Insightful autobiography
Amrik Singh

Partition and the Making of the Mohajir Mindset: A Narrative
by Abdur Rahman Siddiqui.
Oxford, Karachi.
Pages 172. Rs 395.

Siddiqui was not a fighting soldier. He belonged to the public relations category of officials and perhaps the rank of a Brigadier was the highest that he could rise to. After having lived for more than eight decades and done a variety of things, he decided to write a book which is more in the nature of an autobiography than a description of what he did during his eventful life.

Born in the early 20s in Delhi and educated up to the Master’s level at St Stephens College, Delhi, he migrated to Pakistan. As a student, he was active in the struggle for Pakistan. At one stage, when he came face to face with Liaquat Ali Khan, the latter recognised him as a student activist. At Lahore, he took up job with the Civil and Military Gazette. After a couple of years, he joined the Army and the bulk of the book deals with what he did at that time.

An East Bengal official whom he knew rather well made a valuable point when he said "at one stage, the Kashmir war is going to be the bane of Pakistan’s civil society and a boon for the military. Just mark my words and wait and see for yourself. Democracy can never strike roots in a Pakistan aspiring to serve as the laboratory for a modern Islamic state on the British colonial pattern. It would be like mixing oil with water".

How true these words are today! And these were said long before things started going out of hand in Pakistan. The book is dotted with several such insightful statements.

The longest chapter in the book deals with what he calls Mohajarism. He explains how the Utter Pradesh and Delhi Muslims, who had played a pioneering role in the 1947 days, did not fit into the ethnic structure of that country when they moved to Pakistan. He did not speak Punjabi or any other local language and could not merge with the population of any state. Gradually, the Mohajies concentrated in Karachi and came to dominate that city.

While describing all this, he naturally goes at length into what he calls the ideology of the Mohajirs. While fully sympathetic to it, however, he has reservations about where to place this angle of thinking in what may be called the ideology of Pakistan. His writing is brisk, vivid and compelling. This book is for those who wish to understand the psychology of the Mohajirs.

He described his last chapter as an Epilogue: The Song of the Reed! It is an attempt to sum up what he had seen and experienced. In this connection, he has a number of insightful things to say. One of them reads as follows: "How should one look at Pakistan and its status as the promised homeland of the Muslims of the entire Indian subcontinent? Was the emergence of India and Pakistan the making of two sovereign and independent states or the unmaking of a hallowed geographical entity named ‘India’ — an expression that goes as far back as recorded history?"

This statement is both preceded and followed by a number of reflections which cannot be quoted here but one thing that would tickle Punjabi readers here may be reproduced.

"When asked why he chose Urdu as his preferred medium of literary expression as opposed to Punjabi, Faiz Ahmed Faiz, Pakistan’s best-known and admired Urdu poet after Mohammad Iqbal, said, ‘Look, I adopted Urdu hoping one day my compositions might be nearly as good as those of Ghalib’s, without, of course, ever being as good. But never even near that of (the Punjabi poet) Waris Shah even if I had a second span of life`85.’"

He has many such things to say and that is why I describe it as a book which is worth reading. Indeed, it is a book for those who wish to know more about Pakistan and India and, particularly Pakistan today, would do well to read. Speaking for myself, I enjoyed reading it.

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