Page 73 - Train to Pakistan

bad times.’
A few people sighed solemnly, ‘Yes, bad days.’

Meet Singh added, ‘Yes, Chacha—this is Kalyug, the dark age.’
There was a long silence and people shuffled uneasily on their haunches.
Some yawned, closing their mouths with loud invocations to God: ‘Ya Allah.

Wah Guru, wah Guru.’
‘Lambardara,’ started Imam Baksh again, ‘you should know what is
happening. Why has not the Deputy Sahib sent for you?’

‘How am I to know, Chacha? When he sends for me I will go. He is also at the
station and no one is allowed near it.’
A young villager interjected in a loud cheery voice: ‘We are not going to die

just yet. We will soon know what is going on. It is a train after all. It may be
carrying government treasures or arms. So they guard it. Haven’t you heard,
many have been looted?’

‘Shut up,’ rebuked his bearded father angrily. ‘Where there are elders, what
need have you to talk?’

‘I only …’
‘That is all,’ said the father sternly. No one spoke for some time.
‘I have heard,’ said Imam Baksh, slowly combing his beard with his fingers,
‘that there have been many incidents with trains.’

The word ‘incident’ aroused an uneasy feeling in the audience. ‘Yes, lots of
incidents have been heard of,’ Meet Singh agreed after a while.

‘We only ask for Allah’s mercy,’ said Imam Baksh, closing the subject he had
himself opened.
Meet Singh, not meaning to be outdone in the invocation to God, added, ‘Wah
Guru, wah Guru.’

They sat on in silence punctuated by yawns and murmurs of ‘Ya Allah’ and
‘Hey wah Guru’. Several people, on the outer fringe of the assembly, stretched

themselves on the floor and went to sleep.
Suddenly a policeman appeared in the doorway of the gurdwara. The
lambardar and three or four villagers stood up. People who were asleep were

prodded into getting up. Those who had been dozing sat up in a daze,
exclaiming, ‘What is it? What’s up?’, then hurriedly wrapped their turbans round
their heads.

‘Who is the lambardar of the village?’
Banta Singh walked up to the door. The policeman took him aside and