Partition recalled: 'Couldn’t live in a country meant for just one religion'

ALIGARH: Riaz-ur-Rehman Sherwani, 93, retired professor of Arabic who taught at Aligarh Muslim University and later at Kashmir University before retiring, is eyewitness to the tumultuous events in the subcontinent during the freedom struggle and Partition. On India’s 69th Independence Day, he looks back at what he experienced, and the biggest feeling he has is one of relief, because, a series of events caused him to be stuck in Pakistan for two years until he could return to a country he preferred to live in.
"Around Partition, my brother, sister and I were in Kasauli, Shimla, then in Punjab.I was a masters student here in Aligarh. My sister was being treated for TB in the hills. We were stuck. We couldn’t return to Delhi or Aligarh and had to cross over to Pakistan, with only a little money,” Sherwani says, talking to TOI at his home here.
On their way to Pakistan they spent 9 days at Kalka Refugee Camp, starting August 15. “It was tough, raining heavily and the shed was provided to sick, women and children, while young and healthy sought shelter under a tree. There was scarcity of water and we could wash our face only once in a day, we were provided with ration but we never had any way to cook in the rainfall. At that time some people brought food for us but we declined thinking it would be poisoned. But hunger is such a thing that people later ate it, and it was not poisoned,” he said.
Later, they got into a coach for refugees guarded by Gurkhas and finally reached Lahore. Sherwani had no idea he would be stuck there for a long time. His sister died in January 1948. After that, Sherwani’s father, Obaid-ur-Rehman, who was a member of the UP legislative assembly, made efforts to get his sons back. By then Sherwani had taken a good look at the new country that was being given shape and didn’t like what he saw. “The government gave us a place to stay because my family back here was influential, but I did not want to stay in a country which was dominated by a single religious identity. I wanted to come back to the plurality of India,” he says. He was living in the house of some "Kapoor's" at Waris Road, Lahore' - "They had many books, liquor and lots of photographs - it appeared they went for picnics very often," he said.
And to carry on with his education in the meanwhile, he took admission at Oriental College, Lahore. “I found the new nation to be in disarray. People were not welcoming towards migrants except those from Punjab. They only behaved a little better with me when they found out I was there temporarily,” the retired professor adds. The migrant experience was significant. “Those who went from India to Pakistan were called 'Mohajir' and were distinct in appearance and culture. Those who went to India were quickly assimilated,” he points out. In March 1949, his family arranged for a flight to bring him back.
As the nonagenarian looks back on the decades after Independence, he feels the new country whose birth he witnessed squandered a lot of opportunities to make the right choice. “Jinnah and Liaquat Ali Khan both used to stay at my family’s house here, Habib Manzil, when they visited Aligarh. In the 10 years before Partition, anything to do with Muslims was controlled by the Muslim League including Anjuman-e-Taraqqi-e-Urdu. Jinnah didn’t return here after 1944,” he recalls. “But by the time of Independence, Jinnah was a spent force and Liaquat Ali Khan framed all the new country’s policies. I have always wondered since about the people there. How is it that they never came out in support of democratic leaders and principles? Even today, they only say that the army will do everything,” he added, with a shake of his head.