THERE ARE TIMES when some highly improbable incident hits us like an earthquake and manages to shake the foundation of even our most resolute beliefs. We keep building citadels of ideas and ideals on the landscape of our lives and these often blend into one another or take a new shape as we continue our journey. And then some incident occurs, and the sheer force of its tremors jolts us to the very core, leaving us shaken and confused, unsure of our moorings. Things change within us, and everything seems different.
The incident may be relatively small but that doesn’t mean that its impact is so. An ember in itself may be minor but the havoc and fire it can cause isn’t minor at all.
It was precisely an incident of this nature that hit Satnam with the power of an earthquake. Perhaps you could call it an ember that turned into an inferno, which enveloped his edifice of ideas and ideals in a fierce blaze.
It was evening, the curfew was in place and people were largely confined to their homes. Satnam was in his room, lying in bed and staring intently at the short letter fluttering next to him. His eyes were fixed on the lines of the letter, but he didn’t appear to be reading them. Instead, the lines were swirling around him, revealing the ruins of the world he had built on the foundation of his ideals, a world that had seemed in reasonable shape until it was hit by yesterday’s incident.
Incident? What incident? Can we really call the chance meeting with an old man and a young girl and their tragic story an incident? At a time when you saw nothing but caravans of refugees streaming into the city, each with a tale more heart-wrenching than the other?
Granted, it was an ordinary encounter and there was no single event that one could call an incident. But ever since Satnam had met that unfortunate duo yesterday, his mind had gone into a spin. His heart overflowed with sadness and sympathy for the pain they had suffered. The depths of despondence he had seen on the face of that lovely girl; that face of hers was imprinted on his consciousness. And each thought about the girl was accompanied by a surge of hatred towards the brutes who had inflicted such misery. A wave of anger rushed through his veins as he lay there, thinking of the thousands of other innocent young women who had lost their lives and dignity to the frenzied lust of similar brutes.
Satnam felt that yesterday’s incident had possibly caused the first crack in the citadel of ideals that he had painstakingly built. His friends had always argued that the first spark for the communal flames was invariably lit by the Muslims, that they were the ones who poured oil on the inferno. Satnam had never bought into such arguments, but now his mind was a jumble. It was that girl’s face, a face which expressed itself like the page of a book, a page on which he could read clearly, ‘These Muslims are at the root of these riots; pursuing initiatives like the Unity Council to defend these people at a time like this is a sign of insanity…’
Lying in bed, Satnam felt himself being pulled into a whirlpool of thoughts, each one trying to nudge him towards a more demented one until he shook his head violently to break free from their hold. He sat up and started carefully reading the letter he had been aimlessly staring at.
Dear Satnam!
As you know, I am among the many young men who have worked tirelessly under your leadership at the Unity Council and have genuinely strived to save our city from communal riots. And the results are there for all of us to see. I believe that by now you, too, must be convinced of the atrocities being perpetrated by the Muslims, convinced that our focus must now shift to revenge and retribution.
I want to suggest that we get together to discuss the prevailing situation and come to a decision that enables us to take some concrete steps that serve our community. I have consulted some of our friends in the neighbourhood. We plan to come over to your house tonight at 10 for a meeting. We are not worried about the curfew because the chowk in our neighbourhood is patrolled by Sikh policemen. I hope you will be waiting for us.
Sudarshan
After reading the letter, he called Kanhaiya and worked with him to tidy the room and keep some chairs around the table.
Kesar Kaur wasn’t around and he surmised that she had gone to the Golden Temple to bring the two refugees home.