Aparna Kapadia

The Rann of Kachchh, its colorful people and sandy beaches make for one of the three advertisements launched to promote tourism in Gujarat. As the superstar Amitabh Bachchan walks down the moonlit desert, we move to an image we most expect to see of the place that is being sold to us: bandhani-clad women with multiple piercings working at their intricate embroideries; men in turbans and frock-like tunics herding their cattle; carefree children playing in quaint hamlets as their mothers, working at their traditional pestles and mortars, beatifically look on. The adversities of nature, the actor reminds us, have never deterred the people of Kachchh; they make up for its austerity through their brilliant colors, handicrafts and music. In the final scene, Bachchan, himself dressed as a typical pastoralist waiting to join the rest of his brethren, stops to invite us to this idyllic land, “breathe in a bit of Kachchh. Come, breathe in a bit of Gujarat”.

This advertisement reinforces the popular image of Kachchh as a land of pristine beauty, bucolic joy and exquisite handicrafts, where cattle-herding pastoralists move around the desert freely and live stress-free lives. It also reinforces its “natural” location within a unified modern state, ignoring the ambiguous relationship this frontier region has shared with Gujarat and camouflaging the close cultural connections that have existed between Kachchh and Sindh throughout history.

The study is a rich ethnography based on nearly a decade of fieldwork among the pastoralist Jatts and Meghwal harijans of northern Kachchh, which constitutes the border between India and Pakistan.

Farhana Ibrahim’s book, Settlers, Saints and Sovereigns: An Ethnography of State Formation in Western India (Published in Delhi), reminds us of these very ambiguities and internal contradictions that have existed between Gujarat and Kachchh, and their implications for understanding the region today. The study is a rich ethnography based on nearly a decade of fieldwork among the pastoralist Jatts and Meghwal harijans of northern Kachchh, which constitutes the border between India and Pakistan. Using anthropological tools and archival sources, Ibrahim interrogates the idea of the impermeable boundaries between modern day nation states and decodes some of the realities that lie hidden behind the idealized position of Kachchh and its people within Gujarat.

On Kachchh as a ‘Border’

Kachchh’s location as a frontier zone and its access to the sea have rendered it open to a variety of mobile pastoralists, traders and military men for centuries. This feature made it a contested site for the imperial powers that controlled Gujarat from its historical capitals of Patan and Ahmedabad right from the 12th century onwards. Its proximity to the kingdom of Sindh, close to the countries involved in the Great Game, also gave it considerable strategic significance in the minds of the colonial rulers. For the contemporary state of Gujarat, established only 50 years ago on 1 May 1960, Kachchh continues to remain an area of concern on account of its location along India’s border with Pakistan, which must be vigilantly guarded and kept watertight for security reasons.

Its proximity to the kingdom of Sindh, close to the countries involved in the Great Game, also gave it considerable strategic significance in the minds of the colonial rulers.

Ibrahim’s research is an important step towards understanding how an otherwise monolithic and impermeable border can be perceived in multiple ways. The author is concerned with the manner in which people living within a political border “construct meaningful narratives of place; how they at once establish and transgress the boundaries within which they are able to act as meaningful agents” (p 5). She notes, for instance, that the dominant discourse on the history of Kachchh still tends to be based on colonial writings. Popularized by an important local newspaper, Kachchh Mitra (Friend of Kachchh), this discourse primarily focuses on the enmity between Kachchh and Sindh. In contrast, the DƗnetƗ Jatts, who have had a long history of trade and communication with Sindh before the Partition, remember it in more positive ways as a land of abundance and plenty. This nostalgia is also expressed in their poetry and legends, as well as in their relationship with ajrakh, a block-printed fabric, which are shared by both regions. On the other hand, the narratives of the Maru Meghwals, a harijan community that migrated from Sindh to Kachchh in 1971, involve a rejection of the former, particularly its link with “Muslim” culture, in order to find a legitimate place among the upper caste Hindus of their new homeland by adopting their forms of dress, embroidery and manner. In doing this they fit in with the avowedly Hindu nationalist state’s imagination as “legitimate” constituents of the region, albeit in accordance with their own social needs. In all three cases, the “border” holds different meanings for people residing within the same geographical unit.

This nostalgia is also expressed in their poetry and legends, as well as in their relationship with ajrakh, a block-printed fabric, which are shared by both regions.

Borders and boundaries are considered the sine qua non of modern-day nation states. This idea assumes that moving frontiers were a feature of pre-modern societies and, as so many contemporary ethnic conflicts show, ignores the complex relationships that still exist between the people who reside near artificially created borders. Over 60 years after the creation of India and Pakistan, very few studies probe the consequences of this delineation on groups that once existed on both sides of the border. Ibrahim’s book makes an important contribution to this academic literature; with its focus on the oral narratives of migration and cultural practices, it encourages the reader to reflect on the interplay between hermetically sealed borders and moving frontiers that continue to be experienced by the pastoralist communities of Kachchh even today.

On Kachchh as a ‘Region’

Today, 50 years after the formation of its modern avatar, Gujarat is being celebrated as a success story. Over the past decades, its asmitƗ or pride has become its dominant form of self-projection. This framework attempts to culturally and politically homogenize the region through its discourse on progress, economic development, and Hindutva, leaving out those who do not legitimately fit in. How then does a culturally distinctive unit define itself within such a modern state? This question becomes particularly relevant for Kachchh with its historical position as a frontier zone.

Farhana Ibrahim is interested in asmitƗ “for an understanding of what might be the implications of this philosophy of roots and anchored homeland for a place like Kachchh that has defined itself primarily through mobility and cultural flows, especially across a border that is rendered firmly sealed under the gaze of the modern nation state” (p 32). Thus, her study presents a nuanced understanding of the manner in which Kachchh is imagined by those who reside within it and negotiate the forces of “Gujaratization” through the asmitƗ project.

For instance, Ibrahim demonstrates that mobility, Islam and an intimate cultural relationship with Sindh, are important elements in the pastoralists’ imagination of Kachchh as a region. However, these, as has been noted, are viewed with suspicion by the State, extremely concerned with matters of border security. Similarly, as “Hinduism” becomes gradually naturalized in Gujarat, ƖĞƗpurƗ, Kachchh’s local goddess has become a part of the wider pantheon of goddesses worshipped all over the state. Yet, the people of Kachchh continue to associate her with their land. Ibrahim, further narrates how MƗƯ, a female saint worshipped as a pƯr, and sharing some features with ƖĞƗpurƗ, remains central to the devotional practices of the GarƗsiyƗ Jatts, a group of sedentarized Muslim pastoralists, who have also moved from Sindh to Kachchh. In their association with MƗƯ, this group locates itself closely within the region and at the same time rejects the state’s attempts to categorize it as the Muslim “other”. This simultaneously allows the GarƗsiyƗ Jatts to “steer away from being co-opted into a transnational movement for Islamic reform” (p 195), another homogenizing force operational in Gujarat from the 1990s. This choice of resisting categorization also implies that they are left out of the development schemes instituted by the state.

Islamic reform has been widely embraced by the mobile DƗnetƗ Jatts today. Having given up their older ritual practices of pƯr worship, the DƗnetƗs connect their intraregional migrations to the more universal significance of movement within Islam. Ibrahim suggests, in doing this, they also justify their choice of not moving inwards to the more lucrative, but ideologically and politically unsafe “Gujarat”. Gujarat then is viewed as the other in the imagination of these pastoralists who now primarily move around Kachchh.

Gujarat’s asmitƗ is negotiated somewhat differently by the Meghwals, who are relatively new inhabitants of Kachchh. This group, with a long history of residing in the ambiguous zone of Tharparkar on the border of Kachchh and Sindh, once shared their food and burial habits with Muslims. Yet, when they migrated to Kachchh, they chose to give up this association with Islam, attempting to gain a higher status within the local Hindu society. In this regard they have been drawn into the state’s asmitƗ project, making them active participants in creating the dichotomy between Kachchh and Sindh.

For the people of Kachchh, their associations with Sindh are complex, their fabrics and crafts, marketed to the outside world as exotic, are assertions of their community identities, their religious and sectarian choices allow them to negotiate their social positions within their local contexts; for them, all these elements and several others define the region. The strength of Ibrahim’s book lies in the complexity with which she articulates these different elements and locates them, throughout the narrative, within their real, remembered and imposed pasts. Ultimately, this is a study of the politics of memory and the continuously changing nature of human frontiers.

Conclusions

A book this complex in scope, however, is bound to leave the reader wishing for more. Ibrahim’s informants appear to shift easily between the use of Kachchhi, Sindhi, Gujarati and Urdu. It is noteworthy that the author does not highlight this or always mention the language being used. A reflection on how the politics of language, specifically the growing hegemony of Gujarati, is played out along the frontier would have enhanced our understanding of Kachchh’s relationship with Gujarat’s dominance. Further, the reader may miss the relevance of the interesting collection of maps and photographs included in the book, as the text itself does not specifically engage with them; integrating them into the body of the narrative may have contributed to the ethnographic analysis. Finally, the book would have also benefited considerably from a deeper theoretical analysis of the ideology of asmitƗ as it has developed from the 19th century in Gujarat, based on the existing original primary literature and on Ibrahim’s own ethnographic research. However, the ethnography itself displays a nuanced understanding of the concept and would certainly be of great use to anyone interested in producing a theory-based work on regional political ideologies in south Asia.

Perhaps, Ibrahim herself will pioneer such a work in the near future on Gujarat, which remains a neglected area of study.

Even as Amitabh Bachchan’s seductive invitation to Kachchh naturalizes its location within Gujarat, the voices of Ibrahim’s informants point towards the contradictions that remain untamed despite the state’s powerful homogenizing agenda. These voices underscore the multiple ways in which the region continues to be imagined. In this, her book questions the popular notion of a “state” or “region” as “objectively given” and defined by administrative boundaries, proposing, instead, that these categories be viewed in more ways than one.

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Aparna Kapadia is at the Faculty of Oriental Studies, University of Oxford.

Courtesy: Economic & Political Weekly (Published on March 26, 2011)  

The post Kachchh: More Sindh than Gujarat! first appeared on Sindh Courier.

Sindh Courier

Kutch or Kachh district has a rich culture of folk music and dance. People here are very fond of folk music and dance. Sindh folk music existed here since ancient periods. It started from the ancient people who were used to invent new sounds for expressing their sentiments and feelings. Gradually, this music further developed as part of their culture.

There are number of folk instruments used by Kachhi people like tabla, sharnai, nagara, murli, janjhra, manjira, khanjari, gharro or ghaghar (clay pot), flute, duff, dholak, damaru, daklu, nagfani, borrindo. These music instruments are linked with a number of aspects of Kachhi people and their culture. The music is very much influenced by Sufi and folk songs.

Here we are going to introduce Danabhai Bharmal, a Gharro player. Gharro is a baked earthen pot of an average size. A special variety also known as Ghaghar. Gharro or Ghaghar is arrhythmic instrument. The variety of Tals is manipulated on the side walls and other on the mouth of the jar. Traditionally, Gharro or Ghaghar is played to the accompaniment of Surando.

As a child Dana admired the sound of Dhol. Not just the sound but the sway the instrument had on the listener. Also, as a child, he used to spend lots of time with his father’s tape recorder. Playing old Hindi songs. Repeatedly. And to be nourished by the soulfulness of the old Hindi songs.

The cheerfulness of Dhol instrument and the melody of the old Hindi songs shaped the musicality of Dana Bharmal. That’s the sound he pursued with Gharro Ghambelo, a traditional folk instrument from his village. A cheerful percussion sound that is soothing.

But he had to start his childhood journey as a musician with a steel plate and a small Gharro. As a substitute for the actual Gharro-Ghambelo instrument because he didn’t have access to one. He sang traditional folk songs accompanied with music he played on the steel plate and the small Ghado. Soon he earned a fame for himself in his school. As an entertainer but also as a talented musician. It took him a while before he could own an actual Gharro Ghambelo instrument, because of the lack of resources.

Watch the Video: Dana Bharmal (right) on Gharro Ghambelo doing jugalbandhi with Adam Latif on Chang instrument

Meanwhile he tagged along with other folk musicians doing Reyans (folk music evenings) in an around his village. To get the feel for the stage and also a chance to perform on Gharro Ghambelo. Eventually he earned invitations to perform in music programs and to make a small livelihood out of his music. Till date Dana has done more than 500 programs. Travelled many places in India with his music and also got invited to perform in Brazil and Indonesia.

But music alone doesn’t sustain Dana’s family. He also runs a small craft shop with his wife and daughters. They make toys from old clothes. And some quilts. His wife is also an accomplished bead artisan and an embroidery artist.

He is also an accomplished singer with few signature songs to his credit. He specializes in the folk genres of Sindhi Kafi and Lok Sangeet. He often writes his own lyrics, which is a very rare today in the folk music scene of Kachh. He now practices music with his son and daughter. They want to be singers, and learn the instrument Manjira.

Dana played an important role in the formation of Kala Varso and to take forward its mission to sustain folk music traditions of Kutch and its artists. He sits on the board of Kala Varso, an organization to promote folk singers of Kutchh. He participated in Reeyaz Shala – Folk music school in Kutch – training programs to further his music understanding in terms of Sur (melody) and Taal (rhythm).

The locals call him ‘Kalakar’ – an accomplished artist. He won awards and many felicitations. But more importantly inspired many young musicians in his Taluka, including his brothers, to follow their musical heritage.

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Courtesy: Kalavarso, Katchh

The post Introducing Sindhi Folk Artists of Kutch –I first appeared on Sindh Courier.

These glimpses of poet Shah Abdul Latif Bhitai’s work shows his greatness cannot be grasped fully. ‘I Saw Myself’ features new translations of the Sindhi Sufi poet’s works by Shabnam Virmani and Vipul Rikhi.

Rita Kothari

Kabir says the well is one

Water bearers many

Their pots are of different shapes

But the water in them in one

— Kabir

I thought the path was one

But there were a thousand million

Whoever took whichever one

Made it across the ocean

— Mekan Dada

One palace, one million doors

Countless windows in between

From wherever I took

The Beloved is before me

— Shah Abdul Latif

The beauty of language, the inwardness of the translation, in the three verses above tell us of the many journeys pursuers-translators have made. It exemplifies not only the continuity of syncretic thought but also a co-habitation of different regions (through Kabir from north India, Mekan Dada from Kutch, Shah Abdul Latif from Sindh) that refuse to stay fixed.

In my mind Shah Abdul Latif collapses with an unforgettable visual I remember from my visit to Jerusalem. After days of witnessing the hostile intimacy with which the Jewish, Christian and Muslim sides in East Jerusalem cohabited, I encountered a view through a glass window that overlooked the structures of all three religions, but was divided and distorted in the window frame. What that brought home was how no narrative is available in the singular; that choosing one over others is possible only through a manipulated vision. Between the villages of Kutch on the Indian side of the border and those in Tharparker across the international boundary resonate with the voice Shah Abdul Latif.

A passion project

As I hold I Saw Myself: Journeys with Shah Abdul Latif Bhittai, it is difficult not to feel somewhat infected by the passion that must have accompanied Shabnam Virmani and Vipul Rikhi when they undertook the project. Each time I say “project” in such a context I am reminded of Farid Ayaz’s words to Virmani recorded in the film Had-Anhad, “Isko zindagi ka project banayein.” And that’s exactly what Kabir and now Shah Abdul Latif Bhittai are – life projects.

And just as we don’t live life alone, this book is also not alone, with a single author or translator, but one that gives a sense of collectivity in its approach and design. Mine and not mine, as Gandhi said of Hind Swaraj. After the enormous value that the Shabnam Virmani-led Kabir project brought to our understanding of the continued relevance of Kabir and his multiple lives in parts of India and Pakistan, enhanced further by the impeccable translations of Linda Hess, we now have with us a new voice and new collection.

This voice is not from the heart of India, but from its frontiers, parts of which are in Pakistan and parts, in Rajasthan and Gujarat. The book is more a journey than a final and comprehensive compendium to the Sindhi Risalo by Shah Abdul Latif. It has verses from the previous compilations, in addition to ones that Virmani and Rikhi hear as a part of the oral tradition in Kutch. In that sense this is an unusual, almost quirky book in that it mimics, despite being textual, the spontaneity of an oral tradition.

A daily presence

The name of Shah Abdul Latif Bhittai is not unknown anymore to those who follow Sufi thought and music even in the most rudimentary manner. Details of Shah Abdul Latif’s life and the arrangement of the Risalo in surs and dastans, and the forms of bayt and wai, are too well known and accessible to bear repetition here. Equally well-known and recorded are the influences of Rumi and of the Quran, of the yogis and of Vedic learning.

These acquire different emphases depending upon ideological positions of the commentators. The stories of Moomal and Rano, of Noori and Jam Tamachi, are dispersed across the western region – Junagadh, Jaiselmer, Barmer, Thar, and Hinglaj. The singing is found in the repertoires of Abida Parveen, Allam Faqir, and Coke Studio.

In Sindh and Banni (Kutch) no conversation of any kind, literally, is possible without someone quoting a bayt from the Risalo. It is so common to hear, “Shah saab chayo aa…” and then a verse that can explain anything from the absence of rain to the betrayal of a lover, from the names of plants to the dilemmas of a spiritual life.

I remember hearing this about an aspiring politician: “andar vihareen kaunv, baaher boli hunj jee,” which means, “with a crow inside you, you speak the language of a swan” and that should give us a gist of the universality of Latif’s themes. But Latif is essentially and firstly a Sufi, who believes in an austere life, a meagre existence and retreat inside. Given below is a famous verse with my rendering in Hindi:

chup kar, chap-a-ma chore,

poore akhyoon dhuka kana

rah udhooru un

ta who moorat

munjharaan man

tunhijo mushahido maneean

chup kar, hoth na hila

aankhe bandh, kaan bandh

paani pee, pet na bhar

kha anaaj bas thoda sa

taaki woh murat ubhar aaye

jo basi tumhare andar

This life of austerity is not without yearning for a beloved, until the lover and the beloved are experienced as one. Words like “pirin” and “supreen” in the Risalo evoke references to friendships and nations of soul mates. Here’s one more verse, again in Hindi.

shukr hai jo mile

jeete dino mein yaar se

baithe jinke pahlu mein

mile hame kitna qaraar

maalik na karna juda

iss pirin ki pados se

Or this,

Sufi ne saaf kiya

thoya panna vajood ka

phir jua iss kaabil

dikhi jhalak yaar ki

A presence across communities

When Sassui looks for Punhoon only to realise that she has become Punhoon herself, or when Marvi longs for her homeland Malir, Sufism ceases to be an inaccessible form – it acquires in the popular imagination stories of love, wisdom, politics that co-exist with the mystical. This combination makes Shah Sahib very unusual and explains his presence across different communities.

Amena Khamisiani, one of the translators of Risalo mentions how “the peasant ploughing his field, the herdsman and the shepherd tending to the herd of cattle or flock of sheep, the fisherman casting his fishing net in the water, the village housewife at her daily chores and the villager amidst his companions at leisure time, sings, recites, or hears this poetry…”

Another translator mentions how his father, a bus conductor, gave him the Risalo, saying in Siraiki, “…aba hi wada kitab tedi wadi madad karesi (my son, this great book will help you greatly).” It is a different and crucial matter that Shah Sahib himself was a Syed and one may argue that his lineage leaves a caste-blind mark on the Risalo.

Recent scholarship by Sufi Hussain draws attention to this phenomenon, and there is no reason why a new assessment of this iconic figure should not take place. My own knowledge of the Risalo is built through memories and versions of people and a textual tradition starting from Ernest Trumpp to HT Sorley, from Elsa Kazi to Kalyan Advani, from Christopher Shackle to Annemarie Schimmel and, now, to Virmani and Rikhi. These are mere glimpses, but we need to be humble and reconcile with the fact that greatness is not graspable fully.

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About the Authors of book

Shabnam Virmani initiated the Kabir Project journeys in 2002 and has since been exploring the philosophy of Kabir and other mystics through a deep engagement with their oral folk traditions. Her inspiration and joy in this poetry and its wisdom has taken the shape of documentary films and a digital archive, songs and performances, translations and curations, urban festivals and rural yatras and more recently, infecting students with the challenge and wonder of mystic poetry. All this as part of her work at the Kabir Project in Srishti, Bangalore. Earlier she has worked on gender issues through journalism, video and radio work in the community.

Vipul Rikhi is a poet, translator and singer, immersed in the oral traditions of Kabir and other Bhakti and Sufi poets for years. He is the author of a novel, 2012 Nights, and a collection of poems, Bleed. He was a literature fellow at the Akademie Schloss Solitude in Germany in 2010-11. In the course of the magical journeys with the Kabir Project, he developed a deep love for singing mystic poetry in the folk music traditions and now performs widely. He is currently based in Goa.

Rita Kothari is Professor of English at Ashoka University, Delhi. She is one of India’s most distinguished translation scholars and has translated major literary works into English. Rita has worked extensively on borders and communities; Partition and identity especially in the western region of India. She is the author of many books and articles on the Sindhi community.

Courtesy: Scroll

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