The Black Rainbow

by Hussain Zaidi

  “He has no friend. His only friend was Sara. I even tried to contact her but was told she went abroad a month ago.”

  “Ali is also missing for one month.”

  “Do you think he has gone with Sara?”

  “No. But I feel she has something to do with Ali’s disappearance.”

  “But what possible reasons can be for this? Their marriage ended some six months ago,” Mrs Naqvi objected.

  “But she came here just few days before Ali left. If you allow, may I ask father to find Ali’s whereabouts?”

  “I had also considered reporting the matter to the police or seeking Javed Bhai’s help. But maybe Ali is too busy and involving the police in the matter will affect his job,” Mrs Naqvi observed.

  “Too busy to even send you an SMS?”

  “Actually there’s something I haven’t told you. Ali had been annoyed with me for quite some time.”

  “Annoyed with you?” Farzana wondered. “I don’t believe it. You’re the only person he cares about.”

  “Ali wanted to get some job but I wanted him to prepare for the civil service exam. So there was some exchange of words between us,” Mrs Naqvi decided not to disclose to Farzana the real reason her son was annoyed with her.

  “Oh I see! In that case, you needn’t worry at least about his safety. I guess he’s still cross with you. You had better wait for his return.”

  “Tell me do you still love Ali?” Mrs Naqvi asked Farzana looking deeply into her.

  “Yes I do. But this doesn’t matter in the least. Still in his heart there’s no place for me.”

  “My dear Ali is a shattered person. He has suffered so much, all for nothing. He is passing through the most difficult phase of his life and I think he wanted a job only as a means of escape from his predicament. But I know this wouldn’t help him. Ali’s real problem is that he has lost faith in the world and for having his faith restored he needs above all a companion who loves and cares about him and gives him the emotional support and trust he so badly needs,” Mrs Naqvi explained. “You are the only such person. So please help him.”

  “For Ali I can do anything,” Farzana assured Mrs Naqvi. “Now I see some meaning in the breakdown of my own marriage and that of his as well. But I fear he’ll again reject my advances.”

  “But at least you can try.”

  “I’ll do my best.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Thank God you’re back. I was extremely worried about you. Were you ok?” Mrs Naqvi asked as she hugged Ali.

  “Don’t I appear to be?” Ali replied in an off-hand manner.

  “Of course you do but there wasn’t any word from you,” she complained.

  “I’m sorry but I was very busy.”

  Mrs Naqvi wanted to tell Ali that she had searched for him in all NGOs working in the northern areas but thought it wasn’t the opportune time.

  “If you don’t mind, may I have some rest?” said Ali warily and without waiting for an answer went to his room. He was worn out by the journey and immediately went to sleep. When he woke up, it was late in the evening and he was feeling hungry. So he went out to ask his mother for the dinner. When he entered the living room, he saw Mrs Naqvi talking to Farzana.

  “Good to see you back!” Farzana cheered at Ali, who didn’t reply and took a seat with his eyes cast down.

  Mrs Naqvi had requested Farzana not to ask Ali about his whereabouts. So she desisted herself from doing so.”

  “In your absence, Farzana had been very helpful to me,” Mrs Naqvi told Ali.

  “May I have something to eat?” Ali ignored his mother’s remarks about Farzana.

  “Oh yes! Dinner is almost ready. You two have a chat and I come back in a few minutes,” Mrs Naqvi said and left the room.

  “Congratulation on your job and successful training.”

  “Thanks,” Ali replied coldly.

  “You still don’t feel for me?”

  “Look Farzana, after all I have been through, there’s not a single soul I trust; and love is a matter of trust. If you want me to flirt with you, that may be possible. But beyond that I can’t do anything for you,” Ali told her plainly.

  “I’m glad after all you have been through you’re still honest to the hilt. You could have easily flirted with me. I can understand that for anyone in your place it would be difficult to trust a woman. But not all women are alike. If one betrayed you, it doesn’t mean another will necessarily do the same. You have got to repose trust in someone,” Farzana said to Ali.

  “Only to see it broken. Anyway I have embarked on a new career and I need to attend to that. You can wait for me if you want but only at your own risk,” Ali replied bluntly.

  “I can wait for you all my life but I understand your point.”

  Next evening Ali went to see Dr Junaid.

  “Welcome back,” the professor remarked. “How was your training?”

  “Rather tough but very useful.”

  “Your mother would have been very concerned about you since you didn’t make any contact with her. Did she ask you about that?”

  “I don’t care about her. No, she didn’t ask about my whereabouts.”

  “Your training is over and now the job will start. From tomorrow, you will sit in one of our offices and will be paid a modest salary.”

  “What will I do there?”

  “Given your qualifications and aptitude, we have decided to make you a member of our think tank. You will join its office and do the research that will be assigned to you.”

  “That’s splendid! Research is my cup of tea.”

  “We know what a person is best suited for and assign him the work accordingly — justice, as Plato would call it. But remember we can assign you some other work that we think you are more suited for,” Dr Junaid told Ali.

  “I’ll do whatever you ask me to do.”

  Ali joined the Jamia Islamia’s research team. There wasn’t much work to do and he could devote time to his studies. Since he had dropped the plan to appear in the civil service exam, he could study freely. And the first book he laid his hand on was the one that Dr Junaid had given him in one of their initial meetings. Ali found the book exceedingly instructive as well as interesting. In particular, he was struck by its philosophy that one should do one’s duty irrespective of its reward and that in the pursuit of one’s duty one should stop at nothing.

  Another three months passed. Mrs Naqvi never asked Ali where he had been trained and where he was working. But she was happy that he was settling down. Farzana would frequently visit them but couldn’t elicit the desired response from Ali.

  One day Dr Junaid called for Ali.

  “Your work is going well but we want you to diversify your experience. Why don’t you join a newspaper?”

  “If you so desire,” Ali assented.

  “We can arrange a place for you in any media house but we would like you to do it yourself. Go to your late father’s newspaper and meet the editor. I’m sure he’ll give you a reporter’s job.”

  Accordingly, Ali met the editor.

  “I’m glad to give you a job. Your father was an excellent reporter and a great friend. But if I’m not wrong you wanted to join the civil service. So why journalism?” the editor asked.

  “I have changed my mind. I don’t want to be part of a corrupt and decadent system. Besides, journalism is far more enterprising. My father had set high standards of professionalism and I want to emulate them,” Ali replied to the satisfaction of the editor.

  “I appreciate you think like that. You’re welcome to join our reporting team.”

  So Ali became a journalist. When his mother came to know of that, she expressed her pleasure. But at heart she was concerned lest her son should meet the fate of her husband. She had no idea that he was on a far more dangerous path.

  Chapter 43

  “There was another suicide attack in the city in which scores of people were killed.

  “It’s disgusting! I don’t underst
and why these people are playing with innocent lives? Mrs Naqvi expressed her indignation as she watched the footage of the incident on TV.

  “Terrorism is a protest against social injustices,” Ali, who was also present there, remarked. “It will not end as long as these injustices perpetuate. Why doesn’t anyone understand this?”

  “You’re trying to justify terrorism?” Mrs Naqvi was surprised at her son’s remark.

  “No, I’m only supplying an explanation of that,” Ali responded.

  “But do you think terrorism is the solution to social injustices?” she asked.

  “I don’t know. But these militants have this perception. All I can say is that our society is terminally ill and only a major surgery can save it,” Ali maintained.

  “And who will perform this surgery? “These terrorists who kill people in cold blood? No my son, evil can’t be ended by a greater evil. Only good is an antidote to evil,” Mrs Naqvi observed.

  “But how can good possibly work in our system? The forces of the status quo embodied in our ruling class are too powerful to let the good defeat evil.”

  “Yes these forces are very powerful but no earthly power is greater than the people’s power. Remember, a people have the government they deserve. Politics can’t change for the better unless society improves itself. It’s a long process but there are no short cuts to it. The people need to realize this and eventually they’ll do so; though this will take time,” Mrs Naqvi explained.

  “Your approach, I’m sorry to say, is purely academic. Drastic changes need drastic steps. People who lose themselves in the maze of right and wrong end up doing nothing,” Ali wasn’t willing to give in.

  “I’m disappointed that you think like that. If we don’t know the distinction between the right and wrong, we’ll only spell disaster as these misguided souls are doing in the name of religion or social justice. Ends never justify means no matter how noble they are,” Mrs Naqvi was equally adamant.

  “But then what’s your solution to these problems?” Ali asked. “I’m sure you’ll not deny that gross injustices are endemic in our society.”

  “I don’t deny that we have a most unjust society characterized by the extremes of wealth and poverty, luxury and misery, abundance and scarcity, and that our political and economic systems are the chief instruments of perpetuating these injustices. I also agree that poverty is the breeding ground of terrorism and that the militancy at least in some respect is a reaction against economic injustice. We have to change our politics and economics, because they make the rich richer and the poor poorer, the well-off better off and the miserable wretch, the powerful more powerful and the weak weaker. So the system has to go.”

  Mrs Naqvi paused for a while and then resumed: “Where I don’t agree with you is the means by which the change is to be effected, the ills of society treated and its scars healed. Even if you kill at one go our entire elite class — the power-addict politicians, the corrupt bureaucrats, and the unscrupulous business tycoons — it wouldn’t change anything for the better. Even worse people will take their place. There’s an old saying ‘don’t hate the offender hate the offence’. By the same token, I would say don’t attack the corrupt, unjust and tyrannical people; instead attack corruption, injustice and tyranny; attack their root causes. The forces of devastation and destruction, death and damnation can’t salvage us,” Mrs Naqvi said pointing at the footage of the blast.

  “But who can salvage us?” Ali queried.

  “Young, educated people like you.” Who else? I have no hesitation in admitting that my generation was a failure but we have high hopes of you, because you are far more knowledgeable and well-informed and have greater understanding of your world. Only you need to be a bit more patient and rational.”

  “The young educated people find it difficult to get even a decent job. How can they change society?”

  “By changing themselves,” Mrs Naqvi replied. “The holy Quran says that God doesn’t change the lot of a people unless they are committed to changing it themselves. Before pointing our finger at the system, we should ask ourselves where do we stand individually in our everyday life? Are we law abiding? Do we stop our vehicle at the red signal when no traffic constable is in sight? Do we pay taxes? Are we honest in the performance of our duties in schools and hospitals, offices and factories? Do we honor our commitments? And are we really interested in justice? Or are we interested in justice only when we stand to gain by it? Yes, our elite class is rotten to the core but most of the rest of the people if put into their place would be as bad. No government can be better than its people,” she spoke at length.

  “Maulvi Zia wants to see you in the evening. Come to me and we’ll go to him together.“

  Ali received the message from Dr Junaid.

  It was five in the evening when Dr Junaid and Ali drove to Maulvi Zia’s place.

  “So this is your favorite student,” Maulvi Zia remarked to Dr Junaid.

  Ali was meeting the maulvi for the first time, though his face was familiar to him.

  “Junaid is all praise for you and I know he’s not generous in praising others,” Zia continued looking keenly at Ali.

  “In my case, he is too generous,” Ali replied modestly.

  “Ali has learnt a lot in a short span and now he is a most reliable member of our organization,” Dr Junaid said.

  “That’s nice. It means we can give him any assignment and he’ll carry it out. Am I right?” Zia looked at Ali.

  “Yes sir you can count on me.”

  “You and I have at least two things in common: We both fell for the same woman and were deceived by the same woman,” Maulvi Zia remarked. “But Sara is not just an ordinary woman; she represents our corrupt, fickle, worldly, irreligious and un-conscientious elite class, which looks down upon the rest of society as no more than a plaything. It’s this class that is responsible for our problems and it’s this very class that we need to bring to its knees. By the grace of God and thanks to the intelligence of senior people like Junaid and courage of young people like you, we’ll be successful.”

  “You’re right sir,” Ali nodded.

  In the meantime, the intercom rang up.

  “Let him in,” Maulvi Zia told his secretary.

  The door opened and to Ali’s surprise entered Babu Javed.

  “I believe you two are familiar with each other,” Maulvi Zia chuckled.

  “Yes of course,” Babu Javed, who knew Ali had joined Maulvi Zia’s organization, confirmed. “Congratulation. Now you’re on the right track,” he addressed Ali, who could see a sting in the remarks.

  “Let me share it with you that Babu Javed also works for us,” Maulvi Zia said to a bewildered Ali. “It’s all in the family then. Let’s get down to business. Our movement has made the government desperate. First they tried to kill me and after they had failed they tried to put me behind the bars. But here they also failed. We believe that the sun is about to set on this evil system and its obnoxious upholders and we must ensure an early sunset. We have already increased the number of suicide attacks but we need to have high value targets. I believe Dr Junaid has some plans; so over to you Junaid.”

  “The Eid is approaching and as usual there will be a big congregation in the historic Royal Mosque, which we have reports that prime minister and some other top guns will also attend. In the presence of such high value targets amid a large number of people, a blast will go a long way in serving our purpose,” Dr Junaid briefed others.