When Dad walked into a room, he brought with him an air of self-assurance and effectiveness; he projected a sense of ease and poise, which made his presence palpable. The sparkle in his smiling eyes, cheerful and full of mischief and fun, enlivened any gathering he graced. He was aware of his good looks and the attention he drew from people in general (and the opposite sex in particular) as he strode purposefully into a room, exuding strength, nobility and charm in every step he took.
I remember an occasion in Srinagar, when he was, among others, in the company of Mufti Saheb’s daughter, who later, like her father, became the chief minister of Kashmir. She was in her early twenties at the time. If I am not mistaken, she is not a very tall lady and Dad towered over her. She looked up at him adoringly, but he wanted to impress her and the others in the room by appearing even taller. So he balanced himself on a little wooden strip that separated one room from another (as was customary in the wooden houses in Kashmir in those days) and stayed perched on the protruding strip of polished wood for as long as he could.
Dad had a roving eye. He loved the company of good-looking members of the opposite sex and made no bones about it. He thrived on the attention of women and was sorely disappointed if they ignored him. He mentions in his travelogue on Russia that he was quite upset and let down in an Air India flight from Delhi to Moscow in which an exceptionally good-looking air-hostess paid so little attention to him. Her blatant disregard of him and his good looks cast a shadow of petulance on his otherwise cheerful nature.
One seldom found Dad sitting in silence for any length of time. He needed people around him and loved to talk and be the centre of attention in any gathering. Voluble and loquacious, he was even garrulous at times. People not only loved to listen to his interesting conversation, but to watch him as they focused on his delivery and emotions. He had a flair for story-telling and loved cracking jokes and narrating humorous and interesting anecdotes, his humour making every story he told memorable. Whenever he began to speak, people were drawn to him like bees were to honey. He was not, like Bhisham-ji, of a contemplative bent of mind.
Unlike Dad, Bhisham-ji was a man of few words. He spoke either in monosyllables or short, pithy sentences. And he always spoke to the point and was not prone to chit-chat. He chose his words carefully and what he said with gravity was full of wisdom. He was an introvert, but goodwill, honesty and simplicity characterized him. Although serious at times, he was never cunning or scheming. Like his older brother, whom I think he hero worshipped to some extent, he was crystal clear, simple and transparent in his thinking and his dealings with others. There was no double talk in his conversation. He was primarily a listener, not a talker, and as he told me once, loved to ‘go deep into life and its manifestations.’
While Dad had a giant ego, Bhisham-ji was a down-to-earth man, almost devoid of ego. He was humble and unassuming, almost self-deprecatory. Many of his friends called him ‘Christ-like.’ In a gathering, if he was called on to say something, he usually spoke softly, succinctly and to the point and then resumed his sphinx-like silence. He never tried to be the centre of attention in a gathering or a party. Instead of trying to shine in a crowd, he kept to himself and made no attempt to impress anyone, least of all the opposite sex. As far as I know, he was a one-woman man and had no eyes for anyone other than Sheila-ji.
Dad’s openness left no room for speculation about his nature. His life was an open book and there was nothing about it that he didn’t or couldn’t share with others. A free-spirited man, he always spoke his mind without any guile or thought about the consequences. In fact, he was almost naïve in his straightforwardness and candour, often confessing things in his writing, which other people would have cringed to reveal to the world. As a friend of mine once said, ‘He never grew up; there was a childlike simplicity about him, an artless innocence about the way he viewed the world.’ That was his great strength—his ability to strip away non-essentials and relish the true essence of all he did; this was the mark of his innate goodness. He derived uncomplicated and unsullied joy from little things, and it was this uncontrived purity and humility and his ‘transparent sincerity’ (as Bhisham-ji calls it) that made him truly great. As Tolstoy said in War and Peace, ‘There is no greatness where there is no simplicity, goodness and truth.’ This is the facet of his personality that was projected strongly on the screen and this is what endeared him to his audience. People have always preferred an extrovert who can speak well, has a magnetic quality and is charismatic to an introvert, who is more given to contemplation over action, who avoids a high-stimulation environment and who doesn’t fight to have his voice heard in a crowd. This was the reason for Dad’s popularity. It was not that these attributes made him a better or worse person than his brother, it’s just that they derived pleasure and fulfilment from different environments and from different degrees of interaction with the outer versus the inner world.
* * *
Anger did not run in the family. Grandpa was a quiet man. I never saw him losing his temper or even raising his voice. I remember an occasion when I lost an aluminium trunk with not only my entire belongings, but those of my cousins as well, on a train journey from Mumbai to Pindi. I racked my brain to try and come up with a strategy to avoid the ‘telling off’ I was bound to get. And sure enough, the family came down hard on me and accused me of gross negligence. I made a philosophical excuse, hoping it would appeal to Grandpa’s sense of humour, and said, ‘It is fate.’ I told him, ‘one cannot challenge fate! It is gone now because it was meant to go and nothing can bring it back. So why get upset? It was written that it should be lost! It is fate!’ Grandpa laughed for a long time after hearing this, repeating what I had said to the others. He found it extremely funny that a boy of my age could be so philosophical about losing something so valuable. His attitude helped to mellow the others and I heaved a sigh of relief at having got away with my carelessness.
I don’t remember anyone raising his or her voice in the entire family. It was considered uncultured and uncouth. I don’t remember the two brothers ever losing their tempers either. Except twice. Dad raised his voice once when during the shooting of Deedar I was made to run around in a storm (which he thought was very callous of the director) and also once when on the very first day of the shooting of a film, he was made to sit all day long without a single shot being taken. He left the set in a huff in the evening without saying goodbye to the unit. And he arrived home livid. His face was red and he was fuming. All he said to Mummy was, ‘Not one shot during the whole day! They made me wait from nine in the morning till six in the evening. If they come looking for me, tell them I am not doing their film.’
Mummy was cool about what had happened. ‘But what if they come and say sorry?’ she said.
His prompt response, ‘Just tell them I am not interested in working in their film!’ But Mummy was not daunted. ‘But what if they say it will incur a huge loss for them because your name has already been announced and it will be impossible for them to replace you without losing valuable days and money?’ Dad became thoughtful. ‘That would hurt the producer, wouldn’t it?’ ‘Yes!’ Mummy said. He was somewhat mollified and said, ‘Then tell them never to keep me waiting for so long again and to phone me up in the morning. Tell them I have a bad headache and have gone to bed.’ Dad’s temper had cooled off as quickly as it had risen.
This was also true of Bhisham-ji. He never raised his voice nor did he ever seem annoyed. Even If he did get annoyed, he just grimaced, looked pensive for a while and then forgot all about it. In all the time I spent with him, I saw him angry only a couple of times.
On one occasion, I was in Delhi during my college days and was riding on the pillion on Bhisham-ji’s Norton’s motorcycle, a heavy five-horse-power machine. A Sardar-ji (Sikh gentleman) with a huge paunch and a dishevelled beard, also riding on a motorcycle, banged into us from behind. Bhisham-ji’s bike skidded and would have toppled over had he not controlled it deftly with his feet. The bike came t
o a precarious halt ten feet away. This left us rattled. Bhisham-ji got off the bike shakily and walked up to the Sardar-ji who hadn’t even bothered to get off his bike. His apparent lack of concern about the serious injuries we could have sustained if the bike had toppled over enraged Bhisham-ji. The Sardar-ji was cool and calm and this infuriated Bhisham-ji even further. He had just started to say, ‘Tussi . . .’ (You . . .) when the culprit let forth a loud invective, ‘Tussi vekh ke chalaya karo bhaisahab! Zara dekh ke chalao! Main dig painda te kee honda?’ (You should ride carefully. Look where you are going! If I had fallen off I might have got seriously hurt.) The man did not pause for a second, but had the gall to continue with his tirade. This enraged Bhisham-ji even more, but all he could blurt out, his lips quivering, was, ‘Tussi . . .’ The conversation between them was mostly one-sided:
Sardar-ji: “Vekh ke nahin chalande?’ (Don’t you see where you are going?)
Bhisham-ji: ‘Tussi . . .’
Sardar-ji: ‘Changga bhala chala riya see. Tussi turn maar ke thhok ditta!’ (‘I was riding along smoothly and suddenly you took a sharp turn and banged into me!’)
The Sardar-ji was unstoppable and went on shouting, accusing Bhisham-ji of reckless driving, whereas the case was just the opposite. Bhisham-ji tried to tell the man that he was talking through his hat (turban!) but all he could utter was ‘Tussi . . .’ The Sardar-ji spoke so fast and so loudly that Bhisham-ji couldn’t get a word in sideways. Ultimately, disgusted at the garrulous Sardar-ji, Bhisham-ji ended the unequal dialogue by yelling out loud, ‘Jao!’ (Go), an order the fellow promptly obeyed, obviously glad that he had got away with no consequences for his erratic riding.
Another time when I was living with him in Patel Nagar, I noticed a strange patch on a wall of the drawing room. I asked Sheila-ji how the patch got there and she said, ‘I said something inadvertently while he was writing. It disturbed him. So he threw a banana at the wall to cool off. The banana was ruined, completely flattened!’ She didn’t say anything more. It seemed that throwing the banana at the wall had cooled off Bhisham-ji instantaneously.
Psychologists claim that anger is not always a bad thing; it provides a means for expressing negative thoughts and emotions. Although it is a raw and corrosive emotion that can often turn into aggressive and socially unacceptable behaviour, in a controlled manner, it can help one find solutions to problems. Unexpressed anger can fester in one’s mind and become a cankerous sore that can result in explosive bouts of rage. Fortunately, neither Dad nor Bhisham-ji ever let angry thoughts dwell in their minds for long!
With their ability to not let anything ruffle their feathers for too long, they had a stoicism that allowed them to accept calmly whatever transpired, without getting unduly upset or dismayed. For instance, a strange thing happened one day when I was travelling with Dad to Khandala (a nearby hill station) by car during the monsoon season. The way to Khandala Ghat (mountain pass) was via a narrow, steep, treacherous and winding road. Most drivers stopped their vehicles at the base of the climb to cool off their radiators before proceeding up the steep mountainside. This was in the fifties and so the cars were simple and unsophisticated compared to today’s modern cars. So steep and arduous was the climb that quite a few cars would heat up and had to stop by the wayside, their radiators billowing smoke. Added to that, there was a temple on the way where every driver would slow down and throw coins to receive the Goddess’ blessings to reach their destination safely. The resulting congestion and traffic jams caused many accidents. Trucks, in particular, had a tough time going up or coming down the ghat. The engines of their overloaded vehicles screamed and whined and complained vociferously as if in great pain as they climbed up the ghat at snail’s pace. Coming downhill was even more perilous as they inched their way down the hillside in first gear.
Driving conditions on the ghat became worse during the monsoons. There would be incessant rain, and trickling streams and gushing waterfalls cascaded down the porous soil of the picturesque and lush hillsides. Dad prided himself on his driving skills, and although Afzal, our driver, had volunteered to drive up the mountain, Dad asked him to stay put in the back seat. I was sitting next to Dad in the front seat. He was in a hurry to get to Khandala and drove up as fast as he could. We were half way up the mountain (there was not much traffic that day) when he encountered a truck inching its way up ahead of him. He decided to overtake it at high speed, he put the car into second gear and raced the engine. When we were alongside the truck, we saw another truck coming downhill, heading straight at us. Dad was nonplussed. The oncoming truck was almost upon us before he could take some action. But it was too late to hit the brakes. Nor was it possible to overtake the truck next to us. The road was narrow and there was barely enough room for the oncoming truck to pass us. On the downhill side of the road, the incessant rain had created a deep ditch; the truck driver had no choice but to try and pass us, notwithstanding the narrow road. The truck inched its way slowly alongside us, almost grazing our car. We were squeezed in between the two trucks. Dad had brought our car to a halt. And just before the oncoming truck could pass our car, as I stared at it nervously, its tyres skidded into the ditch on the other side and it turned turtle. I had never seen anything like that before. One moment the truck was passing us and the next I was looking at its wheels facing skyward, spinning slowly.
Afzal was panic-stricken and shouted some loud expletives in chaste Arabic that I did not understand. His eyes looked as if they would pop out of their sockets at any moment. ‘Saheb, bhagao gaadi! Bhag niklo yahan se jaldi. Bahut lafda ho gaya. Mar gaya hoga driver. Bahut bada police case ban jayega!’ (Saheb, step on the gas! Quickly! Let us get out of here. This is horrible. The driver must surely have died. This will become a police case), he shouted.
But instead of speeding away from the scene, Dad stopped the car, opened the door and got out. ‘What are you saying Afzal?’ he said. ‘I am the guilty party. I can’t run away and leave these men injured or dead.’
I was too frightened and confused to say anything. I had never been witness to such an accident before and I was sure there would be a big scandal. I followed Dad out of the car and made for the overturned truck. But before he had taken two or three steps, the upside-down door of the truck opened and a hefty and bulky middle-aged Sardar-ji tumbled out and came straight for Dad. For a fleeting moment, I was reassured that he was not injured, but then the thought struck me that he was going to hit Dad and make mincemeat out of him for his careless driving. I looked at Dad, but he was walking towards the upturned truck, calm and composed, seemingly resigned to whatever would happen. As we got closer to each other, I was shocked to see a broad smile on the Sardar-ji’s face.
‘It’s our own Sahni Saheb!’ the Sardar-ji exclaimed. He greeted Dad with, ‘Janab, Sat Sri Akal! Wahe Guru, Wahe Guru! This is a great day. I should have stopped my truck, Saheb. But when I saw you in the driver’s seat I was thrilled and couldn’t take my eyes off you. I didn’t notice the ditch on the left side of the road. Wahe Guru, Wahe Guru! Saheb, this is a great day!’ Dad hugged the driver and asked him if he was all right. The Sikh said he was and so was his passenger, a young lad who got out of the other side of the truck and walked up to us. Dad offered the Sardar-ji some money, but he turned it down. ‘What about the truck?’ Dad asked.
‘That is not our problem, sir. The company will send a crane to pull it out of the ditch. Don’t worry. But we have a request.’ ‘Yes, please tell me what I can do for you’, Dad asked him.
‘We must celebrate! Please have a drink with us. I am sorry for asking you to share a bottle of rum with us. But it would be a great honour for us!’
Dad laughed. The Sardar-ji brought out glasses and placed them on the bonnet of the car. He then poured out the drinks. Dad had a couple of drinks with him and shared his sandwiches, wrapped in an old newspaper. The driver offered me a sandwich too, but I declined, unable to bear the idea of eating something from a newspaper! ‘This is a story people in our villag
e will love to hear again and again. Eh din sadde waste bada mubarak din hai! (Meeting you on the way and having a drink with you!) Sir, this is a blessed day for us!’
Afzal and I were quite rattled by the turn of events. But Dad was stoic and cool as a cucumber! It was sheer luck that the truck driver turned out to be his fan, otherwise the consequences could have been drastic.
I think the two brothers inherited this quality of stoicism from their father; he too never lost his cool. Stoicism is a philosophy that believes that we can only control our responses to external events, not the events themselves. Stemming from a belief in the strength inherent in restraint, compassion and humility, it promotes action over endless rhetoric and debate. This philosophy was ideally suited to the two brothers, but Grandpa had these qualities as well.
One night, in Patel Nagar in Delhi, I remember Grandpa started bleeding from the nose. It wasn’t just a light nose-bleed that I had seen people have every now and then; this was a massive torrent of blood that seemed to gush unendingly from Grandpa’s nose. Before long, a pool of blood covered almost half of the cemented floor of the room. Bhisham-ji was alarmed and was quick to run to the Sardar-ji doctor around the corner and bring him back in a jiffy. I remember the doctor stuffing huge amounts of gauze and cotton-wool in Grandpa’s nose to stop the bleeding, which made his nose look monstrously big. It must have been painful to have so much gauze and cotton-wool up his nose, distending it to six or seven times its actual size, but Grandpa sat through the procedure without flinching. We were all alarmed at the amount of blood he had lost. However, if the doctor was to be believed, the bleeding had actually saved Grandpa’s life because if the blood had not found an outlet through the nose Grandpa might have bled internally, and that he said, could have resulted in paralysis or something worse. I remember Bhisham-ji and Sheila-ji took hours to clean up the blood on the floor as Grandpa sat cross-legged on the bed, unperturbed and unflappable, looking like an alien from outer space.
The Non-Conformist Page 9