Instruments of Exile: Ibn Ul Vaqt

In an exilic story revolving around an exilic figure, caught between two different nationalities and lifestyles, Nazir Ahmed engages with various instruments to act as momentum for the very exile that demarcates our protagonist Ibn ul Vaqt from the natives and colonizers. Among these instruments is Ibn ul Vaqt’s own nature—his indecisiveness, his stubborn desire to ‘have it all’ and inability to settle. His transition from Indian to British lifestyle, shedding off the religion once staunchly followed, and expensing of several homes all serve to isolate him from both the Indians—who resent his “Christian” lifestyle—and the English, who resent his immersion into their culture.

These two parties demarcate themselves into clear cut “natives” and “rulers.” For the native workers for the rulers, they do not ‘forget their place,’ as such humoring their rulers’ superiority complex. Yet Ibn ul Vaqt falls into none of these—his nature is consistent in its stubbornness that refuses to budge from the idea that he should be wholly integrated into the English culture he has so fully externalized, whilst being thought one with the natives, by the natives. He cannot fit in anywhere because his ideology, hopes and proud nature prevents him from doing so. It is this proud nature that causes him to be aloof to both the British and Indians, further entrenching his exile.

His nature also reflects his own concerns with native nationality and its inseparable immersion with religion. This immersion is in fact distinct for the protagonist—thus isolating him from the native masses—for when Ibn ul Vaqt forsakes Indian dress and cuisine as well as Islam, he only appears to yearn for the former—crying out for simple Indian dishes in a fevered state—whilst not only shaking off the latter but also encouraging its reformation in a way that suits the few and isolates the majority. He claims his desire is to act as the Muslim reformer, yet even at the end insists that religion in itself is at a standstill whereas science and the Europeans are moving forward. For Hujjat ul Islam, Ibn ul Vaqt really does “seem to believe that it is only a matter of days that man, God forbid, will become God!”

He cannot embrace the English dishes he consumes and yet cannot abandon the idea that he must settle into the very lifestyle which the Indian part of his nature rejects like bile in the throat. His various homes don’t bring him peace as he never settles in them, constantly on the move to ingrate himself into English society by holding parties that only enhance feelings of solitude. The idea that he has various homes adds to his lack of a base wherein to settle. In the end, he is homeless, isolated, essentially exiled and quite bereft—yet remains confined in his internal war to have it all; to be immersed in both lifestyles— the one he was born with and the one bestowed upon him like Pandora’s box, waiting to tear him down.