Electricity and Memory

Aata hai yaad mujh ko guzra hua zamana,

Woh bagh ki baharein, woh sab ka chehchahana

I heard recently that my great-great- grandfather, when he lived in undivided India, perhaps in Lahore or Amritsar, which is where my ancestors were based, refused to get his house wired when electricity came to their town. He protested that it was the conspiracy of the British and the light from electric bulbs would weaken their eyes. The irony of the story is ofcourse, that his two sons went on to work in WAPDA. This narrative was told to me by my grandfather who likes to reminisce with us about the past, and long gone people of the family, that he seems afraid that we will never know.

I brought up this narrative in comparison to the one about Zakir’s father in Basti. The aim of looking at this is not to talk about resistance to colonialism and the shapes and forms it came in, but for me it signifies staying rooted to the past as opposed to moving on and forward, of the difference that time creates. Zakir’s father was also against “innovation” of any sort, it wasn’t just a battle that he put up against the British.

In this case of course moving on, is the practical course to take, why would anyone keep using lanterns when electricity was available and easy to use and efficient. Yet I think the ‘novel’ questions whether change is indeed practical or positive. For example, was coming to Pakistan, or the making of Pakistan positive and practical?

The other sense in which it looks at change is to question whether it really does take place, or there is any use in trying to affect the change. This is why the ‘revolutionaries’ like Salamat for example are mocked, for the elders say even the prophets were unable to change the world or the system, how did they then, expect to change it.

But what the story of my ancestors seems also to point towards is the change that time brings, the void that is then created in the understandings of the previous generation to the next. Thus most of the youth in Basti regard their parents, as well as other elders as being ignorant. It is perhaps in this way that change seems inevitable, as inevitable as the passing of time.

Yet despite the need for change voiced by some of the characters, there is a strong association with memory, in most part it can be argued that the ‘basti’ also just exists in Zakir’s memory. Nevertheless the fact of the narrative seems to be that though change is inevitable, but the past is always beautiful.