Cracking India by Bapsi Sidhwa Read Free Book Online Page A

pauses, dramatically, and my loafing mind becomes attentive. The pause, shrewdly timed to permit just that tiny license so dear to a Parsee audience, is snapped up. “Who does this Gandhi think he is?” shouts an obliging wag promptly from somewhere in the middle. “Is it his grandfather’s ocean?”
    Colonel Bharucha, smiling amiably, explains that the British government is charging an unfair salt tax and, as a protest, we should not buy it. Gandhijee plans to walk a hundred miles to the ocean to make salt for us. He is even prepared to go to jail to make his point!
    â€œAnd what do we do while he’s in jail? Walk around with goiters for lack of salt?” shouts the wag.

    â€œGo to jail for us!” snorts Dr. Manek Mody. (He is Godmother’s brother-in-law, and is here on one of his periodic visits from Rawalpindi.) “Big deal!” he booms. “There’s such a demand for A-class in jails that there’s no room left for folk like us!”
    (Even though I cannot see him I can tell it’s Dr. Mody by the amazing volume of his voice. He is a short, chubby man, with a totally bald and brown head.)
    â€œYes,” chimes in the first wag. “The Congress gangsters provoke the police and get rewarded with free board and lodging. It’s a shame! I propose that the Parsee Anjuman lodge a formal protest with the Inspector General of Police. Why should we be left out of everything?”
    â€œHear! Hear!” agrees the congregation, and thumps the armrests of its chairs and wooden benches.
    â€œLet us march to jail now!” the wag says, jumping to his feet. He is a paunchy man with very dark skin.
    Colonel Bharucha raises a restraining hand. “No doubt the men in jail are acquiring political glory... But this shortcut to fame and fortune is not for us. It is no longer just a struggle for Home Rule. It is a struggle for power. Who’s going to rule once we get Swaraj? Not you,” says the colonel, pointing a long and accusing finger at us as if we are harboring sinful thoughts. “Hindus, Muslims and even the Sikhs are going to jockey for power: and if you jokers jump into the middle you’ll be mangled into chutney!”
    Wise heads nod—Godmother’s, Electric-aunt’s, Slavesister’s—although Slavesister’s can hardly be called wise.
    â€œI hope no Lahore Parsee will be stupid enough to court trouble,” continues the colonel. “I strongly advise all of you to stay at home—and out of trouble.”
    â€œI don’t see how we can remain uninvolved,” says Dr. Mody, whose voice, without aid of mike, is louder than the colonel’s. “Our neighbors will think we are betraying them and siding with the English.”
    â€œWhich of your neighbors are you not going to betray?” asks a practical soul with an impatient voice. “Hindu? Muslim? Sikh?”

    â€œThat depends on who’s winning, doesn’t it?” says Mr. Bankwalla. “Don’t forget, we are to run with the hounds and hunt with the hare.”
    â€œNo one knows which way the wind will blow,” thunders the colonel, silencing everyone with his admirable rhetoric. “There may be not one but two—or even three—new nations! And the Parsees might find themselves championing the wrong side if they don’t look before they leap!”
    â€œDoes it matter where they look or where they leap?” enquires the impatient voice. “If we’re stuck with the Hindus they’ll swipe our businesses from under our noses and sell our grandfathers in the bargain: if we’re stuck with the Muslims they’ll convert us by the sword! And God help us if we’re stuck with the Sikhs!”
    â€œWhy? Which mad dog bit the Sikhs? Why are you so against them?” says Dr. Mody contentiously.
    â€œI have something against everybody,” declares the voice, impartial and very hurt.
    â€œOrder!