The Black Rainbow

by Hussain Zaidi

  Aren’t we hoping against the hope?”

  “Not really,” Dr Junaid replied. “We’ll do what we need to do. If the government of Malik Naseem falls in with us, it’s well and good; if it doesn’t, it shouldn’t matter much. What I gather is that the new government is taking us for granted and when someone takes you for granted, he doesn’t take you seriously. What we should do is to make them take us seriously,” Dr Junaid observed.

  “And someone takes us seriously when they think we can benefit or harm them. So the moment the government feels threatened by us, they’ll take us seriously. I think I’ll talk to the mujahideen for couple of explosions,” Maulvi Zia said. “Simultaneously I’ll ask the White Mosque students to shore up their campaign against evil.”

  “Campaign against evil! What the hell is that?” Dr Junaid asked.

  On this, Maulvi Zia briefed him about the White Mosque students’ campaign, which evoked laughter from Dr Junaid. It’s interesting,” he remarked.

  “Actually, I lost interest in the campaign because of the non-confidence motion against the previous govt. But now I feel we can use it to our advantage,” Maulvi Zia said. “Actually, I don’t want Malik Naseem’s government to fall apart. But I don’t want it to have a smooth sailing either. Eventually, he must turn to us for support and he will,” Maulvi Zia said with a voice choked with emotions.

  “Agreed,” Dr Junaid nodded. “Oh this reminds me of the girl who interviewed you twice on education reforms. Any news of her?”

  “I’m afraid not. Probably she has left for London but she would return in a few months.”

  “You took fancy to her. Didn’t you?” Dr Junaid enquired.

  “Well she is young, hot and beautiful. I’m sure anyone who saw her would’ve a crush on her. I feel sorry for you that you were not here each time she came.”

  “Zia sahib, I guess you are destined to meet and enjoy beautiful women, while I’m fated only to hear the accounts of your exploits,” Dr Junaid remarked in a light vain. “I think I should leave.”

  “Dinner will be served in few minutes. Let’s go to the dining room.”

  Ali was beginning to take interest in Sara. He thought she was the girl he had always aspired for: she had style, beauty and the brains. To add to that, she was the heir to a business empire, though Ali didn’t have much interest in money. The girls that Ali had hitherto come across were either beautiful or intelligent. But none was endowed with both attributes. Farzana was beautiful but she wasn’t intelligent and that was probably the reason that Ali was able to resist her charms.

  However, Ali was by nature shy and indecisive. That is why he was finding it difficult to express his feelings to Sara. He had gone through similar problem in case of Farzana. But there was a clear difference between the two cases. In case of Farzana, he found it difficult to admit to himself that he loved her; while in case of Sara, he had little problem in acknowledging that he was in love with her. There was another difference between the two cases. Whereas Farzana had conveyed her love to Ali one way or the other; he really didn’t know how Sara felt for him or whether she had any tender feelings for him at all. Though Ali was the only male in the entire college with whom Sara was on friendly terms, it was difficult for him to conjecture whether it was mere friendship or something more.

  Being essentially a lonely person, Ali had no friends. In the college, Javed was the only person he occasionally held tête-à-tête. Ali was not used to sharing his feelings with others — even to himself. But now he felt a strong desire to share his feelings for Sara with someone.

  “Who can it be?” he pondered. “Such feelings can be shared only with a friend. But regrettably I have no friend except perhaps Sara. Should I go and open my heart to her? But how would she react? I think the best course for me will be to ascertain how Sara feels for me, because if she has no place for me in her heart then there’s no point in opening my heart to her. But how to ascertain this? Like me Sara is a solitary figure and has no friends. Should I send her an e-mail or text her? But that looks like an immature way of conveying my feelings to a girl as mature as Sara. I should pick up the courage and speak to her. Yes that’s more like a man. What she would do at the most? Snub me and will never speak to me again. This is not a big deal. But it can be worse. She may insult me before the entire class. And if she did so, that would well be my last day in college for I’ll not be able to face my classmates again.”

  While Ali was arguing with himself, he received a text message from Sara requesting him to meet her the next day. Their college had just closed for summer vacation and since then he hadn’t seen or heard from her. So in response to Sara’s message, he replied her that he would meet her at time and place of her convenience.

  “At 4 in the evening at my place, “Sara texted.

  “Ok I’ll go and see her and then decide on the spot whether I should candidly state my feelings to her,” Ali decided.

  Ali had never been to Sara’s home before. In fact, he had met her only couple of times outside the college including once in his father’s office. He was thinking all the time why Sara had invited her. “Maybe she wants me to meet her father. But why she wants so? Does she also think about me the way I think about her? Well this seems to be quite plausible an explanation. But am I not being too optimistic? Maybe there’s nothing special about that. Well, it’ll soon be clear to me,” Ali thought.

  Sara lived in a posh area of the city at a fair distance from Ali’s residence. So he hired a cab and after fifteen minutes’ drive reached the locality. In another a few minutes, he was standing before Sara’s magnificent house. “So it’s here that Sara lives,” Ali was impressed.

  “My name is Ali and I’m here to meet Ms Sara Aqeel,” Ali told the guard standing outside Sara’s bungalow.

  “Yes sir, you can go in,” the guard answered respectfully and opened the gate for him.

  Ali walked past the gate and had hardly covered few paces when he was received by an attendant, who took him to a small but elegantly furnished study.

  “Sir please wait. I’ll inform madam Sara about you,” the attendant told him.

  Ali seated himself on a leather sofa and cast a glance at the study. There were book shelves across the walls. Each shelf carried the title of the subject on which it contained books like philosophy, literature, psychology and reference works. On one side was a computer table carrying Sony’s notebook.

  “So it’s Sara’s study,” Ali guessed. “When will I have such a nice study?” he thought. “But this requires a lot of money, which I may never have.”

  Ali’s thoughts were interrupted by the sweet voice of Sara. “So you have arrived. Thanks for coming.”

  He rose as he saw Sara, who was casually dressed in black trousers and a T-shirt and was looking younger and paler than she usually appeared. Ali wanted to acknowledge her thanks but could not.

  “I’m sorry I called you here in this manner. Actually I’m not feeling well — just slight fever,” Sara explained.

  “It’s all right,” Ali said with a smile. He wanted to add that he himself was desperate to see her but could not.

  “Oh forgive me. What would you like to have?” Sara asked.

  “I think tea will do,” Ali replied and Sara ordered tea on the intercom.

  “Have you taken some medicine?” Ali asked.

  Sara replied in the affirmative.

  Ali was desperate to know why Sara had called her but was reluctant to ask.

  “Nice study,” Ali remarked for want of saying something else.

  “Yes thanks,” Sara nodded. “Reading, along with web surfing is my favorite pastime. I have a very good collection of books --- original works of Plato and Marx, Shakespeare and Shaw. But I warn you, I don’t believe in lending books. But of course you are an exception. If you need any book, you can borrow it from me.”

  “Thanks for this gracious offer and I’ll certainly draw upon your generosity,” Ali said. “How is your father?”

&n
bsp; “He’s fine. But he is off to Karachi for a business meeting, otherwise I would have introduced you to him. Some other time maybe,” Sara replied. “You must be interested in knowing why I called you here. The thing is…” At that moment, there was a slight knock at the door and a servant entered with tea and cookies.

  “You can go,” Sara said as he put the tea on the table. “And please I’m not to be disturbed.”

  The servant nodded respectfully and left.

  “There are couple of things I wanted to discuss with you, “Sara said as she made tea for both.”

  Ali listened attentively and thanked Sara as she handed him his cup of tea.

  “First any news about the links between my father and Maulvi Zia,” Sara enquired.

  “I’m afraid not,” Ali replied rather apologetically. “If there was any, father would have told me.”

  “Ok. “But just ask uncle Naqvi once more.”

  “I’ll,” Ali assured.

  “Now there’s something more important. I have been proposed by a business friend of Papa. Of course he has always left it to me to decide about my future. But I want your advice,” Sara disclosed.

  “My advice!” Ali exclaimed. “How can I possibly advise you? I mean who I’m to advise you in such an important decision of your life?”

  “Ali you are very special to me. Don’t you think so?” Sara remarked and took Ali’s hand.

  “Really,” Ali spoke in disbelief. “Am I so important for you?”

  “Yes you are. If you have any doubt, just look into my eyes, as eyes are the index of the heart”

  Ali looked into Sara’s deep eyes and what he saw there convinced him that he had a special place in her heart. “I love you Sara,” he remarked.

  “I love you too,” Sara reciprocated.

  The next moment they were in each other’s arms. Ali could feel the beat of Sara’s heart and the soft pressure of her big breasts. He did not believe that things would take that turn.

  “What are you thinking about?” Sara asked and Ali was back to the real time and found himself sitting before Sara.

  “So it was my fancy,” he said to himself.

  “Ali are you ok?” Sara asked.

  “Yes I’m,” he replied abstractly.

  “Ok. I wanted to discuss with you the topic for my research paper,” Sara told him. “I have a few topics in my find. Have you decided yours?”

  “No, I’m afraid I haven’t.” Ali was still between the two worlds.

  “Then you should think about one. We need to make some headway during summer vacation.”

  “Yes I’ll do,” Ali replied abstractly.

  You must share your thoughts with me. But first see what I have in mind. There are four topics. One is ‘critique of dialectical materialism’, the second is ‘the post modern state,’ the third is ‘the problem of freewill and determinism,’ and the fourth is Nietzsche’s view of trans-valuation of values’. What do you suggest?“ Sara asked.

  “All the four topics are interesting. Have you any preference among them?”

  “Not really. In fact, if I had preference for any of them, it would have been an easier decision. As you know, studies are not for me a means of getting a job but an instrument of understanding. So whatever research topic I choose, I’ll go to the bottom even if I don’t get a good grade for that,” Sara remarked rather proudly.

  Ali felt embarrassed at Sara’s reference to studies and job. “Yes you are right, studies become delightful when they are done for their own sake. But everyone is not fortunate like you. Most of us have to study for a job.”

  “I’m sorry I didn’t mean it. But you must advise me.”

  “Ok. I’m myself interested in the problem of freedom and determinism, though I don’t know whether I’ll choose this topic. Dialectical materialism is one topic on which much has already been written. I think you should go for Nietzsche’s view of transvaluation of values. Little work has been done in our country on that,” Ali opined.

  “Here you are. I think I’ll go for Nietzsche. Thanks for the advice. Well this reminds me of Nietzsche’s theory of eternal recurrence. I read it last night and found it quite interesting. You must be familiar with that?”

  “I’m just familiar with that,” Ali replied modestly. “I’m afraid I haven’t been through Nietzsche’s original works.”

  “Don’t you feel at times that what you experience has happened to you before so much so that you can predict what’s going to happen and it turns out to be true — what we call it déjà vu?” Sara asked.

  “Yes, I suppose everyone of us has had such experience on several occasions. But I don’t know we can infer from this that we live the same life again and again,” Ali replied.

  “I agree with you. Déjà vu can be explained on some other ground as well. For instance, that we unconsciously fear or wish something to happen and it does happen. But I don’t know how can we predict an event unless we have been through that before,” Sara said.

  “Actually, there are significant ethical implications of eternal recurrence. The most important being that if we are condemned to live the same life endlessly, there is no possibility of moral progress either individually or collectively,” Ali opined.

  “Here I’m afraid I disagree with you. Moral progress can be achieved in the course of one life.”

  “That may be so,” Ali replied in a tone that showed he wasn’t convinced. “Anyway, eternal recurrence is an interesting theory and I’ll definitely devote some time to that.”

  “I have Nietzsche’s original works, which you can borrow whenever you want,” Sara offered.

  “Thanks. I’ll definitely some time,” Ali replied. Then looking at his watch said, “I’ll take your leave now.”

  “Ok. When will we meet again?”

  “Our department and library will open every Thursday from 9 in the morning to 2 in the afternoon during the vacation. I think we can meet on coming Thursday.”

  “That’s nice,” Sara assented. “I’ll give you a call and we’ll fix the time. “Should I get you dropped?” Sara offered Ali as they came out of the study towards the main entrance.

  “No thanks,” Ali replied. “I’ll take a cab.”

  Chapter 18

  It was a seminary in North Waziristan where some twenty militant leaders had gathered for consultations. Rustam Shah, the head of the Tehrik-e-Taliban, was presiding. Looking at the audience he said, “It’s one month since the new government was installed. We were promised by a person no less than Malik Naseem himself that as soon as they formed the government, the military operation against us would be stopped and we would be allowed to maintain the territory that we held. That’s why we supported him. However, it is a matter of grave disappointment that they haven’t fulfilled their promise and the operation against us continues and so do the drone attacks.”

  Rustam Shah paused for a moment and then resumed: “I have also talked to Maulvi Zia sahib and he is also of the view that Malik Naseem and his government are not going to honor their commitment. In that event, we are also not bound to keep our word. So we need to go back to our earlier strategy of killing as many people as possible including some hard targets so that the government is forced to negotiate with us on our terms.”

  The other militants were listening keenly to him and whenever he paused they shouted Allah-o-Akbar expressing their resolve to live and die for their cause.

  “You want to say something,” Rustam Shah asked his deputy Saad Khan, who was known for his ferocity.

  “Yes with the permission of the ameer I’d submit that we should give a befitting message to the new government, otherwise they would think that we are coward. There should be explosions in next few days in major cities of the country,” Saad Khan said.