Imagining Lahore Read online

  Following his love, Boota crossed the border illegally and reached Nurpur, a small village in the district Lahore, close to the border. Here, Zainab’s family beat him up and filed a case against him. In Lahore High Court, where his case was being heard, Zainab was asked to testify, in which she refused to return with Boota.17 Heartbroken, Boota committed suicide by walking into a running train head-on, close to Lahore’s Shahdara station. He was buried in Miani Sahib. Stories of his love and betrayal were narrated in newspapers and magazines. Soon, a cult grew around Boota Singh’s grave and he came to be referred to as Shaheed-e-Mohabbat (martyr of love).18 Young lovers inspired by his story would visit his grave to pay homage, while those who saw his love as a blot on the nation’s honour fought to remove all traces of his grave.19 The battle over his grave and legacy went on for a long time after his death, and in many ways continues till date.

  Soon after I heard about the story, I reached Nurpur, the village where Zainab settled after her arrival from India. At a barber’s shop, accompanied by a few locals I had befriended, I was told that Zainab was still alive and living at the same village. But it was impossible to meet her and talk about Boota Singh. For her family, the story of Boota Singh was still a threat, so it was better not to explore it any further.

  Some of the teachers of the Indian delegation had heard the story and we were still discussing it when the hateful graffiti appeared in front of me. I did not want my guests to feel uncomfortable with slogans expressing hatred for India. Hafiz Saeed and the JuD remain a bone of contention between India and Pakistan. I sought comfort in the fact that they couldn’t read the script, even if they understood the language. Should I tell them what the graffiti says? Should I mention to them that we were going past the headquarters of the JuD, whose leader is the most wanted ‘terrorist’ in India?

  I knew that they might be interested, but having spent the last two days romanticizing the city, talking about its cultural and historical depth, I didn’t want to confront this reality, this ugly truth about the city of Lahore. I battled within. Was I just to present the beauty of the city, while hiding its hideousness? It’s a question that still rattles me. Is my Lahore, the beautiful city I have called home all my life, the city of love and splendour, the city of allure and charm, only a figment of my imagination? Does the graffiti represent a truth I am not willing to see?

  Defeated, humiliated, the turret of Jain Mandir lies at the centre of this vacant ground. In a sign of complete submission to its new political reality it kowtows to passers-by, most of whom, unaware of its existence, ignore it and move on. It only has one sympathizer who is, ironically, a mochi. Loyal to the temple, he sits at its entrance every day, drowning its cries with the sound of his hammer as he fixes shoes. A few decades ago, when the turret, surrounded by other sacred rooms, stood proud, piercing the sky, the sight of this mochi might have soiled its pride. Today, caged within a wall, it cannot afford to be as picky about its devotees.

  For years after Partition, the temple stood on this ground, staring east, waiting for pilgrims who had long abandoned it. No one ever came back. The temple was gradually cut off from the rest of the complex. Two new roads bifurcated around it. Like Chauburji, visible from here, it too became one of the most important junctions in a new Lahore—Jain Mandir Chowk.

  Just when the temple had adjusted to its new role, the fateful morning of 7 December 1992 descended. The previous day, about 1000 kilometres from Lahore, Hindu nationalists had brought down a historic mosque which had survived invasions, raids and colonization before it, but could not withstand a rising religious nationalism. The same mob, perhaps, in a different garb, gathered outside this temple. None of them knew the difference between a Jain and a Hindu temple. They did not want to know. Within hours, the proud turret was brought down, disgraced, as if the demolished Babri Masjid, 1000 kilometres from here, had somehow been avenged.

  In this way, on that fateful morning, one of the last traces of Jain heritage in Lahore was decimated. According to Jain tradition there were three functional temples in the city, one close to Chauburji, one within the walled city of Lahore close to Bhatti Gate, believed to have been constructed by Emperor Akbar at the request of one of his Jain ministers, Bhanu Chandra, and one in a sixteenth-century village called Guru Mangat, named after a devotee of Guru Hargobind who used to reside there, now incorporated by the elite residential society of Gulberg.20 The other two quickly faded away after Partition, yet somehow this particular temple had survived. Standing tall, the turret served as a junction, while its accompanying buildings, which once must have been used by pilgrims and priests, were taken over by migrants from the other side of the border, and property squatters.

  The Jain heritage of Lahore was part of a rich legacy scattered all over Punjab. There are several localities in many cities of the province still referred to as ‘Bhabrian’, derived from Bhabra, an ancient Jain merchant community of Punjab. Lahore, Multan, Kasur, Narowal, Sialkot, Jhelum, Bhera and Rawalpindi hosted some of the oldest Jain temples in South Asia. Several prominent Jain priests have lived and preached in these areas. In fact, it is also maintained that Mahavira, the final tirthankara, undertook an extensive tour of Punjab, passing possibly through several cities mentioned above, where later his devotees constructed Jain temples.21

  In recent history, Acharya Vijayanand Suri, also known as Atmaramji of Gujranwala, was a prominent Jain teacher in the first half of the nineteenth century. Directly and indirectly, he was responsible for the construction and renovation of several Jain temples in the province, including the one next to Chauburji.22 The splendid smadh of Atmaramji still stands in Gujranwala, about 70 kilometres from Lahore, and now functions as a police station. One can only wonder at the irony that where once the message of non-violence was preached, now suspected criminals are incarcerated and interrogated.

  The Jain temple in Lahore was constructed a few years before Partition by a rich Jain businessman from Lahore called Seth Ghazan Chand Jain, a devotee of Atmaramji. His daughter, Swaran Kantaji Maharaj became a swaran, a female priest, and earned a lot of respect for her services to the Jain religion.23 The family, abandoning their ancestral property and this temple, migrated to East Punjab following the riots of Partition during which the ancient city of Lahore was burned down and this contemporary city was birthed.

  It was not just Jain heritage that suffered on that fateful morning in December. Relics of Hindu temples, long abandoned by their rightful owners and being used for other purposes, as houses, schools, madrasas were also targeted, some brought down, while others continued to stand stubbornly despite repeated attacks.

  The historic Sitla Mandir in Shahalami, once dominated by the influential Hindu families of the city, and the site of some of the worst riots of Partition, was another victim of religio-nationalist passion. The abandoned temple had been taken over by several refugees and its floors and rooms divided amongst numerous families. One such room was taken over by a madrasa where neighbourhood children learned the Quran. Most of the surrounding structures had already been lost, the sacred pool converted into a community garden, smadhs either destroyed or taken over by people, and community rooms converted into residences too.

  On the morning of 7 December 1992, the teacher and students of the madrasa led a procession demanding the temple’s demolition. A mob climbed to the top and brought down a part of the turret, in the process seriously damaging the building. Almost five decades after Partition, the locality of Shahalami once again witnessed a familiar fire that had at that time burnt through the community of Lahore. A deep crack now runs through the middle of the temple, posing a serious threat to the dozens of people who still live inside. Once the passion subsided, the students of the madrasa went back to their room within the temple to continue their education.

  The story of Bheru Mandir is not much different. Located in the middle of what is believed to be the oldest inhabited locality of Lahore, Ichra, this temple was also taken over by several refugee fa
milies after Partition. Now a small town within the metropolis of Lahore, many local historians believe that it is not the walled city but Ichra where the ancient, mythological secrets of Lahore are buried. This area was once the site of some of the oldest Hindu temples of the city. Even though historical records state that Bheru Mandir was constructed in the seventeenth century, and renovated almost two centuries later on the orders of Maharaja Ranjit Singh, its actual origin might be older.24

  Interestingly, Ichra was also home to Maulana Maududi, the founder of Jama’at-e-Islami, a right-wing religious political party. It therefore housed several passionate followers of the organization, for whom any remnant of non-Islamic heritage is a perceived threat to the historical and national purity of Pakistan. Young, passionate loyalists of the parties, along with other fanatics, surrounded Bheru Mandir on 7 December 1992, forcing its residents to flee, and began the process of its destruction. The temple proved to be stronger than expected. Despite repeated blows, it showed no sign of submission. The mob soon lost interest and the temple continues to stand till today, exhibiting only minor injuries from that battle. What it cannot hide, though, are signs of abandonment, neglect and weathering that all such religious shrines suffer once their devotees desert them.

  Whereas stories of intolerance are rampant in Lahore, particularly after Partition, there are also those that present an alternative reality of the city, of a city that has resisted history. These are tales of love, resistance and harmony, which I would like to believe, despite evidence to the contrary, capture the essence of the city.

  Located on the southern edge of Lahore, once marking its boundary but now another historic town incorporated into the metropolis, is the sixteenth-century Niaz Baig. The town, like several others, once had its own distinct identity, separate from Lahore. Today, however, as the city spills beyond its walls and floods the plains around it, it drowns the distinct voices of all such villages and towns, subsuming them into itself. Forced into acquiescence, these localities have a relationship with the city which has been reduced to that of a colonizer and its colony. Such hamlets also provide the city with workers, while the city rewards them with poverty.

  As Lahore has prospered, its suburban localities have thrived—Model Town, Gulberg and now Defence. The wide avenues, the neatly aligned trees, fancy cars and international brands give Lahore the veneer of a leading metropolitan city, yet beyond the shiny houses is another world easily missed through the tinted windows of air-conditioned cars. Many of the new residential societies have been built on the agricultural lands of ancient hamlets, which have now been imprisoned within these communities, reduced to the status of katchi-abadis.

  Nowhere is this contrast more blatantly obvious than at Defence Housing Authority (DHA), the most prestigious residential society not just in Lahore but also the entire country. Like little dots sprinkled all over DHA are these tiny hamlets, some of them dating back to the fourteenth century. Walled and manned by security guards, these hamlets are closely monitored to ensure the exclusivity of the elite of DHA.

  Niaz Baig, after Lahore, served as a regional capital of this area. At the time of raids and invasions, residents of neighbouring villages would retreat into the walled protection of Niaz Baig. For example, in the eighteenth century, as the wrath of Ahmad Shah Abdali descended upon the villages of Hinjarwal and Maraka, Niaz Baig, thanks to its protective wall, was spared.25 That wall has disappeared now. What is left are the remnants of the gates and their names. Much like Lahore, the population of Niaz Baig too has spilled beyond its once-walled boundary to encroach all the way till Multan Road. The crowded community, its chaotic traffic and communal garbage disposed in vacant grounds contrasts sharply with the image of a clean city that Lahore so desperately wants to project.

  Deep within Niaz Baig are the remains of another historic temple—Bhadra Kali Mandir—one of the most important Hindu temples in pre-Partition Lahore. Thousands of devotees would gather here every year in an annual pilgrimage. Like other temples around Lahore, this too was taken over by migrants coming from the other side of the border, its numerous rooms, smadhs and other buildings divided amongst different families.

  One such building was a tall structure with a dome on top constructed on the orders of Maharaja Ranjit Singh, who wanted to gift the people of this community a new temple. The priests refused to shift the shrine, and so the structure remained vacant.26 After Partition, the building was converted into a school. In 1992, when temples all around Lahore were being attacked, a mob converged here as well, adamant to bring it down. The schoolchildren, along with the elders of the community, resisted these attempts. Given its utility, they argued for its protection, and in this way, the temple was saved from destruction.27

  Immediately after the destruction of the Babri Masjid, the religio-political parties spearheading the attacks demanded that the name of the junction be changed from Jain Mandir Chowk to Babri Masjid Chowk. A few enthusiastic shopkeepers also put up the ‘new’ name soon after but in official records the earlier name remained.

  Almost two and a half decades after that fateful day, the rechristened junction remains a memory. Jain Mandir Chowk remained so; its name failed to die. Its memory, its legacy survived in the unconscious nostalgia of the people. Like a bittersweet thought, it continued to lurk in the recesses of Lahore’s mind, a guilty conscience, a regret the city never acknowledged. Even official signs, unaware, or with a tinge of guilt, refer to this junction as Jain Mandir Chowk.

  This has been the story of Lahore, its enigma. A city trying to run away from its history of a thousand years, of a Hindu past it would rather not admit. Lahore—the symbol of nationalism, the birthplace of the Pakistan movement—cannot acknowledge its Hindu heritage, for that would be tantamount to treason. Pakistan is meant to be the homeland of Muslims, a nation separate from the Hindus. For all their differences, Hindus and Muslims cannot live together and neither can their histories, it seems to say. How can Lahore then admit that before it became a Muslim city, a symbol of nationalism, a symbol of a separate civilization, it was actually Hindu? How can it admit that its ancestors, before they became monotheists, used to worship Hindu deities and sing bhajans in their praise? How can it admit that those temples which it is now keen to bring down are the same spaces it once held sacred?

  Histories, like traumatic memories, cannot be easily cast away. They come back to haunt us. Surviving as tiny repositories of traditions are some of these names, preserving within them histories and stories not otherwise officially acknowledged. Despite the imposition of other narratives and propaganda, these names endure, highlighting how, at the level of lived experience, Lahore carries along its past, which the state would rather have it forget.

  Some kilometres from Niaz Baig is another historic hamlet, Qila Gujjar Singh, ‘fort of Gujjar Singh’, named after an eighteenth-century Sikh warlord, Gujjar Singh Banghi, who, along with two others, Lehna Singh and Sobha Singh, had carved up Lahore amongst themselves. Their tumultuous rule was ended by Maharaja Ranjit Singh. Pakistani nationalist history projects the Sikh period, also incorporating the time period of Ranjit Singh, as a devastating time for the Muslims of the city. Mosques, it says, were converted into stables, the sound of the azan was banned, the religious freedom of Muslims was curbed. In the nationalist historiography, history is divided according to religious sub-groups, while in school textbooks non-Muslim history is hardly mentioned. Thus, an average educated Pakistani grows up completely unaware of the non-Muslim history and heritage of Pakistan.

  Even so, the country’s non-Islamic history keeps popping up through localities like Qila Gujjar Singh. Sometimes the state consciously attempts to remove any last traces, as it tried to do in the case of Krishan Nagar. Established in the 1930s, this residential society, with its geometrical layout, parks, sewage system, clean drinking water and bungalows, was meant to fulfil the needs of the growing Hindu middle-class of the city.28 After Partition, with an influx of hundreds and thousands of migrants
, it soon transformed into another locality Lahore was trying hard not to be. In contemporary Lahore, it is a crowded, congested part of the older city.

  With the change of political reality, the name, however, inspired by Lord Krishna, continued to survive, a threat to a nascent, insecure state. In 1992, it was finally changed to Islampura, but the new name was never accepted by the residents of the city. Krishan Nagar remained Krishan Nagar. Now in a homogeneous Lahore eager to hide and pretend that it does not have a non-Muslim past, localities like Qila Gujjar Singh and Krishan Nagar raise some rather uncomfortable questions.

  For years, as the turret of Jain Mandir rested on the ground, it found solace in the fact that its sister buildings, rooms which were once linked with the entire temple complex, still stood tall, providing residence to thousands of people. Surrounded by a fast-changing Lahore, they were a few remaining specimens of pre-Partition architecture, a unique blend of British, Hindu and Mughal influences.

  What two conflagrations of nationalism could not accomplish in 1947 and 1992 was achieved by the demons of development. Skirting the fragile structure of Chauburji, the track for the Orange Line headed straight in the direction of Jain Mandir. These historic buildings, the last surviving evidence of Jain heritage in the city, fell in the way, and so were demolished. The turret would now have to find happiness in the fact that its city, its Lahore, is rapidly ‘modernizing’ and ‘developing’.