Book Review | Pick your battles honestly to survive city of fire

“In the modern age, the toughest battle for most of us… is simply to discover our battles.” And, for the author, born and raised in Aligarh, the battle was not merely one of staying alive during the sporadic riots that erupted in blood and flames across his city, but also the continuous negotiation between religious identity, ghettoisation, “othering” and the necessary living of life like anyone else with all its flow and routine of study, festivity, joys and aspirations.

Children living amidst conflict — whether in Syria, Gaza or, closer home, Aligarh — caught in a cross-fire of religious ideologies and hatred — soon learn what it is to be on alert all the time.  They know that someone who has been a part of their everyday lives, the grocer, or the vegetable seller, can, in a terrifying instant, point you out to a mob baying for blood and then, if you happen to survive those chilling moments, go back to being your friendly neighbourhood grocer or vegetable seller once more a few days later. This seemingly incomprehensible schism in personalities is almost as normal as the constant look-out for trouble every day or stray incidents of violence that one hears about and forgets.  

From the narrow, tortuous lanes of Upar Kot (christened cheekily ‘UK’ by the author), Farsh Manzil, to his home, “on the unofficial line of control between two adjacent Hindu and Muslim ghettos… a point where two universes intersected…” that would also be seared in the blaze of hatred, and the genteel neighborhood of Civil Lines where homeowners nonetheless refuse to rent out rooms upon hearing a “Mohameddan” name — the book describes the contrasts while showcasing a remarkably honest lookback at how life, families and communities shape minds and mindsets. 

The story of the author is inevitably woven into the story of the city. His account can be seen to mirror the experience of hundreds of others — people who only want to live peacefully with their families and neighbours, earn a decent livelihood and enjoy some simple pleasures of life on the land where their ancestors are buried.  

It is also a telling account of how decent people can sometimes be pushed into bigoted and violently extremist positions. There is also a fairly detailed look at the psychological aspects of what constitutes a mob and the manner in which it behaves. The memoir also has notes for those seeking more information on some of the events.

The language is chiseled and shorn of ornamental flourishes that would only have been a distraction.  The similes, all too often, bring in the riot trope, understandably perhaps, and can be quite vivid — “rickshaw as crowded as a hospital after a riot”; “burning with anger like shops did during riots”; markets going back to normal “like a sinner looking for penance”; politicians arriving “robed in saffron like moths after a rainy day”; “rumours… would hover in the air like houseflies on a drain”. But sometimes their use strikes one as excessive and an escape of the author from examining his own thoughts.  

The reviewer, Malati Mathur, was a professor of English. She is an award-winning translator and presently a fellow at the Indian Institute of Advanced Study, Shimla.

City on Fire

By Zeyad Masroor Khan

HarperCollins

pp. 294; Rs 599