Emotional trip back to village in Sargodha

Iwas barely three-and-a-half years old at the time of Partition, and though it may be difficult to imagine, I do remember with a certain degree of clarity my friends Anwar and Suraj in our village, Chak No. 96 (Sargodha district in Pakistan). My grandfather got our spacious house built where we used to play.

Unaware of what was happening around us, we children became a part of the great migration. At night, no one was allowed to light any lamp or even switch on the torch. When an old man switched one by mistake, he was severely reprimanded. It took us 10 days to reach the border at Khemkaran.

While everyone was relieved after crossing the border, no one was sure of where they were destined to go. Anxiety, fear, nostalgia and uncertainty were palpable on every face. Most people went to live with their acquaintances in India. Our family was told to go to Lehal village near Dhariwal in Gurdaspur. As I entered a small house, holding my grandmother’s hand, tears rolled down her eyes. My grandfather told her it was a temporary arrangement till we got a permanent place.

Everything about this new land was unfamiliar. We didn’t know anyone there. Life had suddenly become quite uncertain. Since the land allotment was temporary, there was no interest in building a house, digging a well, or even applying for an electricity connection. Everyone eagerly waited for permanent allocation of land and houses.

The number of landowners who had come from Pakistan was two-and-a-half times that of migrants from India to Pakistan. Only 40 per cent of the land was allotted to the refugee landowners from Pakistan. We were later allotted some temporary land near a village close to Batala. It was barren and away from the village, so we installed tents and built bamboo covers. Later, this allotment was cancelled. Once again, we got land in Dhariwal in 1953. We finally built our own house in 1955, eight years after Partition.

In 2005, when I got a chance to travel to Sargodha, I decided to visit my house. I thought I would be able to recognise it from far since it was the biggest structure in the village in 1947. Strangely, I couldn’t find the building. In fact, there was no double-storey house in the entire village. We were told that two years earlier, our house had been demolished after it was divided among a dozen occupants.

My conversations with some locals were touching. They told me about the love and respect the villagers had for the Sikh families who had to leave Pakistan.

There was an episode that I had heard from my grandfather and father. Once it became certain that the Sikh families had to migrate, my grandfather implored the Muslim neighbour and friend, Aziz, to take everything, including the cattle, before the looters came. But Aziz started weeping loudly and ran to his house, saying this would never happen and they would keep our belongings safe.

I was told by the locals that the Muslim neighbours were able to take care of the houses of Sikh families for two days and the village remained peaceful, but on the third day, rioters from outside attacked the village. They started firing in which two persons were seriously injured. The raiders looted costly items. The next day, another set looted everything. I returned with the heartwarming knowledge that no Muslim family of our village had laid hands on any abandoned house.

— The writer is based in Amritsar