Land of Five Rivers Read Free

their voices. Some squabbled; others cried or roared with laughter. They created such a racket that one could not hear a word. The female lunatics added to the noise. And all this in the bitterest of cold when people’s teeth chattered like the scales of rattle snakes.
    Most of the lunatics resisted the exchange because they could not understand why they were being uprooted from one place and flung into another. Those of a gloomier disposition were yelling slogans ‘Long Live Pakistan’ or ‘Death to Pakistan.’ Some lost their tempers and were prevented from coming to blows in the very nick of time.
    At last came the turn of Bishen Singh. The Indian officer began to enter his name in the register. Bishen Singh asked him, ‘Where is Toba Tek Singh? In India or Pakistan?’
    ‘In Pakistan.’
    That was all that Bishen Singh wanted to know. He turned and ran back to Pakistan. Pakistani soldiers apprehended him and tried to push him back towards India. Bishen Singh refused to budge. ‘Toba Tek Singh is on this side.’ He cried, and began to yell at the top of his voice,
‘O, pardi, good good di, anekas di, bedhyana di, moong di of Toba Tek Singh and Pakistan.’
They did their best to soothe him, to explain to him that Toba Tek Singh must have left for India; and that if any of that name was found in Pakistan he would be dispatched to India at once. Bishen Singh refused to be persuaded. They tried to use force. Bishen Singh planted himself on the dividing line and dug his swollen feet into the ground with such firmness that no one could move him.
    They let him be. He was soft in the head. There was no point using force; he would come round of his own — yes. They left him standing where he was and resumed the exchange of other lunatics.
    Shortly before sunrise, a weird cry rose from Bishen Singh’s throat. The man who had spent all the nights and days of the last fifteen years standing on his feet, now sprawled on the ground, face down. The barbed wire fence on one side marked the territory of India; another fence marked the territory of Pakistan. In the No Man’s Land between the two barbed-wire fences lay the body of Bishen Singh of village Toba Tek Singh.

s tench of kerosene

    Amrita Pritam
            O utside, a mare neighed. Guleri recognised the neighing and ran out of the house. The mare was from her parents, village. She put her head against its neck as if it were the door of her father’s house.
    Guleri’s parents lived in Chamba. A few miles from her husband’s village which was on high ground, the road curved and descended steeply down-hill. From this point one could see Chamba lying a long way away at one’s feet. Whenever Guleri was homesick she would take her husband Manak and go up to this point. She would see the homes of Chamba twinkling in the sunlight and would come back with her heart aglow with pride.
    Once every year, after the harvest had been gathered in, Guleri was allowed to spend a few days with her parents. They sent a man to Lakarmandi to bring her back to Chamba. Two of her friends too, who were also married to boys outside Chamba, came home at the same time of the year. The girls looked forward to this annual meeting, when they spent many hours everyday talking about their experiences, their joys and sorrows. They went about the streets together. Then there was the harvest festival. The girls would have new dresses made for occasion. They would have their
duppattas
dyed, starched and sprinkled with mica. They would buy glass bangles and silver ear-rings.
    Guleri always counted the days to the harvest. When autumn breezes cleared the skies of the monsoon clouds she thought of little besides her home in Chamba. She went about her daily chores — fed the cattle, cooked food for her husband’s parents and then sat back to work out how long it would be before someone would come for her from her parents’ village.
    And now, once again, it was time for her annual visit. She