We have a three-hour stop over at Lahore airport on our way back to Delhi from Islamabad. I am excited about going back home, but, at the same time, am sad at the thought of leaving Pakistan. I don’t know when, if at all, I can come back here, if I can ever again meet some of those wonderful people whom I almost instantly bonded with in my short week-long visit to the country. I wonder if I will again be fortunate enough to get a visa to visit Pakistan.
After all, this, my second visit to Pakistan, was made possible only after great effort and because of having friends who had the right contacts in the right places. After my first visit, three years ago, my applications for a visa to return, to attend conferences and meet friends, were repeatedly turned down. The reason, so I heard: Upon my return from that visit, some articles that I wrote on certain aspects of life in Pakistan—the problems of Dalits and other rural poor in Sindh and the crisis of intellectuals in the country generally—were not quite liked by someone in the Pakistan High Commission in New Delhi, who, so
I gather, assumed that this somehow made me highly suspect. So, he made it a point to make sure that I was to be refused to enter the country again by putting my name on a particular ‘list’ of unwanted elements. Of course, this someone did not care to notice the good things that I had written about Pakistan as well, and the fact, as I had mentioned in my writings that he had seen, that we in India face similar problems—observations which firmly contradicted the opinion that he had formed about me.
But, somehow, I am back now in Pakistan and I feel wonderful about it (after all, this was the home of half of my ancestors!) and this week-long visit to Islamabad has been overwhelming in every sense of the term. This trip has afforded me an opportunity to see a different side of Pakistan, in many respects quite in contrast to what I observed on my first visit. Islamabad is certainly the cleanest and most organized city in all of South Asia, and the friends that I’ve made on this trip have been exceptionally interesting: social activists, religious scholars, journalists, NGO workers and documentary film makers. All of which makes me feel a sense of loss and a heavy sadness deep down inside at the prospect that now that I should be in Delhi in four hours’ time and not knowing if I can ever come back.
I spend my remaining Pakistani money at the Government handicrafts’ shop, picking up onyx vases and ashtrays and a brightly-hued tapestry. ‘I really wish I could stay on in Pakistani longer’, I tell the friendly shopkeeper as he tots up my bill. He smiles, and says as he shakes my hand firmly, ‘Inshallah, you will be back soon’.
I walk over to the cafeteria. A young handsome man hands me a cup of tea and I repeat the same phrase about wishing that I could stay in Pakistan longer, meaning ever word of it. And he answers in an identical fashion. ‘Inshallah, you will come back again’, he assures me. We get chatting. His name is Habib. He has just joined this job, having previously worked in a local band. He has composed over a dozen songs, he says, and on my pleading he sings his latest composition: a Punjabi song about the pangs of separated lovers.
A voice comes over the microphone, announcing the imminent departure of Pakistan International Airlines’ flight to Delhi. A line forms around a counter, and I join it at the end. ‘I really wish I could stay on longer’, I tell the lady who checks my boarding pass before I head for the gate leading to the plane. ‘Inshallah, you will be here soon’, she says coyly.
We have now taken off, and within five minutes we are out of Pakistani territory, having crossed an imaginary frontier into the Indian Punjab. Forty-five minutes later, as the plane begins to descend, we are above Delhi, flying over an urban jungle that extends till the horizon. And just then, the plane begins to quake like a leaf in the face of a terrifying typhoon. It violently heaves up and down, this way and that. We have been caught in a furious storm. Menacing black clouds swell up outside the window, the darkness broken by massive bolts of lightening. The plane feverishly resists this sudden assault, and, I, in my panic, imagine it is all in vain.
An elderly woman next to me seems on the verge of fainting. Her eyes are shut tight, her face contorted in terror. She buries her head in the lap of her daughter, who is repeatedly taking the name of Allah, exhorting Him for protection. I hear similarly desperate cries to God and Ishwar buzz around me. We all believe that this is the end. I have never come so close to possible death before. Being a horribly nervous air-traveller, this experience is grueling. My heart is in my mouth, and I stomp my feet violently on the floor as the plane furiously tilts from side to side uncontrollably. Death has come, I imagine, and my mind seeks to focus on God, begging for forgiveness of sins and for His acceptance. If a violent death in an air-crash is what He has decreed, then so be it, I scream to myself. All this while, appeals to Allah, Ishwar and God become louder and more desperate, all of us, Indians and Pakistanis, Hindus and Muslims finally united before the Creator in the face of what we think is imminent death.
The ordeal lasts for almost twenty minutes. I do not know how I survived that long. As we appear to be crashing below through the blinding blanket of clouds a desperate voice crackles over the microphone. I fear for the worst. The airhostess announces that due to ‘very bad’ weather over Delhi we are forced to fly back to Lahore. The plane then veers around suddenly, as if retracing its steps. Wisely, the pilot takes a slightly different route back, skirting the rain-swollen clouds. But till we touch down in Lahore an hour or so later we are all shocked into an eerie silence in our seats, whispering our prayers to the one God with multiple names.
‘See, I told you that you would come back soon’, beams the keeper of the handicrafts shop in the airport when we pile out of the plane, seeking to pacify me. Habib, the young singer-turned-waiter at the airport restaurant, welcomes me with a firm hug and an identical reply. Yes, it is good to be back, to be back on terra firma, to be back in Lahore, to be back in Pakistan, to be back alive.
The passengers of the aborted flight are directed to a PIA counter in the departure lounge. There we are informed that there is no scheduled flight from Lahore to Delhi for the next four days. We could wait till then, we are told. I wish I could avail that option, for it would give me four extra days in Pakistan. But, I cannot, since my visa expires tomorrow.
We are advised to take an alternate route: to fly to Karachi the next evening, and from there to Delhi, obviously an arduously long journey. I hear noises of protest. Frankly, I would not mind this option either. That way, I could get to see a bit of Karachi, at least its airport, said to be the swankiest in Pakistan. But the grumbles of protest grow louder and more aggressive. A hefty Pakistani man and two angry Indian women surround the counter, threatening to go on virtual strike and demanding that PIA arrange a special flight to take us to Delhi directly. I think their brusqueness is entirely uncalled for, considering the valour of the intrepid PIA pilot (a woman, it turns out) who steered us safely through what could have been a deadly killer storm. But, now that most of the other passengers have joined the chorus demanding a special flight, I decide to keep shut. So, finally, it is decided by our strike leaders that we, a bunch of some fifty Pakistanis and Indians, roughly equal in number, shall refuse to fly to Karachi and, instead, shall press on with the demand
for a special flight to Delhi immediately. I quietly submit to what I think is an entirely unreasonable demand.
Three hours later, the PIA officials relent and graciously announce that they have arranged for a craft to take us to Delhi tomorrow evening. We are informed that arrangements have been made for us to stay at the nearby Airport Inn. Meanwhile, the three white passengers have left the group, probably planning to cross over into India through the Attari-Wagah border crossing point, thirty miles away, which we Indians and Pakistanis ironically cannot do because our visas permit us only to fly to India and not cross overland.
We file into vans waiting outside and are driven to the inn—which turns out to be a modest privately-owned lodge and not the fancy, government-owned five star hotel that some passengers were obviously expecting, judging by the angry clicking of tongues that I hear when we arrive at the reception desk. The lodge is short of rooms, we are told by the receptionist, and so are to be put two to a room. This is done in an entirely random fashion, which is, I feel, all to the good, because most Indian and Pakistani passengers find that they are forced, whether they like it or not, to share rooms with a person of the other nationality.
Rehan, a businessman from Gujranwala, and I have been assigned the same room, which is barely large enough to accommodate the bed that occupies almost all the available space. We introduce ourselves to one another, and, as all the other passengers seem to be doing, talk about the harrowing experience on the flight and about how glad we are to have been saved from impending death. We walk up to the room together and, after a quick wash, lunge into the bed and earn some very well deserved sleep.
It is late evening when we wake up. Rehan insists that I join him for dinner at a nearby eatery and refuses to budge when I plead that we share the hefty bill. In less than three hours, the panic that gripped all of us on the flight in the face of the near-death experience has bonded Rehan and me together in a strange, unexplainable way. He’s now ‘Yaar’, ‘Bhai’ and ‘Baba’, and I slap him on the back and he does the same to me. I already know much about his wife and his three children, about his income and his passion for travel and good food, and I’ve told him likewise about myself. It seems that I’ve known Rehan for as long as I can recall.
And this seems to be the case with most of the other Indian and Pakistani passengers who have been herded together in shared rooms in the Airport Inn. By now, I am on first-name terms with at least half of the passengers. So, I know about Nathu, the Hindu trader from Sukkur in Sindh and his passion for Sufi music. And Najma, a corpulent Shia woman from Lahore, who is on the way to visit long-lost relatives in Lucknow. And Haji Shams, a learned maulvi from Sargodha, who has been invited to a conference in Delhi on ethics and biotechnology. And Hussaini, a frail, elderly woman from Hyderabad in Sindh who is heading for a city with the same name in India for a medical operation. And so on. And, likewise, the numerous Indian passengers whose addresses I have noted and whom I hope to meet once we get back to India, Inshallah.
The next day is spent in the confines of the Airport Inn, for we have no idea when the special craft that we have been told would be arranged for us would depart. Rehan and I sit on the steps of the entrance to the inn, watching the traffic pass by—cars, gaily painted buses (each a work of art), Chinese-made tempos and donkey-carts. This part of suburban Lahore could easily pass for any north Indian town. Ayub Khan, the hefty, amiable armed Pakhtun guard, keeps us regaled with stories about his village nestled in the mountains near the Afghan frontier. Some passengers (Indians, I am ashamed to report) interrupt our
reverie with frantic shrieks hurled at the receptionist for badly functioning air-conditioners, taps which do not work and tea that has been served cold.
At three in the afternoon, we are told that PIA has arranged for a plane to take us to Delhi and that it would depart at six thirty that evening. I react to that announcement with relief, mixed with sadness at the thought of imminent departure.
When we reach the airport we are told that the special plane arranged for us is a forty-seater craft that flies with the help of propellers. That sends me into a spasm of agony. Surely, I tell myself, this tiny craft that I think uses outmoded technology will not be able to weather a storm over Delhi, if we are again stuck in one. And the timing of the flight is another major cause of trepidation. It is scheduled to arrive in Delhi in the late evening, when, at this time of the year, fierce squalls have a nasty habit of breaking out.
I ascend the ladder leading up to the tiny plane with a deep sense of fear. I wish there was some other way of getting back to Delhi. But, there isn’t, since our visas strictly require us to return to Delhi by air from Lahore, and so, I tell myself, there is no point in fretting. The friendly steward guides me to my seat, which is next to Rehan’s. Rehan isn’t making things easier for me, as he talks about how diminutive the plane seems, how feeble the propellers might be in the face of a storm. Najma, the corpulent Lahori who is heading for Lucknow, tries to make light of the situation. Surveying the miniscule aircraft, which looks like a slightly oversized toy plane, she jokes, ‘It’s as if we are all going on a family picnic!’.
I struggle to smile.
And, then, in a short while, we are airborne and I whisper my prayers to God. The sky is remarkably clear, a brilliant cloudless blue. The plane sails majestically like a swallow in spring. The friendly steward assures me, when I tell him that I am already missing Pakistan, that I shall, Inshallah, return soon.
Barely half an hour later, plane begins to descend, and the airhostess informs us that we should be reaching Delhi in a short while. My mind goes to Pakistan, which we have left just thirty minutes ago, and I also think of India, where we should be touching down in half that time. How near the two countries are, and yet so distant!
Then an idea strikes me. I grab a scrap of paper—actually, half of the airsickness bag kept in the pocket before me—and I scribble down the following lines:
“Dear Friends,
Yesterday’s near brush with death has brought all of us, Pakistanis and Indians, so close together. If in the face of death, our common destiny, we can be so close, then why not in life, too? In order to celebrate the close bonds that we all have established in this one day, I propose that the moment the plane touches down in Delhi, Allah/Ishwar willing, we should raise the following slogan:
Pakistani-Hindustani Bhai Bhai!
Please read this note and pass it around.”
I hand over the note to the passenger sitting behind me, and it gradually weaves its way around the plane. Just to make sure that everyone gets the message, after a while I stand up and announce what the note is all about. Aware that we have two feminists on board—who had attended the same conference as I in Islamabad—I add that the phrase “Bhai-Bhai” can be substituted by “Behen-Behen”, if the need is felt.
A panic-stricken airhostess, hearing my impassioned speech, rushes to my seat, wondering what has happened. ‘I’m doing my politics’, I tell her with a chuckle, and she breaks into an approving smile when I explain what my declamation is all about.
Five minutes later, the little plane gracefully touches down at New Delhi airport and I hear a loud chorus repeat after me, “Pakistani-Hindustani Bhai-Bhai!”.
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