Azam’s memoir explores the complexities of partition, highlighting loss, reunion, cultural exchange, and the power of human connection in a family’s journey across borders, exclusively for Different Truths.

Read More here https://www.differenttruths.com/love-across-borders-a-familys-journey-in-time-and-traditions-part-two/

BAD-DAD AND UNCLE Choudhry Mohammed Hussein, his boss, weren’t just content with a sumptuous tea party to reset our emotional equilibrium. They took the necessary steps for us to be able to claim a semblance of partial victory over defeat for the sake of our life-long mental health.

Cashing in favours, they cajoled and bullied an exit and entry visa for one-mum and two children for India, though not Kashmir. The family from Kashmir would come down to Indian Punjab. Although we would not be able to visit one-mum’s parental home on Residency Road, Jammu, we would be able to meet our blood relatives. It was some sort of a bureaucratically paranoid one-parent-two-children type exit visa, also ensuring that Bad-dad and bhaijan staying back would guarantee against any hanky-panky us three might get up to in India. Or, if it was all five of us, we might just cross the border and announce our defection!