Reclamation

“How were we to know that it would stop being Pakistan in 1971 and turn into Bangladesh instead?” He left me with a question to ponder over on my way back home in a city that stretches out in directions I wonder if I ever will venture towards. I’ve had a small life in this big city by the sea which some say was named after an old woman, Mai Kolachi from the fisherfolk community—the forgotten indigenous people languishing by the sea as the city was taken over by everyone that came from outside—people like my own family. 

When I was a kid, I knew we were Biharis. What I don’t remember is the first time I felt ashamed for being one. Was it when I first heard someone say, “Jo na katay aari se, woh katay Bihari se?” (What cannot be chopped by an axe, can be slashed by a Bihari) Or when I was told, “Aik Bihari sab pe bhaari?” (One Bihari overpowers all) Or when my latent Bihari accent slipped out at school and my classmates laughed at me for speaking that way? 

Once, when I was at university, I went to Sea View with two other Bihari friends of mine. As we walked along the wet grey shore of soft cushiony sand, baby waves crashing at our bare feet, I started talking in the stereotyped Bihari way of speaking, poking fun at my friend who refused to call herself Bihari simply because her mother was Punjabi. “Sarmeenwa, tum kaahe nahi maanti ke tum bhi hamra log ki tarha Bihari ho?” (“Sharmeen, why don’t you accept that you, like us, are Bihari?”) I asked her why she refuses to acknowledge her Bihari identity from her dad’s side of the family. She laughed and attempted to respond using the same accent, although in a completely botched manner, confirming how quickly this sweet way of speaking was going to become extinct by assimilation.

Growing up in a country that made me feel inferior for simply belonging to a certain community, I quickly learned to mask my Bihari identity behind unaccented Urdu and even better English. It took me 23 years and moving across the border to study and live in India to embrace my roots. Suddenly, the Bihari accent was music to my ears every time I heard someone speak in it—be it an auto-rickshaw driver or a fellow student in my university. No longer did I feel ashamed as I proudly told everyone that my family came from Bihar. For the first time, I could tell people that my father was born in the Bhagalpur district of Bihar and my mother was born in Khulna, when Bangladesh was still East Pakistan. For the first time, despite disclosing my connection to Bihar, I wasn’t ridiculed—only celebrated for once being a part of India and then returning to it, in a moment of full circle. Thus began my journey to reclaim my Bihari-ness. 

It wasn’t easy at first. When I met my now ex-husband for the first time, whose family were proud Dehlvis—a surname given to those who come from Delhi—I was asked by a relative of theirs from UP where I was from ‘peechay se’ (behind)—a common way of asking where one’s roots lie. Taking the opportunity to own my Bihari identity, I announced that my family was from Bihar. In response, I was met with a visible look of disapproval. At that moment, I felt that old feeling of shame rise to the surface; this time however, I did not let them get to me. Despite having my Urdu constantly corrected by self-proclaimed patrons of the language around me—the Delhi and UP wallahs—I marched on. 

Soon, writing not only became a weapon for my resistance but also my path to reclamation: resistance against the status quo of those who made me feel small for not speaking my mother tongue the way they deemed correct; and, reclamation of my Bihari heritage that I used to desperately hide. This gives me hope despite the fears of putting myself as well as my family at risk of being told that we are not Pakistanis, the next time we go to renew our National Identity Cards (NICs) or passports, owing to our Muhajir (immigrant) status.