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 As promised by the Commissioner Sahib, next day promptly at eight in the morning the Sub-Collector and Assistant Commissioner of Karachi reported at my hotel. I was duly escorted by them in a jeep full of armed guards to the Karachi museum and to the Clifton Shiva temple. Karachi Museum was got opened an hour before, to enable me to visit it without disturbing my official programme, courtesy Commissioner Sahib.
On arrival in the museum I discovered that the Chief Preservation Officer of the Karachi museum was a good friend of our very own Harinarayana (the ex-director of the Madras museum). They were together on various training programmes and International conferences. He took great pains to show me all the rare objects in the collection and made my visit most rewarding. TA visit to the Karachi Museum is a must for all, since it houses all the archeological finds of the Indus Valley Civilization. It also has an enormous collection of objects made from the site of the ancient Buddhist University of India at Texshila. I had no idea that so much of ancient Indian culture and heritage is hidden in Karachi museum. The pride of the place goes to the largest collection of Buddhist sculptures belonging to the Gandhara School of Art. It is the Indo-Greek school of art which flourished in this region with Indian and Greek cultures coming together (an unintended contribution from the acts of Alexander, the Great).
Amongst the Indus Valley collection I was delighted to see the Priest of Mohanjodaro. Originally Karachi Museum housed the entire Indus Valley Collection. It is a freak chance that half of the collection is today in India. As luck would have it a part of the Indus Valley collection was on an exhibition tour to other states of India at the time of partition. After partition what was in India remained in India and what was in Pakistan remained in Pakistan. As a result, I was told jokingly by the museum director, that the Dancing girl was separated from the Priest. He also said that they were happy to retain the Priest as he resembles any present day mulla in Pakistan and felt India was a better place for the dancing girl (dancing is not encouraged in Islamic countries). The dancing girl and other Indus Valley Artifacts never came back to Karachi and are now housed in the National Museum at New Delhi.
This museum also has an amazing collection of coins. The coins of Harsha, Ashoka, Chandragupta and early Muslim dynasties like Slave, Lodhi, Tuglak and Mugal, which we cannot see in any museum of India, is well preserved and well presented in Pakistan. The collection includes many gold coins. There is an excellent display of rare books of calligraphy and a collection of the Holy Koran manuscripts in different styles of calligraphy in different languages of the world. There are also a number of miniature versions of the Holy Koran. This museum also has an excellent section on Islamic art. As a parting gift, the authorities of the museum very kindly gave me a replica of the Priest of Mohanjodaro and a head of the Buddha from the Gandhara School of Art. On my return I placed the priest in the room of the Chief Secretary and Buddha on the writing table of my husband where they stayed for many years.
Earlier my hosts took me to the Shiva temple at Clifton. Azra also accompanied me. It was a familiar experience for me as if I was in a district in Tamil Nadu visiting a temple accompanied by the fellow officers. The temple of Shiva at Clifton is a very ancient one. I had to visit it as my mother, grand mother and the great grand mother had all visited it. It is largely underground in a cave like structure. It does not have any ancient carvings but it has the marble statues of Shiva, Nandi and other deities and pictures of Gods and Goddesses. Shri Maliji is the priest of the temple. He looks like any other Pakistani and wears a salwar suit. He lives alone in the temple while his family lives in a neighbouring village. On Mondays rice and dal (lentils) are cooked and the hundreds of devotees who visit the temple partake of the community meal. There are several thousand Hindus living in Karachi. Most of them are engaged in small businesses. Several Hindu families live in remote villages in Sindh and Baluchistan.
Our host Commander Nassim narrated a story to me. He had earlier been the Commissioner of Baluchistan. According to him there were a lot of Hindu traders in the tribal belt of Baluchistan. They were well protected by the tribal chiefs. Once when a Hindu household was robbed, the entire tribe collected money and paid it to the robbed family, as a compensation, in front of the Commissioner Sahib. When I was eating Kulfi and Faluda in a restaurant called Sunshine Restaurant I was told that it belonged to a Hindu family. While travelling on the Karachi flight, I met three Hindu families going back to their native villages in Pakistan after visiting pilgrim centres in India. I saw their Hindu names when they requested me to fill in their immigration forms. One thing I felt very sad about was that on this flight there were several illiterate persons traveling both from Indian and Pakistani side. I myself filled the forms for about ten persons. On my return journey from Karachi I met some very excited nuns who were on their maiden visit to India. They were headed for Goa and for the church of Bom Jesus. They informed me that in their convent in Karachi many Hindu children were studying. There are also many Christian and Parsi families in Karachi. Pakistan has reservation for minorities like Hindus, Parsis and Christians in the legislative bodies.
(Concluded)
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