Train to Pakistan (8 page)

Iqbal lay down once more and gazed at the stars. The wail of the engine in the still vast plain made him feel lonely and
depressed. What could he—one little man—do in this enormous impersonal land of four hundred million? Could he stop the killing? Obviously not. Everyone—Hindu, Muslim, Sikh, Congressite, Leaguer, Akali, or Communist—was deep in it. It was fatuous to suggest that the bourgeois revolution could be turned into a proletarian one. The stage had not arrived. The proletariat was indifferent to political freedom for Hindustan or Pakistan, except when it could be given an economic significance like grabbing land by killing an owner who was of a different religious denomination. All that could be done was to divert the kill-and-grab instinct from communal channels and turn it against the propertied class. That was the proletarian revolution the easy way. His party bosses would not see it.

Iqbal wished they had sent someone else to Mano Majra. He would be so much more useful directing policy and clearing the cobwebs from their minds. But he was not a leader. He lacked the qualifications. He had not fasted. He had never been in jail. He had made none of the necessary ‘sacrifices’. So, naturally, nobody would listen to him. He should have started his political career by finding an excuse to court imprisonment. But there was still time. He would do that as soon as he got back to Delhi. By then, the massacres would be over. It would be quite safe.

The goods train had left the station and was rumbling over the bridge. Iqbal fell asleep, dreaming of a peaceful life in jail.

Early next morning, Iqbal was arrested.

Meet Singh had gone out to the fields carrying his brass mug of water and chewing a keekar twig he used as a toothbrush. Iqbal had slept through the rumble of passing trains, the muezzin’s call, and the other village noises. Two constables came into the gurdwara, looking in his room, examined his celluloid cups and saucers, shining aluminum spoons, forks and knives,
his thermos, and then came up onto the roof. They shook Iqbal rudely. He sat up rubbing his eyes, somewhat bewildered. Before he could size up the situation and formulate the curt replies he would like to have given, he had told the policemen his name and occupation. One of them filled in the blank spaces on a yellow piece of printed paper and held it in front of Iqbal’s blinking eyes.

‘Here is warrant for your arrest. Get up.’

The other slipped the ring at one end of a pair of handcuffs in his belt and unlocked the links to put round Iqbal’s wrists. The sight of the handcuffs brought Iqbal wide awake. He jumped out of bed and faced the policemen.

‘You have no right to arrest me like this,’ he shouted. ‘You made up the warrant in front of me. This is not going to end here. The days of police rule are over. If you dare put your hands on me, the world will hear about it. I will see that the papers tell the people how you chaps do your duty.’

The policemen were taken aback. The young man’s accent, the rubber pillows and mattress and all the other things they had seen in the room, and above all, his aggressive attitude, made them uneasy. They felt that perhaps they had made a mistake.

‘Babu Sahib, we are only doing our duty. You settle this with the magistrate,’ one of them answered politely. The other fumbled uneasily with the handcuffs.

‘I will settle it with the whole lot of you—police and magistrates! Come and disturb people in sleep! You will regret this mistake.’ Iqbal waited for the policemen to say something so that he could go on with his tirade against law and order. But they had been subdued.

‘You will have to wait. I have to wash and change and leave my things in somebody’s care,’ said Iqbal aggressively, giving them another chance to say something.

‘All right, Babu Sahib. Take as long as you like.’

The policemen’s civil attitude deflated Iqbal’s anger. He collected his things and went down the stairs to his room. He went to the well, pulled up a bucket of water and began to wash. He was in no hurry.

Bhai Meet Singh came back vigorously brushing his teeth with the end of the keekar twig which he had chewed into a fibrous brush. The presence of policemen in the gurdwara did not surprise him. Whenever they came to the village and could not find accommodation at the lambardar’s house they came to the temple. He had been expecting them after the moneylender’s murder.

‘Sat Sri Akal,’ said Meet Singh, throwing away his keekar toothbrush.

‘Sat Sri Akal,’ replied the policemen.

‘Would you like some tea or something? Some buttermilk?’

‘We are waiting for the Babu Sahib,’ the policemen said. ‘If you can give us something while he is getting ready, it will be very kind.’

Meet Singh maintained a casual indifference. It was not up to him to argue with the police or be nosy about their business. Iqbal Singh was probably a ‘comrade’. He certainly talked like one.

‘I will make some tea for him, too,’ replied Meet Singh. He looked at Iqbal. ‘Or will you have your own out of the big bottle?’

‘Thank you very much,’ answered Iqbal through the tooth paste froth in his mouth. He spat it out. ‘The tea in the bottle must be cold by now. I would be grateful for a hot cup. And would you mind looking after my things while I am away? They are arresting me for something. They do not know themselves for what.’

Meet Singh pretended he had not heard. The policemen looked a little sheepish.

‘It is not our fault, Babu Sahib,’ one of them said. ‘Why are you getting angry with us? Get angry with the magistrate.’

Iqbal ignored their protest by more brushing of his teeth. He washed his face and came back to the room rubbing himself with a towel. He let the air out of the mattress and the pillow and rolled them up. He emptied the holdall of its contents: books, clothes, torch, a large silver hip flask. He made a list of his things and put them back. When Meet Singh brought tea, Iqbal handed him the holdall.

‘Bhaiji, I have put all my things in the holdall. I hope it will not be too much trouble looking after them. I would rather trust you than the police in this free country of ours.’

The policemen looked away. Meet Singh was embarrassed.

‘Certainly, Babu Sahib,’ he said meekly. ‘I am your servant as well as that of the police. Here everyone is welcome. You like tea in your own cup?’

Iqbal got out his celluloid teacup and spoon. The constables took brass tumblers from Meet Singh. They wrapped the loose ends of their turbans round the tumblers to protect their hands from the hot brass. To reassure themselves they sipped noisily. But Iqbal was in complete possession of the situation. He sat on the string cot while they sat on the threshold and Meet Singh on the floor outside. They did not dare to speak to him for fear of rudeness. The constable with the handcuffs had quietly taken them off his belt and thrust them in his pocket. They finished their tea and looked up uneasily. Iqbal sat sullenly staring over their heads with an intensity charged with importance. He glared vacantly into space, occasionally taking a spinsterish sip of his tea. When he had finished, he stood up abruptly.

‘I am ready,’ he announced, dramatically holding out his hands. ‘Put on the handcuffs.’

‘There is no need for handcuffs, Babuji,’ answered one of the constables. ‘You had better cover your face or you will be recognized at the identification parade.’

Iqbal pounced on the opportunity. ‘Is this how you do your duty? If the rule is that I have to be handcuffed, then handcuffed I shall be. I am not afraid of being recognized. I am not a thief or a dacoit. I am a political worker. I will go through the village as I am so that people can see what the police do to people they do not like.’

This outburst was too much for one of the constables. He spoke sharply:

‘Babuji, we are being polite to you. We keep saying “ji”, “ji” to you all the time, but you want to sit on our heads. We have told you a hundred times we are doing our duty, but you insist on believing that we have a personal grudge.’ He turned to his colleague. ‘Put the handcuffs on the fellow. He can do what he likes with his face. If I had a face like his, I would want to hide it. We will report that he refused to cover it.’

Iqbal did not have a ready answer to the sarcasm. He had a Semitic consciousness of his hooked nose. Quite involuntarily he brushed it with the back of his hand. Reference to his physical appearance always put him off. The handcuffs were fastened round his wrists and chained onto the policeman’s belt.

‘Sat Sri Akal, Bhaiji. I will be back soon.’

‘Sat Sri Akal, Iqbal Singhji, and may the Guru protect you. Sat Sri Akal, Sentryji.’

‘Sat Sri Akal.’

The party marched out of the temple courtyard, leaving Meet Singh standing with the kettle of tea in his hand.

At the time the two constables were sent to arrest Iqbal, a posse of ten men was sent to arrest Juggut Singh. Policemen surrounded his house at all points. Constables armed with rifles
were posted on neighbouring roofs and in the front and rear of the house. Then six others armed with revolvers rushed into the courtyard. Juggut Singh lay on his charpai, wrapped from head to foot in a dirty white sheet and snoring lustily. He had spent two nights and a day in the jungle without food or shelter. He had come home in the early hours of the morning when he believed everyone in the village would be asleep. The neighbours had been vigilant and the police were informed immediately. They waited till he had filled himself with food and was sound asleep. His mother had gone out, bolting the door from the outside.

Juggut Singh’s feet were put in fetters and handcuffs were fastened on his right wrist while he slept. Policemen put their revolvers in their holsters. Men with rifles joined them in the courtyard. They prodded Juggut Singh with the butt ends of their guns.

‘O Jugga, get up, it is almost afternoon.’

‘See how he sleeps like a pig without a care in the world.’

Jugga sat up wearily, blinking his eyes. He gazed at the handcuffs and the fetters with philosophic detachment, then stretched his arms wide and yawned loudly. Sleep came on him again and he began to nod.

Juggut Singh’s mother came in and saw her courtyard full of armed policemen. Her son sat on the charpai with his head resting on his manacled hands. His eyes were shut. She ran up to him and clasped him by the knees. She put her head in his lap and started to cry.

Juggut Singh woke up from his reverie. He pushed his mother back rudely.

‘Why are you crying?’ he said. ‘You know I had nothing to do with the dacoity.’

She began to wail. ‘He did not do it. He did nothing. In the name of God, I swear he did nothing.’

‘Then where was he on the night of the murder?’ the head constable said.

‘He was out in his fields. He was not with the dacoits. I swear he was not.’

‘He is a badmash under orders not to go out of the village after sunset. We have to arrest him for that in any case.’ He motioned to his men. ‘Search the rooms and the barn.’ The head constable had his doubts about Juggut Singh partaking in a dacoity in his own village. It was most unusual.

Four constables busied themselves looking around the house, emptying steel trunks and tin cans. The haystack was pulled down and the hay scattered in the yard. The spear was found without difficulty.

‘I suppose this has been put here by your uncle?’ said the head constable addressing the mother sourly. ‘Wrap the blade in a piece of cloth, it may have blood stains on it.’

‘There is nothing on it,’ cried the mother, ‘nothing. He keeps it to kill wild pigs that come to destroy the crops. I swear he is innocent.’

‘We will see. We will see,’ the head constable dismissed her. ‘You better get proof of his innocence ready for the magistrate.’

The old woman stopped moaning. She did have proof—the packet of broken bangles. She had not told Jugga about it. If she had, he would certainly have gone mad at the insult and been violent to someone. Now he was in fetters and handcuffs, he could only lose his temper.

‘Wait, brother policemen. I have the evidence.’

The policemen watched the woman go in and bring out a packet from the bottom of her steel trunk. She unwrapped the brown paper. There were broken pieces of blue and red glass bangles with tiny gold spots. Two of them were intact. The head constable took them.

‘What sort of proofs are these?’

‘The dacoits threw them in the courtyard after the murder. They wanted to insult Jugga for not coming with them. Look!’ She held out her hands. ‘I am too old to wear glass bangles and they are too small for my wrists.’

‘Then Jugga must know who the dacoits were. What did they say when they threw them?’ asked the head constable.

‘Nothing, they said nothing. They abused Jugga …’

‘Can’t you keep your mouth shut?’ interrupted Jugga angrily. ‘I do not know who the dacoits were. All I know is that I was not with them.’

‘Who leaves you bangles?’ asked the head constable. He smiled and held up the bits of glass in his hands.

Jugga lost his temper. He raised his manacled fists and brought them heavily down on the head constable’s palms. ‘What seducer of his mother can throw bangles at me? What …’

The constables closed round Juggut Singh and started slapping him and kicking him with their thick boots. Jugga sat down on his haunches, covering his head with his arms. His mother began to beat her forehead and started crying again. She broke into the cordon of policemen and threw herself on her son.

‘Don’t hit him. The Guru’s curse be on you. He is innocent. It is all my fault. You can beat me.’

The beating stopped. The head constable picked pieces of glass out of his palm, pressed out blood, and wiped it with his handkerchief.

‘You keep the evidence of your son’s innocence,’ he said bitterly. ‘We will get the story out of this son of a bitch of yours in our own way. When he gets a few lashes on his buttocks, he will talk. Take him out.’

Juggut Singh was led out of the house in handcuffs and fetters.
He left without showing a trace of emotion for his mother, who continued to wail and beat her forehead and breasts. His parting words were:

‘I will be back soon. They cannot give me more than a few months for having a spear and going out of the village. Sat Sri Akal.’