Every thing in the description
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lecture3_crackingindia_3-3-2017_1.pptxBapsi Sidhwa’s Cracking India
1947 Partition
Lecture 2: chapters 9-16
The impact of the trauma from the riots (pp. 148)
I examine the sari-and dhoti-clad Indian dolls…I hold it upside down and pull its pink leg’s apart. The knees and thighs bend unnaturally, but the stitching in the center stays intact.
I hold one leg out to Adi. “Here,” I say, “pull it”
“Pull damn it!,” I scream, so close to hysteria that Adi blaches and hastily gravs the proferred leg...Adi crouches close to me. I can’t bear the disillusioned and contempuous look in his eyes. “Why were you so cruel if you couldn’t stand it?” (148)
Cracking India
“I am a Pakistani. In a snap. Just like that. A new nation is born. India has been divided after all. Did they dig a long, long canal Ayah mentioned? Although it is my birthday no one has time for me. My questions remained unanswered even by Ayah (150)
The new pakistan – incorporation of historical events
“I blow out the candles and cut the squashed cake. And then we sit around the radio listening to the celebrations of the new Nation. Jinnah’s voice, inaugurating the Constituent Assembly sessions on August 11 says, “You are free. You are free to go to your temples. You are free to go to your mosque or any other place of worship in the state of Pakistan. You may belong to any religion or caste or creed, that has nothing to do with the business of State…etc,...etc...etc, Pakistan Zindabad!” (154)
The climax – the breaking of Punjab
IceCandy man comes to an abrupt and jolted halt. He is breathless, reeking of sweat and dust, and his frantic eyes rake the group. They rest for an instant on the Sikh, and flutter back to us. “A train from Gurdaspur has just come in,” he announces, panting. “Everyone in it is dead. Butchered. They are all Muslim. They are no young women among the dead. Only the two gunny-bags full of women’s breasts!” (159)
Ice-Candy Man’s Revenge
“What’s it to you, oye?”…”If you must know, I was. I’ll tell you to your face – I lose my senses when I think of the mutilated bodies on that train from Gurdaspur…that night I went mad, I tell you! I lobbed grenades through the windows of Hindus and Sikhs I’ve known all my life. I hated their guts…I want to kill someone for each one of the breasts they have cut off the Muslim women…the penises” (166)
Ayah and the Masseur
Ayah is crying softly, “I must get out of here.” She says, sniffling and wiping her nose on her sari-blouse sleeve. “I have relatives in Amritsar I can go to.”
“You don’t need to go anywhere, “ says Masseur, so assuredly possessive that I feel a stab of jealousy, “Why do you worry? I’m here. No one will touch a hair on your head. I don’t know why you don’t marry me!” he says, sighing persuasively, “you know I worship you..” (168)
The aftermath of partition
“Instead, wave upon scruffy wave of Muslim refugees flood Lahore – and the Punjab west of Lahore. Within three months, seven million Muslims and five million Hindus and Sikhs are uprooted in the largest and most terrible exchange of population known to history. The Punjab has been divided by the icy card-sharks dealing out the land village by village, city by city, wheeling and dealing and doling out favours.
For now the tide is turned – and the Hindus are being favored over the Muslims by remnants of the Raj. Now that it is objective to divide India is achieved, the British favor Nehru over Jinnah. Nehru is Kashmiri; they grant him Kashmir. Spurning logic, ignoring the consequences of bequeathing a Muslim state to the Hindus, while Jinnah futilely protest: “Statesmen cannot eat their words.”
Statesmen do. (169)
The masseur’s death
Himmat Ali (Hari), too is uneasy. He pulls back saying: “Stay here. There is something on the other side.” By my fear of the wall and my congenital curiosity prevail. It is only a bulging gunny sack. We cross the road.
The swollen gunnysack lies directly in our path. Hari pushes it with his foot. The sack slowly topples over and Masseur spills out – half on the dusty sidewalk, half on the gritty tarmac – dispelling the stiletto reek of violence with the smell of roses.” (185)
Ayah’s Adbuction
Page 191-195
Lenny’s betrayal: “Something strange happened then. The whole disorderly melee dissolved and consolidated into a single face. The face, amber eyed, spread before me: hypnotic, reassuring, blotting out of the ugly frightening crowd. Ice candy’s versatile face transformed into a savior’s in our hour of need (193)
Ice candy man is crouched before me. “Don’t be scared, Lenny baby,” he says. “I’m here.” And putting his arms around me he whispers, so that only I can hear: “I’ll protect Ayah with my life. You know I will…I know she’s here. Where is she?” (194)
Ayah’s Abduction
They drag Ayah out. They drag her by her arms stretched taut, and her bare feet – that want to move backwards –are forced forward instead. Her lips are drawn away from her teeth, and the resisting curve of her throat opens her mouth like the dead child’s screamless mouth…the men drag her in grotesque strides to the cart and their harsh hands, supporting her with careless intimacy…I am the monkey-man’s preforming monkey…the last thing I noticed was Ayah, her mouth slack and piteously gaping her disheveled hair flying into her kidnapper’s faces, staring at us as if she wanted to leave behind her wide-open and terrified eyes. (195)
