by ZEHRA JABEEN SHAH
It is a humid and unforgiving summer evening. Tonight, we are not of the blessed. Karachi is encumbered under a dry spell, as the night wombs all air and cool. I am seated next to my best friend, Reja, as we patiently await the Indian classical ensemble that is to play on stage. It’s been a while since I’ve heard any classical music; my days are all-too-consumed with plays by Shakespeare, Marlowe and Pinter, Bulleh and Waris Shah (admittedly, a first-time for the English department), and writing a poem or two and preparing for the end of my literature degree.
“You can enter now!” the student-volunteer guarding the concert hall calls out. I eavesdrop on a private but audible release of breath — Reja, who has lived in Karachi her entire life, is strangely not at all climatised to our city’s heat. I internally grapple with the question of my best friend’s life trajectory as we swiftly capitalise the front row seats.
Inside, I call upon a forgotten god as the night takes an unexpected turn. I may have entered the womb itself. Gulping this foster air, I crowd and shiver. The air conditioner is unremorsefully blowing directly on our faces; I am already cold and now annoyed. Disoriented by the switch, by this make-believe space, this artificial room, a prison of privilege as I know life to be, I turn to have Reja jot down my dramatic complaints, but I find that she is utterly relieved.
She reminds me of a moment. A sacrificial goat that instantly paraded my compact garden as he was let out along with five other arrested goats from the back of the tiniest office van my eyes had ever seen. If I had a choice, would I kill or be murdered? My unrelated and useless thoughts drone through every performance till suddenly, I am struck. It isn’t the climate, this time — or the lack of one — but a paralysing passion. I am, for the first-time during performance, present and feeling within this concert hall. No thoughts, just her.
This is a pivotal point — the very first of an ongoing conversation I am holding with the Indian classical sarangi. This marks the very beginning of my relationship with her.
The decline of the sarangi and its connection to courtesan culture
It is no secret that in present-day Pakistan, the Indian classical sarangi is rapidly in decline. The reasons for this span from an emergence of an overtly pseudo-religious culture, rise in political Islamicisation that thrives on a halal/haraam dichotomy, the lack of interest and social respect for the classical arts, and the poor financial state of a sarangi player. These are some of the major reasons to say the least.
Almost all musicians in Pakistan, however, cite the ‘difficulty’ of the sarangi and the consecutive deaths of the elders (established sarangiyas) as a reason for its decline. The 1980s is usually cited as this period. Although valid, I argue that the sarangi’s decline was in place long before the creation of the State of Pakistan. It was a consequence of a deliberately planned anti-Indian reformist movement that was led by no other than the British colonial establishment. I believe this to be the biggest reason for the sarangi’s decline. It is somehow easier to believe that colonialism would drive its decline than the fact that hardly anyone in Pakistan’s Indian classical music scene would think to mention this and reflect over it.
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