January 23, 2003

A view of Karachi from Jehangir Kothari Parade in Clifton (oppoiste page, inset and top left); a statue of N. Eduljee Dinshaw, a philanthropist and businessman. NED College is just one institution named after him

Bapsi Sidhwa was born in Karachi, brought up in Lahore and now lives in Houston. In three out of her four published novels, the characters belong to her own community. Faredoon Junglewalla (Freddy) and his family in The Crow Eaters, 16-year old Feroza Ginwalla An American Brat, as well as five-year old, polio stricken Lenny of Ice-Candy Man, like the Sitara-i-Imtiaz winning author herself, are all Parsis.

A day before her departure for America, Feroza drives to the trendy new Agyari, near Lahore’s fashionable Liberty Market. Holding her palms together, she raises her eyes to the Atash — the holy fire. She bows her head in gratitude, then chants the happy little Jasa-me-avanghe Mazda prayer, in the hallowed Avastan language of the Gathas. She knows it’s meaning in English: “Come to my help, O Ahura - Mazda! Give me victory, power and the joy of life.”

The 276,612 Zoroastrians or Zarathushtis around the world (the highest number being in Iran, 157,000, followed by India, 76,382, with Pakistan having 2,510 almost as many as in Australia) believe in Ahura Mazda as the One and Only God, follow the teachings of Prophet Zarathustra as laid down in his Gospel — the holy Gathas. Zarathustra is said to have lived in Persia (Iran) during the days of the father of King Darius, in the sixth century BC. Many Parsi names remind one of the Great Persian Kings like Cyrus (558-528 BC), Darius and Xerxes (519-465 BC). Bapsi’s Ice-Candy Man is dedicated ‘for Xerxes’.

In The Crow Eaters, Faredoon Junglewalla in his prosperous middle years, sits with his seven children and young visitors and shares with them the history of his community: ‘Booted out of Persia at the time of the Arab invasion 1,300 years ago, a handful of our ancestors fled to India with their sacred fires.’ Historical records date the event back to 641 AD, when following the Arab invasion of Persia (Iran), many Zarathushtis fled to remote areas. Around 756 AD, some of them sailed in boats and reached the west coast of India. In the 12th century, they moved to Surat on the banks of the river Tapti, in Gujarat. By 1612, Surat was to be the site of the first British factory in India, then became the first headquarters of the British East India Company. With the establishment of it’s first dock in 1720, trade flourished making Surat the mercantile capital of west India. But in the following century the city was destroyed by a fire, which was followed by floods. These disasters forced the Parsi community to shift their thriving businesses to Bombay.

The grandeur of Bombay Parsis is discovered by the Junglewalla family in The Crow Eaters, when they visit the mansion of Sir Noshirwan Jeevanjee Easymoney. ‘In the morning when Hutoxi drew the lace curtains to look out of the window she received a shock. “Adi! Adi! Come here!” she squealed. Adi toddled over to the window and gaped in astonishment. There were acres of garden and trees beneath them, but what fascinated Hutoxi was the emerald swimming pool and the elephant kneeling before it. While they watched he dipped the tip of his trunk into the pool and gave himself a shower. Half hidden behind a clump of mango trees was a camel and to their right, in a hedged enclosure, some deer and a peacock. Hutoxi rushed to the adjoining room to awaken the children.’

According to the Zarathushtrian census of Pakistan conducted in 1995, by the Karachi Zarthosti Banu Mandal (an organization of Parsi ladies, established in 1912) and followed by an address and telephone directory (second edition compiled in March 1997), there were a total of 2,753 Parsis in Pakistan.Out of these, 2,567 were in Karachi (93 per cent). The latest figure for Pakistan as mentioned in the Fezana Journal of North America (2001), stands at a total of 2,510.

According to the ‘Statistical Survey of Parsi Housing’ presented in 1964, there were 400 Parsis in Sindh, in the year 1861. By 1881, the population had increased to 1,063. A peak of 5,018 was seen in 1951, after which the numbers started declining. It appears that the population of Parsis increased in Sindh, after the latter’s capture by Charles Napier, in the year 1843 and it’s annexation to the Bombay Presidency.

Going back to The Crow Eaters, Bapsi Sidhwa states, ‘There were no Parsi beggars in a country abounding in beggars. The moment a Parsi strikes it rich he devotes a big portion of his energies to charity. He builds schools, hospitals and orphanages; provides housing, scholarships and finance. Notorious misers, they are paradoxically generous to a cause.’

In Sands of Time, Sunnu Farrokh Golwalla gives an account of Zarathushti Associations in Karachi. One of the very first mentioned is Bai Virbaiji Soparivala (BVS) Parsi High School. A centenary volume (1859-1959) of The Virbaijeeite — the school magazine, states that it started in the year 1859, as the Parsi Balakshala — an elementary school. In 1870 Shapurji H. Soparivala offered his spacious house, to accommodate the school. It was renamed Parsi Virbaiji School in memory of Seth Soparivala’s beloved wife, who had died a year earlier. In 1904 their eldest son Seth Khurshedji, laid the foundation stone of the present school building, on Abdullah Haroon Road. It was completed in 1906.

As I enter the office of the school’s principal, I find Mrs Deena Mistri the great-granddaughter of the school’s founder and a recipient of the prestigeous Pride of Performance Award - 2001 (for her services in the field of education) seated under a portrait of Quaid-i-Azam Mohammad Ali Jinnah, with her white silken hair and a matching white cardigan worn over a printed sari, which is wrapped in the traditional Parsi style. She tells me that this year, they had 600 applicants for the 50 vacant seats, in class one. ‘If a student comes to me complaining, that another has hit him, I always tell them not to hit back. Tolerance and respect is what we teach them here,’ she adds with an affectionate smile.

Talking to her, I am reminded of Lenny’s inimitable Godmother in Ice-Candy Man, about whom Lenny says, ‘The bond that ties her strength to my weakness, my fierce demands to her nurturing, my trust to her capacity to contain that trust - and my lonliness to her compassion - is stronger than the bond of motherhood. More satisfying than the ties between men and women’. In the end it is the Godmother, who ventures to rescue Shanta, Lenny’s 18-year old Ayah from a life of perpetual doom.