Arundhati Roy - The Ministry of Utmost Happiness

Junaid Ahmed Shah was an Area Commander of the Hizb-ul-Mujahideen who had been captured a few months ago when he made that most common, but fatal, mistake of paying a midnight visit to his wife and infant son at their home in Sopore where soldiers lay in wait for him. He was a tall, lithe man, well known, much loved for his good looks and for his real, as well as apocryphal, acts of bravery. He had once had shoulder-length hair and a thick black beard. He was clean-shaven now, his hair close-cropped, Indian Army — style. His dull, sunken eyes looked out from deep, gray hollows. He was wearing worn tracksuit bottoms that ended halfway down his shins, woolen socks, army-issue canvas Keds and a scarlet, moth-eaten waiter’s jacket with brass buttons that was too small for him and made him look comical. The tremor in his hands caused the crockery to dance on the tray.

“All right, get lost now. What are you hanging around for?” Amrik Singh said to Junaid.

“Ji Jenaab! Jai Hind!”

Yes sir! Victory to India!

Junaid saluted and left the room. Amrik Singh turned to Musa, the picture of commiseration.

“What happened to you is something that ought not to happen to any human being. You must be in shock. Here, have a Krackjack. It’s very good for you. Fifty-fifty. Fifty percent sugar, fifty percent salt.”

Musa did not reply.

Amrik Singh finished his tea. Musa left his untouched.

“You have an engineering degree, is that not so?”

“No. Architecture.”

“I want to help you. You know the army is always looking for engineers. There is a lot of work. Very well paid. Border fencing, orphanage building, they are planning some recreation centers, gyms for young people, even this place needs doing up…I can get you some good contracts. We owe you that much at least.”

Musa, not looking up, tested the spike of a seashell with the tip of his index finger.

“Am I under arrest, or do I have your permission to leave?”

Since he wasn’t looking up, he did not see the translucent film of anger that dropped across Amrik Singh’s eyes, as quietly and quickly as a cat jumping off a low wall.

“You can go.”

Amrik Singh remained seated as Musa stood up and left the room. He rang a bell and told the man who answered it to escort Musa out.

Downstairs in the cinema lobby there was a torture-break. Tea was being served to the soldiers, poured out from big steaming kettles. There were cold samosas in iron buckets, two per head. Musa crossed the lobby, this time holding the gaze of one of the bound, beaten, bleeding boys whom he knew well. He knew the boy’s mother had been going from camp to camp, police station to police station, desperately looking for her son. That could have lasted a whole lifetime. At least some horrible good has come of this night , Musa thought.

He had almost walked out of the door when Amrik Singh appeared at the head of the stairs, beaming, exuding bonhomie, an entirely different person from the one Musa had left in the projection room. His voice boomed across the lobby.

“Arre huzoor! Ek cheez main bilkul bhool gaya tha!”

There’s something I completely forgot!

Everybody — torturers and torturees alike — turned their gaze on him. Wholly aware that he had the attention of his audience, Amrik Singh trotted athletically down the steps, like a joyful host saying goodbye to a guest whose visit he has greatly enjoyed. He hugged Musa affectionately and pressed on him a package he was carrying.

“This is for your father. Tell him I ordered it especially for him.”

It was a bottle of Red Stag whiskey.

The lobby fell silent. Everybody, the audience as well as the protagonists of the play that was unfolding, understood the script. If Musa spurned the gift, it would be a public declaration of war with Amrik Singh — which made him, Musa, as good as dead. If he accepted it, Amrik Singh would have outsourced the death sentence to the militants. Because he knew that the news would get out, and that every militant group, whatever else they disagreed about, agreed that death was the punishment for collaborators and friends of the Occupation. And whiskey-drinking — even by non-collaborators — was a declared un-Islamic activity.

Musa walked over to the snack bar and put the bottle of whiskey down on it.

“My father does not drink.”

“ Arre , what is there to hide? There’s no shame in it. Of course your father drinks! You know that very well. I bought this bottle especially for him. Never mind, I’ll give it to him myself.”

Amrik Singh, still smiling, ordered his men to follow Musa and see that he got home safe. He was pleased with the way things had turned out.

DAWN WAS BREAKING. A hint of rose in a pigeon-gray sky. Musa walked home through the dead streets. The Gypsy followed him at a safe distance, the driver instructing checkpost after checkpost on his walkie-talkie to let Musa through.

He entered his home with snow on his shoulders. The cold of that was nothing compared to the cold that was gathering inside him. When they saw his face his parents and sisters knew better than to approach him or ask what had happened. He went straight back to his desk and resumed the letter he had been writing before the soldiers came for him. He wrote in Urdu. He wrote quickly, as though it was his last task, as though he was racing against the cold and had to finish it before the warmth seeped out of his body, perhaps forever.

It was a letter to Miss Jebeen.

Babajaana

Do you think I’m going to miss you? You are wrong. I will never miss you, because you will always be with me.

You wanted me to tell you real stories, but I don’t know what is real any more. What used to be real sounds like a silly fairy story now — the kind I used to tell you, the kind you wouldn’t tolerate. What I know for sure is only this: in our Kashmir the dead will live forever; and the living are only dead people, pretending.

Next week we were going to try and make you your own ID card. As you know, jaana , our cards are more important than we ourselves are now. That card is the most valuable thing anyone can have. It is more valuable than the most beautifully woven carpet, or the softest, warmest shawl, or the biggest garden, or all the cherries and all the walnuts from all the orchards in our Valley. Can you imagine that? My ID card number is M 108672J. You told me it was a lucky number because it has an M for Miss and a J for Jebeen. If it is, then it will bring me to you and your Ammijaan quickly. So get ready to do your homework in heaven. What sense would it make to you if I told you that there were a hundred thousand people at your funeral? You who could only count to fifty-nine? Count did I say? I meant shout — you who could only shout to fifty-nine. I hope that wherever you are you are not shouting. You must learn to talk softly, like a lady, at least sometimes. How shall I explain one hundred thousand to you? Such a huge number. Shall we try and think about it seasonally? In spring think of how many leaves there are on the trees, and how many pebbles you can see in the streams once the ice has melted. Think of how many red poppies blossom in the meadows. That should give you a rough idea of what a hundred thousand means in spring. In autumn it is as many Chinar leaves as crackled under our feet in the university campus the day I took you for a walk (and you were angry with the cat who wouldn’t trust you and refused the piece of bread you offered him. We’re all becoming a bit like that cat, jaana . We can’t trust anyone. The bread they offer us is dangerous because it turns us into slaves and fawning servants. You’d probably be angry with us all). Anyway. We were talking about a number. One hundred thousand. In winter we’ll have to think of the snowflakes falling from the sky. Remember how we used to count them? How you used to try and catch them? That many people is a hundred thousand. At your funeral the crowd covered the ground like snow. Can you picture it now? Good. And that’s only the people. I’m not going to tell you about the sloth bear that came down the mountain, the hangul that watched from the woods, the snow leopard that left its tracks in the snow and the kites that circled in the sky, supervising everything. On the whole, it was quite a spectacle. You’d have been happy, you love crowds, I know. You were always going to be a city girl. That much was clear from the beginning. Now it’s your turn. Tell me about—