April 21, 2002

IT is nice to see the bookshelves filling up again with literature for children and it is no longer impossible to find interesting material for the young readers. In this context, Imrana Maqsood’s work in the form of a short serial for children is to be welcomed. The stories, as the title of the books indicate, are based on true events which occurred in 1947 when the subcontinent was partitioned. Those were the times when the generation, whose great-grandchildren will read these books, suffered the trauma of massacres, migration and homelessness to give us a homeland.

This valuable collection of three booklets Qayam-i-Pakistan ki sachchi kahanian contains about 16 stories. The first book which was printed in March 2000 had received the Presidential Award for the best book written for children on the Pakistan Movement (and has already been reviewed in this paper). The second and third parts were published in 2001.

Illustrated with appropriate drawings, these books, touch the minds and souls of the readers. With a message of love, commitment, responsibility, loyalty, duty and sacrifice, the narratives also focus on freedom. The series was prompted by a long-felt need to remind the young readers of the achievements of their forebears and the price they had to pay to win freedom.

The author herself had witnessed the upheaval, though she was at the time too small to comprehend the meaning of the horrendous happenings around her. The announcement of an independent state for the Muslims of the subcontinent had unleashed a fury so difficult to understand. Her father, though a Muslim bureaucrat at the time of Partition, did not discriminate in providing help and necessities to the uprooted Hindus, who had opted to migrate from Pakistan to India.

The author has done a lot of research and legwork to compile the events which form the underpinning to her stories. The narration is not a mere figment of her imagination. The write-ups are based on facts which actually took place in history, and are linked to a place, a date, and real characters, some of whom have been long dead while others are still alive, leading a secluded life, either here, or on the other side of the border.

The narrations have come either directly or from a single source. Children can learn a lot from them. Unfortunately the fast-paced developments, which have engulfed the entire world in the last two decades, are widening the generation gap. The speedy progress has tossed the young ones into the new millenniums when they have not even fully comprehended their own past.

The author seeks to stir patriotic sentiments among the young readers. At a time, when lawlessness, chaos, and brutality are taking their toll, these booklets come as a ray of hope. Pinning her faith on Allama Iqbal’s verse, “Nahin hai na-ummeed Iqbal apni kasht-i-veeraan se; zara num ho to yeh mitti bahut zarkhaiz hai saaqi”. (Iqbal has not despaired of this barren soil, when it is dampened, this soil is really fertile).

Partition was marked by happy as well as sad incidents. Human relationships brought forth lessons of love, honesty, responsibility, duty and commitment. In the backdrop of all episodes there was the storm of communal hatred. Tens of thousands of Hindus, Sikhs and Muslims were uprooted as they migrated to the other side of the neatly carved border. Happily enough in this atmosphere of hatred and misgivings, not a single episode betrays personal hostility. It is repeatedly mentioned that the killings were the work of only a few, who were out to stoke the fire of hatred among the Muslims on the one side and the Hindus on the other.

The narration is remarkably free of prejudice and venom as the author tries to strike a balance by narrating the stories of atrocities on both sides of the borders.

One hopes that the attraction of the round-the-clock audio-visuals notwithstanding, the youngsters will find time and the interest to read these books. They will certainly teach them something about their history.

The upcoming channels should adapt the tales in these books into short plays which might help stir some patriotic emotions in the youngsters of today.


 

Qayam-i-Pakistan ki sachchi kahaniyan: mera angan (vol 2) and chand say batein (vol 3)

By Imrana Maqsood

Ferozsons, 60 Shahrah-i-Quaid-i-Azam, Lahore. Tel: 042-6301196

277 Peshawar Road, Rawalpindi. Tel: 051-564 273

Mehran Heights, Main Clifton Road, Karachi. Tel: 021-583 0467

74-E Blue Area, Islamabad. Tel: 051-274708

ISBN 969-0-01645-8 and 969-0-01646-6 32pp each. Rs 50 each

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