German Mian felt alert and ready. He realized he would become a participant in this partition, a process of endless partition, which could not be stopped. He rose from his bed for a drink of water to soothe his parched throat and thought about how the water here had a very bad taste. It was then that he decided to move to Pakistan.
The next morning German Mian felt ill. He could no longer suppress the story of his dream of the previous night. No sooner did the saga of the dream become known than there was mayhem at home. German Mian’s elder brother decided to take him to Shah Rustam’s shrine in Salar.
Rustam’s shrine was exceptionally potent, and unless German Mian was taken there his fate would always hold nightmares for him. Accordingly, an awning was strung up on an ox-cart and a thick mattress was laid out on it. German Mian was a man of luxury, so it was decided that a radio would also be taken along. If they left very early in the morning, they would reach Salar in four hours. A lantern was hung beneath the cart to dispel the darkness of the night. Tentuli was at the helm, steering the ox cart.
As they were passing Palsha on their way to Daskamalgram, they saw a strange sight. A body lay in front of a primary school made of earth, with a thatched roof. The face wasn’t clear in the half darkness, but German Mian had no doubt it was a woman’s body. Tentuli was asked to turn the cart around. ‘No, we cannot go back,’ declared Mejo Mian. ‘Drive straight to Salar, Tentuli.’ German Mian was not accustomed to defying his elder brother. Half-sitting, half-lying under the awning, he busied himself with reconstructing the face of the corpse. In his head he recited the Ayatul Kursi, the throne verse of the Quran which emphasized Allah’s power over the universe. This would make the devil flee from his presence. He also knew that there was no alternative to the Ayatul Kursi to rid himself of the agony of leaving the safe haven of his home, his Al-makam-al-amin that was tearing his heart apart. Even as he reconstructed the face, he recited softly,
‘Allah is the immortal eternal entity who holds the entire world firmly in his grip. There is no god but him. He does not sleep and slumber cannot touch him. Everything on earth and in the sky belongs to him. No one can make a recommendation in his court without his permission. He knows all that is known to man, and all that is unknown to man is not unknown to him. What he knows lies beyond the limits of human knowledge. It is a different matter if he wishes to teach any of this to mankind. His kingdom encompasses the earth and the sky. Looking after all this does not exhaust him. In truth he is a noble entity, the finest.’
German Mian fell asleep reciting the Ayatul Kursi and reconstructing the face of the dead woman. When you go to sleep after reading this verse, Allah sends an angel your way. The angel would guard German Mian until he woke up. Therefore, there were six creatures on or near the cart now – Anwar Mian, German Mian, Tentuli, the angel, and two black oxen. The last two were only slightly visible in the dark and Tentuli kept up the occasional banter with them. Anwar Mian wondered about the woman. Who had killed her and left her here? How would she be buried? Inna lillahe wa inna elaihe rajeoon. We belong to Allah and to him we shall return.
Only the angel put all thoughts aside and accompanied the cart like a guard, sometimes perched on the awning, sometimes whirling around the lantern beneath the cart. Not even daybreak brought him relief – he would be done only when German Mian awoke. But this young angel knew that German Mian’s wakefulness was actually another kind of sleep. Just as fate never did hold dreamless sleep for German Mian, he too never entirely left the world of sleep and descended to the real world. Would the angel then have to stay with German Mian till he sank into eternal sleep? He didn’t know. He had no task other than to follow orders. But he quite liked this tall man whom he visited frequently. Although his visits were professional he had his likes and dislikes, even if he wasn’t allowed to express them. The young angel decided to sneak into German Mian’s sleep for a glimpse of the world of his dreams. He discovered that this man’s soul was housed in a place just like Dar-ul-makam, or Home. Offering a mental sajdah to Allahtaala, prostrating himself in his head before Allah, he said: ‘to the one who has made room for us to dwell in his infinite compassion, where there is neither suffering nor fatigue, to Allah I proffer my sajdah.’
— Excerpted with the permission of Hachette Book Publishing India Pvt Ltd
ABOUT THE WRITER
Samim Ahmed writes novels, short stories and non-fiction in Bengali. An assistant professor of philosophy in R.K. Mission Vidyamandir, an autonomous post-graduate college, he is the author of eight published books and a regular contributor in reputed dailies in Bengali and English. Samim was born in 1973 in Birbhum district, West Bengal and grew up in Murshidabad and Kolkata. He lives and writes in Kolkata. Saat Aasman (Seven Heavens) is his first novel.
ABOUT THE BOOK
German Hossain's dreams never seem to leave him in peace.
As India's independence approaches, bringing with it a wrenching partition and the bloodbath of communal riots, German, a resident of Birbhum district in Bengal, sets out for Murshidabad in the hope of curing himself of his dream-sickness and, in his newfound sympathy of the Muslim League, to make his home in a place destined to become part of Pakistan. But when, after a three-day tug-of-war of sorts, the Radcliffe line recommendations deem that Murshidabad be returned to India, German decides to return to his place of birth, still plagued by his dreams and led by them, still in search of his destiny. This is the story of his journeys.
Political, personal and surreal landscapes are intricately woven together in this exquisite novel about djinns and fairies, demonology and Sufism, the partition of a country and, above all, the dreams that make men who they are.
ABOUT THE TRANSLATOR
Arunava Sinha translates classic, modern and contemporary Bengali fiction and non-fiction into English. Over 25 of his translated works have been published so far. He has won the Crossword translation award twice, for Sankar’s Chowringhee (2007) and Anita Agnihotri’s Seventeen (2011), respectively and has been shortlisted for The Independent Foreign Fiction Prize (2009) for his translation of Chowringhee. His translations have been published in the UK and the US in English, and in several European and Asian countries through further translation. He was born and brought up in Kolkata, and lives and writes in New Delhi.