The atmosphere began to change with the Muslim demand for a separate state spearheaded by another Gujarati, M.A. Jinnah. Hindu-Muslim riots broke out in many Gujarati towns and cities. When the country was divided, many Gujarati Muslims migrated to Pakistan. The Gandhi-Patel legacy of communal goodwill and harmony was washed away. Among the thousands who migrated from the now Pakistani Sindh was an embittered Advani who made his political base in a constituency of Ahmedabad’s ironically named Gandhinagar. He became an active pracharak of the RSS and the chief propagator of the "show Indian Muslims their place" theory. He was also the principal architect of the destruction of the Babri Masjid in Ayodhya. The seeds of anti-Muslim hatred he sowed bore their poisonous fruit. After the mosque’s destruction came calculated ethnic cleansing in Maharashtra, Gujarat and elsewhere. When some Muslims retaliated as in Bombay with the bomb blasts, they provoked more violence against their community. Then, a compartment of the Sabarmati Express was set on fire, killing over 60 kar sevaks. Since all the victims were Hindus, it was presumed the train was set on fire by Muslims—an assumption that proved to be wrong. A pogrom on Muslims followed in which thousands perished. It had the approval of chief minister Narendra Modi who cited the Newtonian law that every action has a (self-justified) reaction. The spirit of Gandhi died a thousand deaths.
This background is encapsulated in this deeply moving tragedy of what happened to a dargah in the small town of Haripir not far from Ahmedabad. It was founded 700 years ago by an Ismaili Sufi belonging to a sect of assassins who, drugged with hashish, slew their victims; hence the title. Over the centuries it absorbed so much Hinduism that it became hard to tell whether they were Muslims or Hindus. Their names were largely Hindu, like that of the narrator Karsan (from Krishna) Dargawalla, chosen by his father to be his successor. Most of its followers were Hindus. They did not offer namaaz but sang bhajans or ginans in Gujarati. They cremated their dead, then raised graves over their ashes. At this dargah, Pirbaag, mornings began with bhajans, temple bells and the call for prayer from an adjacent mosque. A flame burns apparently on its own (it is secretly fed with ghee). Miracles happen: the sick get healed, barren women conceive, prayers are answered.The dargah’s pir is a scholarly, saintly person married to an unlettered Hindu. Apart from copying old manuscripts, he likes to be massaged by a young Hindu woman—reminiscent of Mirabai ministering to Bapu while Kasturba watched with disapproval. Pir Saheb’s wife explodes with anger and shouts randee—whore! The masseuse never returns.
Karsan is a bright student from a school run by Christian missionaries. He runs into a Jewish chemist’s son who advises him to apply to an American university. He gets admission with full scholarship. He renounces his succession as the head of the dargah, spends four years at Harvard, marries a half-Indian, half-Canadian girl and gets a job as lecturer in a college in Vancouver. Their son gets run over by a car. The marriage breaks up. Events take place at a breathless pace; only the dargah stays where it is. But by the time he returns, flames of hatred consume the dargah. Pir Saheb pleads with his killers in the name of Bhagwan but is slashed into two by a sword. The only one who escapes is the younger son, Mansoor. As one would expect, he turns terrorist.
Karsan assumes the responsibility of keeping the flame alive. He also wants to write a history of his ancestors, and finds himself in the Institute of Advanced Studies in Shimla. Needless to say, his movements are watched by the police. They are searching for his brother, who visits him and disappears into the mountains on his way to Pakistan.
This is a shoddy summary of a novel that I rate among the best I’ve read written by an Indian. It has moving descriptions of nature, ideas on love, lust, death and how to deal with them.
