My Birthplace
Sant Tulsidas was never tired of singing the praises of Shri Rama. I also never feel tired of narrating the romance, beauty and culture of my birthplace. The panorama and topography are always vivid before my eyes just as on the cinema-screen and I can never forget it even if I try to do so.
As we go on to the eastern hills there was a village named surrounded on all sides by beautiful fruit gardens. In this village the important person worthy of mention was , who later became Pakistan’s High Commissioner in India.
The front hills on the South were not very far from there and there was situated a village called surrounded and crowded by grape orchards. In our childhood, we would at any time go and eat grapes, as many as we liked. But of course we had to hide ourselves and be careful that we were not caught while eating them.
There were no means of transport in those days, no cold storages and also no exports, therefore these grapes were sold in baskets carried on the heads by the vendors only to the nearby villages.
From the West when we would go down the hills for about a mile or two, there was a big valley which looked like the Garden of Heaven. This valley was rich in red roses and fruit gardens. The red roses were of a most exceptional quality and fragrance. These roses were sent to far-off countries like Kabul, Iran and Yunan and were used for preparing the most valuable Unani medicines and perfumes. Its Gulukand was the chief tasteful medicine commonly used by everyone from children to the aged. The rose-water was so fragrant that it was used as eye-drops and for bath by the rich people.
In this valley there was a famous place of pilgrimage , which was one of the five holy places in India, the others being Puskar-Raaj, Prayag-Raaj, Kailash-Raaj, and Kashi-Raaj. Here in Kataas-Raaj every year on the occasion of a very big fair used to be held to which lakhs of pilgrims used to come.
The whole picture of the pilgrimage and the festival is still fresh before my mind. Thousands of sadhus and sannyasins used to visit the place and the main feature was the march of the naked or nanga-sadhus, in a battalion with decorated elephants in the lead.
There was a huge natural water reservoir, sarovar, going deep into the caves. On one side of this sarovar there were three storeyed buildings for the pilgrims and from the top of these buildings the expert divers used to jump in the sarovar to the joy of everybody around.
In the vicinity, hardly half a mile away, there was a Muslim pilgrimage place, the tomb (dargah) of the saint Faquir Saidan Shah. Here also every year a big Muslim festival, Urs used to be held.
The peculiar phenomenon of this valley was the natural flow of oozing waters through the bazars and the town of Choa Saidan Shah.
The people used to have small pucca kunds (ditches) in front of their houses and shops for their use. The water used to flow through the ditches providing them sufficient quantity of water for their drinking and household purposes. Water could be taken and the ditches were never allowed to be used directly and were kept in clean and healthy condition. The water was very cool, refreshing and sweet. That was perhaps the reason for the excellent quality of roses and the richness and sweetness of fruits.
And further down the water was made to fall off into the deep to provide force to run the grinding mills. The people of the surrounding areas used to get their corn ground. It was very interesting and useful.
In the North at the back of our village there was another hill loftier than our hill, called Karangal. In this hill there was a strange type of jet black stone, scarcely found of course. It was burnt, powdered and passed through a most fine mesh and was used for the eyes — surma. There was an adage that anybody who would use this surma continuously for a year would see the stars in the day.
In the upper Vahalee there was a famous and popular Band Party. It grew up under the guidance, training and leadership of Gulab Khan. Gulab Khan was a member of the Military Band Corps in the First World War. After his retirement, he collected a number of young men, bought all the instruments by his own initiative, zeal and dynamism. This is how this Band group developed and was always in demand throughout Punjab for marriages and other ceremonial occasions.
It is quite strange and probably a divine destiny for a young man of the Band group named Nadir Ali who came down to U.P. and settled in Meerut. There as the destiny would pick him up, he gradually established a factory for manufacturing musical instruments of all types. He must have become a multi-millionaire for he constructed along one or two furlong a row of double and triple storeyed buildings with a bazar in the heart of which he built a mosque.
I know about this musical instrument factory through my youngest son Victor. Sri Aurobindo Ashram in Pondichery has a very powerful Band consisting of a large party and my two sons have been members of this Band for the last 25 years. Victor has been occasionally coming to Meerut for purchase of instruments and to get the French and German instruments repaired. This factory is now supplying musical instruments throughout India. It is said that some special band instruments made in this factory quite compare with the famous instruments made in France and Germany.
In the upper Vahalee there was a renowned person Captain Sher Khan. He was not educated, still he rose to the position of a Captain in the Army during the First World War. In those times hardly any Indian was given this rank. The reason for his getting this position was his contribution in getting a large number of youths of village and surrounding areas recruited in the Army. The recruitment in the First World War was very much needed. He got practically all the youths of our village recruited in the Army.
The recruitment used to be done by a panel of British Army Officers and there is a humorous story that the recruits were made to mug up five answers in reply to five questions which the recruiting officer would ask:
Q.1. What is your name?
Ans. Sir, my name is Rehman.
Q.2. What is your age?
Ans. Sir, 21 years.
Q.3. What is your father’s name?
Ans. Sir, my father’s name is Suleman.
Q.4. What is your father’s age?
Ans. Sir, 42 years.
Q.5. Are you loyal to the Government or your father?
Ans. Both Sir.
In one of the instances the recruiting officer just slipped and asked the questions in the reverse order and the replies were:
Q. What is your father’s name?
A. My father’s name is Rehman.
Q. What is your father’s age?
A. Sir, 21 years.
Q. What is your name?
A. Sir, My name is Suleman.
Q. What is your age?
A. Sir, 42 years.
The Officer was very much annoyed and asked:
Q. Are you an ass or your father?
A. Both Sir.
In spite of the wrong and foolish answers, on the recommendation of Captain Sher Khan the young man was recruited to the Army. In fact the Army Officers could not lose the young man just for the harmless mix-up.
It also gave a distinction to our village that no one was rejected and all the youths of the village had gone to the war. That was considered very brave and a credit to the village.
In the vicinity of Vahalee, right from Khewra up to our village many useful minerals were found. Rock-salt of course was the chief mineral and such a good quality of salt was nowhere else available in the whole of India. It used to be supplied throughout India, mostly to Bihar, Bengal, Punjab and Madhya Pradesh.
The other minerals available were limestone for making lime and cement, and gypsum which is one of the most essential ingredients in the manufacture of cement. Gypsum from this area was supplied to the cement factories, throughout India. Besides these important items, other minerals available were steam coal and clay of different colours — white, yellow, pink and grey.
The purpose of my singing these songs in praise and admiration of my birthplace is to show how beautiful and naturally rich my village was and of which I am truly proud.