Actual Independence - Part I

No one noticed it in the school except his poor uneducated house servant who took him there for the Independence Day celebrations. There was a mistake in the order of tricolors in the Indian Flag hoisted - 'Hara neeche hona chaiye' - His servant pointed to the school staffs. It was soon corrected. That was the first Independence day he could remember. He felt it then.

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He don't remember what class he was studying in - perhaps the first standard, from his house being one of the tallest building in the town (courtesy the big joint family he was part of), he could easily see the fire near the railway station. Majority of the shops there belonged to Muslims. Then he heard that his uncle's best friend's(a Hindu) shop also got burnt in that fire. The next day early morning he got ready for school. But his uncle announced no child in the house will go to school that day. No one from the house went for work. The unannounced holiday had started.Since all the males were at home, special food was cooked. But perhaps no one ate. They were busy in terrace collecting whatever they can - hundreds of bricks , chilli powder , cemented slabs, preparing for onslaught if any. People lined in their terrace seeing the loots made across the road. The Hindus broke the locks of all the tailors' shops nearby , just because they were Muslims and burnt the clothes they were working on , not thinking twice that those same clothes actually belonged to mostly Hindus.

From the same terrace , he looked down and recognized the rickshawalah who used to daily take him to school along with other children of the locality. The rickshawalah was visiting each house and taking orders for bomb perhaps and was much sought after mainly for the self-protection as there were rumours floating around that Muslims are forming groups and attacking the hindus areas.Suddenly, there was a loud sound, he could see the firings around the nearby Gurudwara. The house doors were closed and everyone was at terrace, ready to attack from above. At that instant, a loud noise came from back - 'Ya Ali'. Everyone turned back in horror. One of his uncles brought a loudspeaker from behind and played a prank which ofcourse no one liked. But later it became fun - there was a bit of competition amongst the children of all the households in the locality regarding which house can shout the slogans most loudly. And the sky was filled with lines like 'Jai Shri Ram' , 'Har har Mahadev' and 'Jai Maa Kali , Tetarpur(one of the popular muslim areas in the town) Khali'. One of his cousins shouted - 'Yaa Ali, tod dushman ki nali' but was immediately reprimanded by the elders in the house. Not much changed in next few days. The schools remained closed. Curfews were put. The independence was lost and shamed.

One day,  he could see one aeroplane flying and people waving their hands to it - it was the Prime Minister Mr.Rajiv Gandhi visiting the place.Whenever curfew was relaxed, there used to be festive kind of environment, people lining up to stock their daily necessities.The mornings started with newspaper discussions in the space just outside the house with big guns from the locality participating in the discussions. And if there was any siren type sound coming, they used to scatter immediately perhaps fearing of the shoot at sight orders during the curfew. All lights and televisions used to be off during the night so that Muslim attackers,  if they come think,  that no one lives in the house.The female members were not allowed to pick any telephone calls. It was decided after receiving a couple of 'Please save us, they are killing everyone, please send the police' calls - desperate attempts from people who just happened to pick any number from the telephone directory for help during their time of trouble. It was common to hear of dead bodies being found in wells.

One morning newspaper headlines were widely discussed. He got curious and the first news item he ever remember reading was  -  Lalu Yadav had got Advani arrested and brought his rath yatra to a halt. Soon Diwali came but it wasn't celebrated because crackers were perhaps banned. Schools remained closed and promotions to next class were made on the basis of half yearly exams' results. Once the things got normal , one particular day was celebrated as the Diwali day in the locality. His family tailor , a Muslim, again stitched his new clothes. He felt independent again.