This Eid is of gratitude, Eid-ul-Fitr came twice that year but I am talking of the other Eid — Eid al-Adha more commonly known as Bakrid which came in March. In 2000 Eid-ul-Fitr was 8 January and 28 December, this year in India it is celebrated today, in Saudi and Pakistan it was celebrated yesterday. In twenty years the shift is due to lunar change. Eid depends on citation of moon is probably known to all but rest is my recent learning from links added below. I have had little relation with the endless festivals that are celebrated in India. There is a saying in Bangla, ‘Baro mashe tero porbo’ (thirteen festivals in twelve month). I landed up with my first lockdown during Eid in Lahore.
I was still working in Centre for Rural Development, an outreach programme (in Udwada, South Gujarat) of SNDT Women’s University, Mumbai then. The women community workers tried a lot to dissuade me from going to Pakistan but when they realised it was not working they all had a plea, that I would not stay back if I find women working in grassroots.
For me Lahore is Lahore, with an identity of its own. I landed in Lahore to do a residential Certificate course in Institute of Women’s Studies Lahore (IWSL). There were 23 girls(women) from 10 countries, five from Lahore, one from Sindh, one from Baluchistan, one from Ravi paar, one from nearby township (forget the name probably Shahpura), one from Northwest Frontier, three from India, three from Nepal, one each from Bangladesh, Srilanka, Malaysia, South Africa, Nigeria, Philippines and Thailand. We became friends and I am still in touch with a few. To be in Lahore during that time of the year is a heady feeling which comes floating with just saying Lahore. Eid was just another festival. I am sharing here what was special other than being in Lahore doing a course of Women’s Studies with world perspective.
I acquired parents there, us paar ke (from the other side) Mata and Baba. When I learnt that IWSL will be under lockdown for four days I promptly told my us paar ki Mata that I would stay with her. The course started 1 February 2000 and lockdown for Eid would be around March 17. All the girls who had come from different parts of the world had plans to go visiting different cities.
My us paar ki Mata, Bilquees Begum, accepted me at first glance as her daughter, as I had come to her from India, her native country. Her two married sons, one bachelor son, two married daughters and one unmarried daughter, my friend, a lawyer, who was doing the course with me, would all wonder as they had not seen her talk so much with anyone. She would hold my hand and start with, ‘you are mine you will understand’ and would continue to anything and everything under the sun as if I was a daughter born to her and knew everything about her life. There were times I would tease her on this, she would get angry and scold me, ‘your hair have become gray but you have not yet got any brains’. Whenever her married daughters would come she would send bhai, the youngest brother to take me home. Once when I could not come she got her married daughter and her family to the Institute situated in New Lahore (like South Delhi) to introduce her newly found daughter to them. She would wait for the vegetable vendor to come every morning and prepare vegetables for me specially. She would say, ‘this girl does not eat well’. She would take me visiting neighbours in the evenings, introducing me as her daughter. I would be silent spectator to different kinds of people.
Baba, Mohammad Saeed Sheikh, would make up with his silence for Mata’s communicative nature. His room was similar to Dr. Purohit’s room, lined with books on all four walls floor to ceiling. He would be always dressed formally, be either reading or writing. His magazines with translation from English Literature to Urdu were circulated in various universities across Pakistan. Once when I asked him if he would like me to bring something from India he pensively looked at the sky and hesitantly said English Literature books after 1947. I agreed readily without registering the relevance.
The two brothers, their wives and children welcomed me as a family member. Just like my friend I was Fufu (aunt) to all the kids.
This description is basically to share that I had a home to go to for the 4 days lockdown period during Eid. The institute where women studied and men cooked food was going to be closed, so I could not possibly stay there. I took it for granted that I would go to that home, where else. I went to stay with no idea what the festival stood for. I was not young, forty three to be precise, but living alone for a long period having hardly any affinity for festivals, the idea or the relevance did not occur in my blinkered head. I did know it was Bakrid. Living in Kalina, a multi cultural suburb of Mumbai, I would receive siwayiyan in one Eid and biryani in other just like I got sweets in Diwali and cakes in Christmas from well wishing neighbours. Everyone in that Lahore home was giving a different reason for not getting a goat for qurbani that Eid. Eid was on March 17 in Lahore and March 16 in India. The hectic schedule we had followed in the course from day one was taking its toll and I needed a break. I did not have the energy to think neither did I have any inclination to think. I accepted the various versions of not getting a goat at face value and relaxed and rejuvenated in the love of my new found mother. I got Eidi (gifts/cash given as blessings by elders for Eid) from Baba which I still have with me.
This Eid in 2020 I express my gratitude for that home and its people for another Eid in 2000, my thanks for the by-lanes of Lahore, for 12 February celebration of women taking to streets against Marshal law, listening to Abida Parveen in World Sufi conference, the teachers of Asr-IWSL, the sumptuous lunches I had in the homes of my classmates living in and around Lahore, getting to know Bahaar the only non religious festival celebrated by night kite flying and enhancement of my universal citizenship. If there was Eid everyday instead of two in a year for gratitude, that too would not be sufficient to acknowledge the debt of parents. My is paar (this side) parents and us paar ke Mata and Baba are not alive, but I am sure they will understand that I do not have it in me to acknowledge what they gave me as parents.
https://www.drikpanchang.com/calendars/indian/muslim-festivals/bakrid/eid-al-adha-date-time.html?year 24.05.2020/11.14 a.m.
https://www.drikpanchang.com/calendars/indian/muslim-festivals/eid-al-fitr/eid-al-fitr-date-time.html?year=2000 24.05.2020/11.16 a.m.
https://www.luckky.online/2020/05/facts-about-eid-ul-fitr-know-why-eid-is.html 24.05.2020/ 02.16 p.m.
https://www.facebook.com/asr.iwsl the facebook page did not exist then!
