On an impulse, Bibha looked up the latest controversies on
ADHM on YouTube. Yesterday, when Sejuti had called up, all she had talked about
was ADHM. Sejuti and her friends were warmly anticipating a three-hour fiesta.

“What problem, Mashi? All problems are limited to prime time
news,” Sejuti breezily informed. “In Kolkata, people aren’t bothered. The pujas
have just gotten over. Diwali preparations have not yet begun. Please come down
during Christmas, Mashi. We’ll watch Bahubali together.”

Sejuti was a movie buff. Rather generously, she insisted on
narrating plots of the Bengali films she’d watched during her long-distance
calls to Bibha. Rather contrarily, Bibha accused Kolkata Bengalis of lacking
work motivation.

“Plays, movies, Durga Puja, Rabindra Jayanti; you people are
perpetually in the puja mode,” Bibha would exclaim. But then she would remember
how it had been with her on her visits to Bhowanipur decades ago.

Now that she had retired and had the time to hark back to
the lost Bhowanipur days, Bibha often recalled the ecstasy of pulsating crowds
whenever an Uttam Kumar film was released. In her brother’s house in
Bhowanipur, a pig-tailed Bibha had experienced frenzy with every Uttam Kuman
movie playing in Basusree and Bijoli. Here in Manchester, with Taal, Kabhi
Khushi Kabhi Gam, Dilwale Dulhaniya Le Jayenge, Bajrangi Bhaijan, there would
be such a warm buzz in Trafford Centre. Serpentine queues, the bracing aroma of
decaf, the buttery fragrance of freshly roasted popcorn, crowds of
honey-skinned Asians crowding multiplexes and avid discussions on SRK, SK and
KJo wafting in and out. Bilal and Shaheen dragged her out of her house every
time, and the mood caught on even while they looked for parking space outside
Trafford Centre.

“Auntie, please,” the beautiful Shaheen would plead,
clasping her dark hand in her impossibly fair ones. “You have to come with us.
Without you, it is no fun.”

Poker-faced, Bibha went every time and enjoyed herself
thoroughly.

In those queues they made many friends, mostly Pakistani
families from neighbouring zones, for Trafford Centre was a huge favourite
among Manchester Asians and Shaheen was as gregarious as she was lovely. And
later Shaheen would drag her to visit the new friends.

Picnics would be arranged at Blackpool, kabab nights in
Manchester Mile. It was fun. Life got freshly imbued with meaning every time a
Bollywood blockbuster released in Trafford Centre.

Sheikh Saab’s death 10 years ago had been intensely mourned
by Bibha, Bilal and Shaheen. The couple hadn’t said anything but the way they
looked out for her, the way Shaheen kept inviting her over to dinner and lunch,
the first set of bookings Bilal made for a short Scottish holiday including
Bibha, made it clear that they had adopted her.

Bibha had rebelled. “I don’t need babysitters, Bilal. All my
life I’ve been independent. I won’t give up the habit.”

“Of course, you won’t, Auntie,” quipped Bilal good
naturedly. “You are smart, independent and knowledgeable. Shaheen looks up to
you. She’s come here leaving all her relatives in Karachi. She sees you as a
mother figure.”

Bilal was Sheikh Saab’s grandnephew; Sheikh Saab had been
Bibha’s mentor 40 years ago when, fresh and green from Ghatshila, she had come
to try her luck in Manchester. Her senior by 30 years, Sheikh Saiffudin, a
tall, distinguished Asian and founder-member of Bury Hospital for Cancer
Research and Medicine, had given her a long look and declared, “You have
Parveen’s hazel eyes and round elbows. My other children are tall and
strapping. Only Parveen, Allah rest her soul, was short and round…”

Those had been hectic, apprehensive, learning years. Bibha
failed her first plab and driving tests. Sheikh Saab consoled her. A gutsy girl
like her needn’t give up. Lots of candidates failed the first time. Emily
(Sheikh Saab’s English wife) would tutor her.

Emily was warm, sweet and a flibbertigibbet. “I hate housework,”
she confessed. “I hate it as much as my mother loves it. Once, when I was
living in an intern’s hostel in Birmingham, I happened to look out the window
and there was my mother walking up the shingle-path. My room was a mess, my
kitchen sink piled high with dishes. I snatched up bag and coat and stepped out
the front door, securely locking it after me. O Mummy, I exclaimed, you had to
come today! I have an appointment I cannot miss. So sorry, Mum, but you have to
leave.”

Though she had laughed at the humour of it, the story taught
Bibha something about the country she was trying to sink her roots in. Bibha
could never imagine locking out a guest, much less a mother who had taken a
train to meet her. But such was Emily, footloose and fancy-free, and hers was
an open house. Sheikh Saab’s guests kept trickling in from Pakistan. Soon Bibha
made friends with Bashir, Sheikh Saab’s nephew, younger than him by only five
years, who was like a brother, Saima, his niece, and Parvez, his eldest son, a
businessman in Karachi. Bibha could see Parvez’s stiffness around Emily.

“I always wanted a baby,” Emily confided. “But when we
married it was too late for me. Sheikh Saab has his children, but I hardly
connect with them.”

And then Bibha failed plab and driving test a second time.
Sheikh Saab was exasperated. “You cannot live in this country without clearing
plab and you cannot survive a day without a car. What are you thinking of?”

The third time under Emily’s and Sheikh Saab’s tutelage
Bibha scraped through. Emily wept with relief and gifted her a diamond pendant.
“I cannot accept it,” Bibha demurred.

“You can and you will.”

Those years were now memories. Sheikh Saab had found his
rest beneath a green patch in the Manchester cemetery. Emily now lived in
Australia with a brain surgeon. They exchanged Christmas emails, but that was
that. Bibha had her Bengali circle in Manchester, but their snide, sometimes
openly vulgar comments hurt her. They were particularly uncharitable towards
Shaheen since the time Bibha had requested them to speak in Hindi or English
since Shaheen couldn’t follow Bengali.

“You and your Paki contacts! Don’t expect us to adjust with
them. Sheikh Saab has established you in this country. You have a stake in
socialising with his relatives. We don’t.”

Their parochialism chilled Bibha. She could have reminded
them that Sarmistha, after her widowhood, had returned to Kolkata, only to come
back in two months flat after a cold reception from her relatives. Pritha’s
only child had married an American Jew and now lived in Jerusalem. What Bengali
exclusivity were they talking about?

Bibha now met them occasionally, during Bijoya or at an
Ilish festival and sometimes in Bangasammelan meets. Something had soured in her
after their spiteful comments on Sheikh Saab. If Sheikh Saab heard people
calling him Paki, he would say in his deep, cultured voice, “Yes, I am
Pakistani, but by choice, not by birth. I was born in Lucknow, worked in
Calcutta and then I migrated to Karachi with my brothers and sisters. And
finally, at the age of 24, I came to Manchester. The years I spent in Pakistan
are less in number than those I’ve spent in Bury Hospital.”

Bibha sorely missed Sheikh Saab and Emily. With them she had
travelled to many corners of the world, tasted multitudinous cuisines. Emily
had taught her to play the piano, while Sheikh Saab had sparked her interest in
electronics and online transactions. Once or twice Sheik Saab had hinted at his
desire to see her married to Parvez, his quiet, businessman son. But Bibha’s
father, alive then, disagreed, and soon after Parvez married a Pakistani girl
and settled in Karachi, his Manchester visits spacing out with time. The only
one among Sheikh Saab’s relatives who showed an interest in settling in
Manchester was Bashir’s son, Bilal. Sheikh Saab sponsored him and for that
Bilal was deeply grateful.

Bibha wished that Bilal and Shaheen were more intellectual.
But while Bilal’s work didn’t permit him to cultivate the finer points of life,
Shaheen was obsessed with Bollywood and Pakistani TV and the good life of the
expatriate. Whether it was Atif Aslam or Rahat Fateh Ali Khan, Shah Rukh or
Salman, Fawad or Mahira, Shaheen lived and breathed popular entertainment. The
latest gossip was at her fingertips.

Now that she had time on her hands, Bibha found herself
surfing YouTube for the latest gossip and feeding it to an eager Shaheen. “I am
listing towards Bilal’s family,” she reminded herself soberly, Bilal and
Shaheen’s simple warmth was so much more attractive than the convoluted
coldness of the Bengali clique.

It was Sarmistha who informed her, “Bibha, have you heard
the latest? ADHM may not release in Manchester. The producers are having
problems with political factions in India over the inclusion of one Pakistani
actor, I forget his name. They want him removed and they want a promise that no
Pakistani actor will ever be taken in an Indian movie.”

“Fawad?” asked Bibha incredulously.

“Yes, that is the name. God knows why they have to court
controversy. It is not as if there’s a dearth of talent among Indian actors.”

Bibha bit her tongue to stop herself from asking Sarmistha
not to be an idiot, to join the crowds of Trafford Centre just once on the
first day-first show of a new release. It was not talent; it was inclusion.
South Asians clamoured for fresh Bollywood releases and the Shaheens of the
world went mad with happiness at a glimpse of their Fawad and Mahira alongside
a Shah Rukh or an Aishwarya. The first thought that troubled Bibha was, did
Shaheen know?

“Auntie, watch them, just watch Fawad and Mahira in Zindagi.
They are so good! And now they are coming to Bollywood! You will come with us,
Auntie, and the treat will be on Bilal. You’ve always been so generous to us,”
Shaheen had urged, her alabaster cheeks flushed apple-red. “My Roshni will be
here in October. First time she is coming after her marriage. We’ll all go
together. It will be one huge party. O, Auntie, I am so, so excited!”

For the past week Bilal and Shaheen had been curiously
silent. The tidal waves of the Uri attacks and surgical strikes had driven a
wedge between friends. The release date was just a fortnight away. What if the
movie didn’t get released? There would be such awkwardness between Shaheen and
herself! How could it be avoided?

It was at that moment that Emily whispered in Bibha’s ear,
“Snatch your bag and coat, lock your door securely and walk away. The space we
created in our lifetime is shrinking fast. You’ll have no place left to plant
your feet. Throw your dice with one of either. That is the only way out.” Bibha
fingered her tab. What should she do? Should she check the bed-and-breakfasts
of Stratford-on-Avon, her favourite getaway, or should she tune in to NDTV to
catch the latest regarding the Indo-Pakistani Bollywood controversy?

Suddenly, Bibha wished she was back in Bhowanipur in the
tiny second-floor flat of her elder brother, the iron-trellised balcony of
which overlooked Bijoli. Life was simpler then. Bibha wiped her tears and kept
her tab aside. Sheikh Saab would have been offended with her sniffling.
“Grapple with the problem, Bibha. Clear the test. The quality of life this
country offers has drawn you to it. Stay back and fight for the space it has
taken a lifetime for you to create.”

Enough mooning, Bibha told herself. If Shaheen didn’t call
her, she would call Shaheen. If ADHM didn’t get released, some other movie
would. They would watch it together. If nothing else, they would all sit in
Shaheen’s living room and watch Fawad and Mahira in Zindagi. Bibha punched
Shaheen’s speed-dial.

By Arpa Ghosh