine of one paisa per day for late returns. My introduction to the Shapan Kumar series was through Kishor Ashar library and I have to confess that the romance and excitement I got from that detective series far exceeded anything I got from Sherlock Holmes books which I read later in life. By the way, I can't remember if Deepak had an associate and if so, who was his Dr. Watson?
Fortuitously, at this point in time, I received an unexpected present by mail. My second oldest brother had been dispatched to Sargodha in the early 1950s. He had gone on a school expedition to Sialkot, which is famous as a manufacturing centre of sporting goods. He bought a football for me and sent it by postal parcel, with my name on the address label. Thus there was to be no confusion regarding the ownership of this football. Kishor Ashar leader I might not be, but I was now the sought after owner of a football and suddenly my status rose by a few notches amongst the collective leadership team of Kishor Ashar. They pleaded and cajoled and when that didn't bear fruit they threatened me with ex-communication from Kishor Ashar. Finally, the godfathers of Kishor Ashar made an offer I simply could not refuse. I was offered a "Life membership" (Ajiban Shadashwapad) in exchange for the ball. How could a 9-year old boy refuse the chance of a lifetime?
A few years ago I went to visit Anjali Fufu (a distant cousin of my father), the erstwhile librarian of Kishor Ashar. I was told she was very sick. Her place was hardly 200 meters from our house but I hadn't gone in that direction in many decades. The whole place looked unfamiliar. Gone was the open space in front of the old club and the club house itself was nowhere to be seen. There were all kinds of houses all around some new brick structures and some made of corrugated iron sheets while some of the familiar older houses of my time were in various states of dilapidation. The place was like a mirror which reflected the fate of what had once been the 'village aristocracy'. Some amongst the growing population managed to sail to more attractive shores, but for those who were left behind life is hard. They are caught between a rock and a hard place. They don't have the skills of hands-on farming and yet their disdain for physical work coupled with their reminiscence of a golden era would even make Mary Antoinette blush. They look sneeringly at the double storied brick houses funded by remittances from Dubai and lament at the audacity of the upstarts who breathe down their necks through the leaking roofs of their own derelict houses. They are trapped in their delusions.
Anjali Fufu was pleasantly surprised to see me after all these years. We exchanged brief pleasantries. There was the expected litany of complaints about everything - shortage of everything shortage of money, shortage of food and medicine and above all shortage of respect from the Dubaiwalas - harking back to a glorious bygone era. I listened politely but said nothing for I had no solutions for her. To lighten the mood I told our former librarian that I wanted to check out a book from the library. I said, "You may not remember but I am a life member". I am not sure whether she was in any frame of mind to appreciate the deep irony of my observation.
Recently, I had some repair work done on a car and the repair came with a lifetime guarantee. I asked the manager what 'lifetime' really meant. Whose lifetime? My lifetime or that of the car or perhaps that of the spare part? He attempted to answer but my mind had wondered off and I wasn't listening anymore. It was really a rhetorical question which did not seek an answer. I had simply made an observation in the form of question. When I was inducted into Kishor Ashar life membership, I was never told that life also implicitly implies death, which includes demise of seemingly omnipresent and omniscient organisations like Kishor Ashar which to a 9-year old was going to last for ever!
When I visit my brother, now settled in Toronto, I may have to confront him about this lack of disclosure in the Kishor Ashar prospectus.
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