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Sunrise over Valivade

Growing up in the Sindhi Refugee Camp in Kolhapur

Susheel Gajwani

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An important book, a record of the time after Partition, when the Sindhi community began the rebuilding of their lives in refugee camps.
Jerry Pinto
Sunrise over Valiwade is an eye-opener. The widespread image of Sindhis in India has always been of savvy, well-to-do businessmen. Here we get a poignant glimpse into the lives of a people, now without means, displaced from their ancestral homes and made to settle in a new land at the mercy of those who already occupied it. It is a universal story, told with compassion. One can only imagine that it mirrors the story of refugees on the other side of every border, in the man-made tragedy of Partition.
Anand Patwardhan

About Sunrise over Valivade

This memoir, emerging from the well-populated yet little-known Gandhinagar Refugee Camp at Valiwade, Kolhapur, tells a story of heartbreak and devastation met with resilience and determination. It brings to light a history obscured by time, and the remarkable feats of ordinary men and women who adapted swiftly to their tragic loss and displacement, continuing to strive with all their might, to secure a better future for the generations that followed. Poignancy weaves through this narrative, connecting rejection with reconciliation, loss of cultural heritage with relentless efforts to rebuild lives of comfort and dignity, and the past with the present. Sindhis are seen all around the world – generally well settled and prosperous. Their presence is invariably taken for granted, their origins seldom considered, or understood, or even acknowledged. They are often reduced to shallow caricatures, moulded into a onedimensional monolith. Books like this allow the rich, multi-layered reality to emerge.

About the author

Susheel Gajwani is a writer, speaker and filmmaker, well-known for his columns, radio shows and performance poetry.

AakhreenTrain – The Last Train, his fourteenth feature film, is a Sindhi film based on the memoirs of well-known Sindhi writer Thakur Chawla, and put together by an inspired team including Shobha Lalchandani, Anil Chawla, Barkha Khushalani, Goldie Gajwani and Shashi Gajwani. It has been greatly appreciated in India, the US, and other countries where the Sindhi diaspora is spread.

His performance Roots – The Time Travellers is a musical based in Sindhi Partition poetry and its performances in English, Sindhi, Hindi, Punjabi and Marathi have been widely appreciated. It has evolved into Roots – a Million Dollar Confidence Musical, and continues to expand its horizons by including Partition poetry from around the world.

A Mumbai University double postgraduate in English Literature and Human Resources, and a Doordarshan Producer for seven years, Susheel Gajwani ran Money Satellite Television Channel as its Founder and Vice President. Money Television was India’s first Business Television Channel.

Susheel Gajwani played the high-performance role of lawyer-detective Bagu Barrister in the Sindhi feature film Anand Kripalani jo Murder, directed by renowned Sindhi author-filmmaker Bineeta Nagpal, and produced by Doordarshan.

A Rotary Foundation Technical Fellowship Recipient to study American media at New York University, Susheel Gajwani conducts life skills training workshops in Human Resources Development, Communication Skills, and Emotional Intelligence.

He continues to write on life skills and other topics in English, Hindi and Marathi newspapers.

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Sunrise over Valivade

Growing up in the Sindhi Refugee Camp in Kolhapur

Susheel Gajwani

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Eyyy Nirvashya!

For me, that first visit to Kolhapur with my father, was a step into the outside world. A step out of our safe haven. It was the first time I saw that the world actually belonged to others and that we were aliens.

It’s not as if I had never seen any people who lived in this area before. But inside the camp, the sanitation workers and camp officials were functionaries. The villagers from whom we purchased farm vegetables, so very different from the residents of the camp, may have seemed peculiar to a child’s perception, but they were an essential and well-accepted part of our lives. We took them for granted, accepted them as they were. But that day when I went to Kolhapur for the first time with my father, and on subsequent trips, I gradually came to understand that my planet was just a pinpoint in the larger world. And we were aliens, sometimes feared, often mocked, too frequently resented.

That word, Nirvashya, in particular, spitted out with venom, never failed to make me feel disgraced, and inflame me with anger. It happened many times but the one I remember most, the one which had a lasting impact on my life, was the day I was returning home after an evening of badminton with my friend Suresh M. Doshi at the Residency Club.

My family was now well settled. By 1963, we had a shop of our own in Shivaji Market: Bajomal, Parchomal & Brothers. There were many other similar shops, and we had good relationships with both the Hindu and Muslim shopkeepers. My family continued dealing in onions and potatoes, ginger and garlic, and as their goodwill in the market grew, were able to include mangoes in the season and other commodities. They bought potatoes and onions in wholesale from Talegaon and Lonand, both in the Pune district, as well as from Metupal and Hassan in Karnataka, and sold them in retail in Kolhapur.

We had purchased a building in the Gangavesh area of Kolhapur, jointly with members of our extended family, so that we could live in close proximity with our loved ones. It was close to the area traditionally occupied by the dairy businesspeople and their herds of buffaloes. The thick, creamy, delicious milk from those buffaloes is one of the most beautiful memories of my childhood! Such a treat for the senses – and so different from the experience of standing in line for milk in the refugee camp.

That day, after the game, I was walking home, wheeling my bicycle, when I was stopped by a havildar.

“Where is the light?”

“It fell off.”

“But your cycle has to have a light!”

“Yes, I know, that’s why I’m walking and not riding it!”

He began shouting, abusing me, insisting that he was right and I had no business to argue with a policeman. And then he used that word.

“Nirvashya! Saala Nirvashya.”

“Don’t call me that!”

He hit me with his stick, spitting it out again, “Saala Nirvashya!”49

“Don’t call me that you bastard!”

He hit me again.

And again.

And again, until I stopped protesting.

 

At sixteen, I got admission to Inter Science at Rajaram College in Kolhapur. I was no longer a refugee, certainly not a despicable refugee.

Yes, my family were exiled from our ancestral homeland, for no fault of theirs. Absolutely no fault of theirs. For a time they were displaced; a people who had lost everything. Even to call them refugees was wrong, because they were in their own country. Indeed, many Sindhis refused to accept the label ‘refugee’ and the government coined the phrase ‘Displaced Persons’. These displaced persons, the Sindhis, started all over again, worked hard, used their business expertise, and in time began doing well and did their best to integrate.

But to the havildar, and so many others like him, we would always be Nirvashya. In moments of anger, hatred, spite, bitterness – the ugly prejudice would spill over and come pouring out of them.

I was not a refugee. But if he had to classify me as one, it may have hurt less if he had used the word Sharnarthi, slightly more respectful, slightly more genteel.

The havildar converted the incident into a case against me.

I was put into a lockup. I had raised a hand against a policeman on duty.

My family paid bail.

The case took six months of my life. It was torture. I was cleared of all charges, and the havildar was suspended for a few days, but that was little consolation. I was distracted from my studies.

It was a difficult time for my family, but my parents supported me with kindness and generosity.

I became a tough and aggressive person – very aggressive. You could say that the people of Kolhapur may have reduced the frequency with which they used the word Nirvashya frequently in a derogatory way partly due to the aggression I and some of the other Sindhi youngsters showed. It may have helped that my brother Shashi, at the age of sixteen, had started working in the editorial department of Pudhari, one of the most popular newspapers of the region.

Shashi had begun writing in Marathi when he was still in school. It came naturally to him because he read magazines and papers in Marathi, loved the language, and began writing poetry in Marathi. He made friends in literary circles who appreciated his interest, and encouraged him, and he started getting published in mainstream publications like Maratha, Swarajya, Pudhari. This he did as a hobby, because education was very important to our family and, while we both worked with our father in the dukaan all through those years and the years to come, we continued our education.

I had played cricket for my school, St Xavier’s School, Kolhapur. This was due to a very lucky opportunity given to me by a fellow student, Rajsinh Khardekar. I would sit watching the cricket wistfully every day, and one day, out of the blue, he called out to me and told me to take his place. He was invariably put into the position of wicketkeeper batsman but Raj was a good fast bowler too, and was keen on using his bowling talent for the team.

One day he called out to me.

“Do you like wicketkeeping?” he asked.

I said, “Yes, Raj.”

“So why don’t you step in for me?”

“Sure, Raj.”

I agreed happily, and thrived in the position he vacated for me. We became friends. And in time, I became captain of the school cricket team.

 

Despite my record as a crack wicketkeeper for my school team, I faced a hostile attitude in college and was rejected by the university team. Why? Perhaps because it was clear from my surname that I was a Sindhi. How could a Gajwani represent Maharashtra, how could that be possible?

After the lathi incident, I told my father that I had to leave this place. He agreed to send me to Chandigarh to study. And in Chandigarh, I did play for the university. Yes, a Gajwani represented Punjab!

Living in Punjab was a healing experience for me. I felt closer to my roots than I ever had before. I could understand the language effortlessly. I remember the first time I had lunch with my DAV College classmate Ashok Singhi’s family. His grandmother asked me, “Puttar, teraa dhidh bharyaa eh? – Son, did you eat well? Is your stomach full?” Dhidh is also dhidh in Sindhi; puttar is puttra in Sindhi.

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