But the most distressing part of the camp was the ‘acute shortage of water-supply and appallingly insanitary conditions.’24 In one instance, one tap had to be shared by at least 250 persons. The common water tap was the location and cause of numerous fights, if anyone attempted to jump the queue and tried to fill their water pot first. Consequently, containers of a uniform size and number were introduced, so as to ensure equitable distribution. Filling water was more often than not assigned to women, and the water tap became the venue for socialisation and gossip.
During the summer, the water supply – which was only provided for six hours in the day – would dwindle to a trickle and it would take five minutes to fill a single bucket of water. As a result, many Sindhis took to washing their clothes in the nearby rivers, Ulhas and Waldhuni.
The camp did have some wells, but they were dry in the summer. Some of these had no boundary walls, and were level with the ground. Given the frequency of power cuts, it was easy to fall into the wells at night.
The toilets in the camp were in an appalling condition. One latrine was available for 10 to 20 families, while some barracks had no latrine at all. More than two-thirds of the camp bathrooms were in a dilapidated condition, with crumbling walls, tileless roofs, and broken drains. Several toilets did not have doors, and persons using them were obliged to open umbrellas to obtain some degree of privacy.
Due to the shortage of water supply, the septic tanks were unable to function properly. Sometimes, their metal lids were stolen and sold by the impoverished refugees. These open tanks gave off a foul stench, as did the open drains all around the camp, which overflowed during the monsoons – these served as breeding grounds for mosquitoes and diseases.
Large field rats were to be seen in abundance in Kalyan camp and, according to Vakil and Cabinetmaker, they were so big and ferocious that cats ran away from them instead of hunting them. Poisonous snakes were plentiful there, as also pigs.
Kalyan camp was three miles away from Kalyan railway station. The closest station was at James Siding, now known as Vithalwadi. (The Ulhasnagar railway station came up only in 1956.) Transport was a huge problem. Over time, bus services between the camp and the station and between various parts of the camp came to be organised by the refugees themselves. However, the buses were old and ramshackle, and the roads – full of potholes, stones and litter – were difficult to negotiate. Moreover, the buses would often wait for passengers at various halts, thus contributing to long delays. Sometimes it took an hour to travel 10 miles. Those Sindhis who commuted daily into Bombay city for education or for work were even more affected; they had to wake up extremely early in order to queue for the bathroom and the toilet, and given the arduous commute, they were fatigued by the time they returned home.
The stress of living in the camp, the poor quality of food, the unhygienic surroundings, and the commute to and from the city took a heavy toll on the health of many Sindhis living in Kalyan. They fell prey to a number of diseases, such as scabies, tuberculosis (TB), dysentery, diarrhoea and night-blindness.
TB was especially rampant. The Government Central Hospital in the camp had a TB ward with 109 patients when Vakil and Cabinetmaker visited it – inadequate for all the TB patients in the camp. Moreover, the TB ward was directly opposite the maternity ward. After a while, a separating wall was built between the two. But this did not block the breeze which passed from the TB ward towards the maternity area, thus jeopardising the health of newborn babies and their recovering mothers. The hospital itself was understaffed and understocked, with insufficient supplies of medicine and lacked even basic facilities such as X-ray machines or TB laboratories. Over time, homoeopathic and ayurvedic dispensaries were opened, some by Sindhi refugees, and some by Sindhis who had been previously settled in Bombay.
With the passage of time, the Sindhis, who are enterprising and fond of the good life, tried to improve living conditions. By 1952, the camp had grown to accommodate three cinemas and one public library; there were sweet shops, teashops and restaurants as well. There were 125 places of worship and the camp came to be home to three daily newspapers and two weeklies. The Sindhis, essentially a community of traders, had set up an estimated 3,000 shops in Kalyan camp, and several small-scale industries.
Until mid-1949, the refugees lived rent-free and also constructed unauthorised shops and other structures on empty land. On 8 August 1949, C. Rajagopalachari, then the governor-general of India, declared Kalyan camp a township: Ulhasnagar, named after the nearby river Ulhas. Now the refugees were asked to pay rent for their tenements.
Yet, even after 1949, Ulhasnagar remained essentially a camp and was run by an administrative officer, assisted by three camp commanders (who were in charge of three sub-townships). The administrative officer was in charge of considering loan applications, registering shops and industries in the camp, providing maintenance allowance to those refugees who owned urban property in Sindh (and were solely dependent on rent from such property, pending settlement of claims with the government of Pakistan), considering claims for cash doles, allocating tenements, collecting rent, and considering property claims. Most significantly, the administrative officer was also in charge of issuing ration cards, which essentially determined who could or could not be a legal resident of Ulhasnagar.
As the Sindhis began to grow roots, they also began to illegally appropriate plots in the camp for themselves, and to illegally expand their section of the barracks. This became a source of friction among their neighbours, not to mention with the local authorities. In Ulhasnagar, even today, FSI25 violations continue to be a thorny issue with the state.
Other Refugee Camps
The abysmal condition of Kalyan camp in the early years was not unique: It was common to other camps for Partition refugees all over India and Pakistan.26 The narratives of Sindhi refugees in Dhulia, Mahgaon, and Pimpri – to name just a few camps – all recount gunny-sack walls, hearths improvised with a brick or two, arduous commutes and an overwhelming sense of privation. But, as in Kalyan camp, what the Sindhi refugees abhorred the most were the sanitary arrangements.
Janki Lalvani, a young Sindhi woman who had migrated to Bombay from Karachi, came to live for a short while in Chembur camp with her family. She recollects:
My overwhelming memory of the camp is of the toilets. They were indescribable; the overpowering smell… We only went to the toilet when we could put it off no longer, under utter desperation. There was squalor everywhere but at least the constant fear for our lives had disappeared.27
The refugee camps were sites of several thefts, with Sindhis stealing from other Sindhis. They were also the sites of many arguments and brawls: people fighting for water or toilets, or clashing over barrack space or later, appropriating empty plots in the camp. Sometimes, in camps in Mahgaon and Ahmedabad, the refugees gave vent to their dissatisfaction by accosting camp officials (several of whom were corrupt), and had to be restrained from violence.
Sardar Nihalsingh, who continues to live in the same barracks in Kalyan camp, recalls laughingly the aggressiveness of the Sindhi Sikhs. He tells us that if there were fights in other parts of the camp, very often the Sindhi Hindus would call upon the Sindhi Sikhs to protect them or to settle the fight on their behalf. According to him, the Sikhs were often aggressive enough to bully the Hindus, throw their pots aside, and jump the queue to fill water:
The strongest person would win. He would get preference to fill water. The vanias used to say, ‘The Sikhs have dangerous tempers, they will beat us up.’ Later, gradually, we came to know one another, and love one another, and we stopped bullying each other.
At that point though, might was right. If one family had four or five strong brothers, it ruled like kings. We too came to occupy empty plots by relying on the sheer number of male members in our family and our combined muscle power. Neither the police nor the government could do anything. Whoever had strength, had everything.28
There were other sources of inter-personal con
flict among the Sindhis in camps. The Amils, the professionals, felt uncomfortable living so close to the Bhaibands, the traders, whom they considered ‘boorish country yokels’. The Bhaibands, on the other hand, found the Amils ‘“foreign” in their ways, and an irreligious, inconsiderate, selfish lot at that, who neglected their kith and kin.’29 Even among the Bhaibands, those of a higher class looked down on those lower down on the social ladder.
There were also instances where the Sindhi refugees clashed with refugees of other ethnicities, and these degenerated into violence or illegalities. In March 1948 the Central Provinces government noted that it was not possible to rehabilitate refugees from Sindh and Punjab in the same camp, as they did not get on well together.
The government appointed officials, from among the refugees themselves, to administer the camps and to attend to various other duties, such as escorting the refugees from the docks to the transit camps, or from the transit camps to other camps. Unfortunately, several of these officials were not necessarily qualified for their jobs. Furthermore, some proved to be corrupt, with bribes being demanded for the performance of regular duties.
A case in point was the distribution of provisions. Initially, the Sindhi refugees – soon after they arrived in the camps – were provided with free rations by various officials, regardless of their economic status. This included cereal, cooking oil or ghee, spices, fuel for cooking and lighting, milk and milk powder, and vitamin tablets. Sometimes cooking vessels and clothes were also distributed. However, these supplies were often commandeered by black-marketeers (who were in league with the camp officials who received kickbacks), or by the camp officials themselves. The refugees either received adulterated or diminished rations, or in some cases were made to make partial payment for rations that were meant to be free.30
In 1949, the Government of India began to stop these free rations in some camps. Kalyan was the last camp to stop doles, which meant that indigent refugees from other camps migrated to Kalyan. But in August 1949, free rations were stopped in Kalyan camp too. Only certain categories of persons – including widows, senior citizens, invalids, the physically challenged, and orphans under the age of 16 – remained entitled to free rations.31
Corruption existed at other levels too. In the camps, it was often found that Sindhi refugees banded together on the basis of regional affinities. Panchayats based on the town of origin were formed, such as Sukkur panchayat or Sehwani panchayat. According to Vakil and Cabinetmaker, a panchayat would form a ‘common pool’ to help the members at times of marriages and deaths. It would also provide cooking utensils and other requirements for hosting large numbers of guests.32
The mukhis or headmen of these panchayats came to acquire disproportionate power and influence over their fellow refugees, since the government found it convenient to deal with them directly, as representatives of the migrants. Vakil and Cabinetmaker report:
Consequently, the elders or the mukhis of these punchayats wield considerable influence and they have to be listened to. All the interviewees who are in arrears of rent payment [to the government] stated that they were obeying the orders of the mukhis. The punchayat members are afraid of them and keep them pleased with gifts of money which is the main source of income of the mukhis. They are useful in obtaining favours from the Government such as sanction for loan, getting a ‘permanent’ ration card which entitles the holder to accommodation in the camp etc. This is possible because the mukhis have influence with some of the officers in the camp. These officers are themselves D.P.s [Displaced Persons] from Sindh. We witnessed shady transactions passing between an officer and a mukhi in connection with a ‘temporary’ ration card. Such irregularities add to tensions.
[…] The mukhis exploit their power to exact sums of money from those whose interests are involved. Those who fail to do so are harassed and made to suffer indignities. The lack of integrity on the part of the mukhis, who themselves are D.P.s, creates friction between the Government authorities and the D.P.s.33
This lack of integrity found in the Sindhi officials and mukhis engendered high levels of resentment, bitterness and distrust among the other refugees.
While many Sindhis living in refugee camps moved out to regular accommodation in the nearest city as soon as they could afford to, Vakil and Cabinetmaker also report that they came across Sindhis who had the means to afford a flat in Bombay city, but still preferred to live in the camp because they wanted to be close to their fellow Sindhis.34
While several Sindhi refugee camps were wound up, many went on to become permanent colonies – such as the camps in Kalyan, Sion, Chembur, Mulund and Thane in Bombay, Kubernagar in Ahmedabad, Pimpri in Poona, Bairagarh in Bhopal – which are known today for their predominantly Sindhi population. However, with the passage of time, other communities have also begun to live in these locales.
Families Splinter
Many Sindhi families physically splintered in the aftermath of Partition. In many cases, the father and/or the elder sons of the family stayed behind in Sindh to safeguard the family property, while the female members were sent to India. Even after the entire family came to India, there were numerous instances where the mother and the children were in one city, while the father sought to establish a livelihood elsewhere. In some cases, some families were too large to be accommodated in temporary housing together. Sometimes, family members simply drifted apart.
The writer, Motilal Jotwani, recounts in his autobiography that his maternal aunt decided that she would live in Anandpur, while her husband and children resettled in Delhi. His father’s joint family was also fractured, with one paternal uncle in Varanasi and the other in Bombay. Motilal Jotwani’s father chose to settle in Delhi.35
The splintering of families was not always only physical. Living under enormous stress in conditions of crowding and scarcity, unexpected rifts also emerged in families. Mohan Makhijani, the Port Trust employee who had sailed away one day from Karachi on the spur of the moment with just the clothes on his back, went to Delhi to look for a job. Here he recounts his initial days in Delhi’s winter, of how he was given the cold shoulder by relatives and friends.
I reached Delhi on 6 February 1948. It was as cold as hell. I took my trunk and all my other belongings.
In the meantime, my mother had written a letter to her first cousin, my uncle in Delhi. (My uncle’s father was my grandfather’s elder brother.) They had settled in Delhi well before Partition, and I expected to stay with them.
In those days it was customary to just write a letter, and arrive as a guest. Besides, the relatives we were seeking accommodation with had stayed with us in Karachi by the dozens.
When I reached my uncle’s, I found the whole family very cold. My cousin said, ‘Sit, sit, sit. Dad has gone to the bathroom.’
I was puzzled, but I sat down anyway.
My uncle emerged. He had come prepared with an answer. He said, ‘Look, I am sorry, but you can’t stay here. My mother is staying with me.’
I wanted to tell him, ‘Your mother is almost like my grandmother.’ But I bit my tongue.
My uncle continued, ‘I think you will have go to a hotel.’
Now I got the shock of my life. I should go to a hotel? I had never stayed in a hotel before!
‘Which hotel?’ I asked.
‘There are many hotels near the railway station.’
‘Okay,’ I muttered.
I knew that they were thinking – that if you house a refugee, he will stay permanently. He won’t leave. He won’t have any money. And you’ll have to feed him.
I had not faced a situation of this nature before. I was really shocked. What was I to do? My uncle had left the room. I admitted to his son, ‘I don’t know anything about hotels here.’
His son said, ‘Just near the railway station. Prince Hotel, on the first floor.’
With that, I walked off. I asked them to store my luggage for a bit and just left. My uncle had gone to make me tea, he wanted to offer me refreshments.
But I didn’t feel like eating.
I walked to Prince Hotel. I rented a room, I think it cost me nine rupees per day. I hired a tonga and went back to collect my baggage.
‘Why are you being a fool?’ my uncle asked, when I returned. ‘Have some breakfast. You didn’t have to leave like that!’
I said, ‘If I have to go, I’ll go now.’
My uncle didn’t stop me.
I checked into Prince Hotel and immediately started looking for a job. I had a friend from the Karachi Port Trust, Parso Shivdasani. At that time, he was the deputy general manager of BEST. He had given me two or three letters of introduction. My relative, Taro Malkani, who was an executive engineer, had also given me three letters. I went to Delhi Cloth Mills and several other places, I walked the whole day, got onto a tram and travelled. Everybody said, ‘You leave the letter of introduction behind, we’ll see what we can do.’
Then I went to visit L. G. Mirchandani.* I had secured a first class in his course in Gas Warfare in Hyderabad (Deccan) in 1942, during the war. I thought he would consider helping me. I sent a slip to his office. He wrote back, ‘At my bungalow, one pm.’ I asked several people where his bungalow was. ‘Somewhere on Bhandara Road’ was all the information I could get.
You know, one gets lost in Delhi, with all those circles and roundabouts. Nevertheless, with the meagre directions I had, I managed to reach his residence at one o’clock. He didn’t even ask me inside. He stood within, I stood outside. He said, ‘Everyone is looking for a job. You give my name as a reference.’ He was nobody. He was an assistant secretary, a nobody. Nothing came of the visit.36
Many Sindhis who lived with their relatives settled in India before Partition also recall that, at some point, they felt that they had overstayed their welcome. Typical of the ‘common cycle which the relationships between survivors and non-victim benefactors follow’, the host families in Bombay would accord a warm welcome to the refugees in the initial days. The warmth of this welcome would soon be replaced by escalating friction and tension experienced through a trial-and-error effort at adjustment.37
THE MAKING OF EXILE Page 26