Inside the narrow bylanes of Indra Colony in Jodhpur’s Pratap Nagar, hundreds of artisans sit inside cramped rooms, busily working on leather jootis or embroidering chiffon sarees. Sixty-year-old Ram Chand, a traditional leather shoemaker, sits hunched over a bunch of leather strips, carefully piecing them together with a bowl of home-made glue. His wife Ganga Devi swiftly draws out an accurate oblong shape and hands them over to their son Jetha Nand, who cuts out the shape and passes it to his father. For the past 20 months, this family of eight has spent most of their days doing just this. Traditional shoemakers, Ram Chand and his family migrated from Hyderabad in Sindh last year to escape persecution and find a new life in Rajasthan. Amid worsening law and order, the family decided to move out and, over a period of five years, saved enough to pay for the passage. More than 1.2 lakh such migrants, who have crossed over since 1965, have been granted citizenship while another 15,000 applications are in the pipeline — numbers that give Ram Chand much hope. Having completed 20 months in the state, he now has to spend another 40 before he too is eligible to apply for citizenship. His relatives, who migrated earlier and thereafter got citizenship, stood guarantors for the family as they filed for ‘visit visas’ to Jodhpur, and thereafter helped them settle down and earn a living. Thousands of Hindu Pakistani migrants like Ram Chand are looking forward to a year of new hope. With Home Minister Rajnath Singh and the Rajasthan government sending out positive feelers to the displaced community, activists working for their rehabilitation feel a long-term visa for multiple locations will come as a huge relief for the migrants, who have to travel across cities to find employment. The Home Ministry, in an order issued earlier this month, had made certain changes to rules to make life easier for the migrants. Activist Hindu Singh Sodha, who heads Seemant Lok Sangathan, a group working for the community, said, “If all goes well, we hope to get citizenship status for at least 15,000 migrants in the coming year. We welcome the Home Ministry’s decision to grant long-term visa of five years and permitting multiple location visas. However, there is a long road to be traversed. In our recent meetings with the Home Minister, we have submitted a roadmap for this.” From making ‘Mirza chappals’ in Pakistan, Ram Chand’s family has now taken to crafting ‘leather jootis’ that do brisk business not only in the country but also abroad. Ram Chand, however, has little understanding of the big market. All he worries about is ensuring that at least 28 leather covers are completed by each working person in the family. “We get a paltry Rs 4 per leather cover. With six working members, we manage about Rs 100 per person if those 28 covers are made. Then there are rainy days when no work can be done and no money is earned,” he says, briefly looking up from the job at hand. The finished leather covers are sent out for further assembling. Ram Chand’s parents might have shifted to Sindh after the severe drought in 1935-37 when hundreds of families migrated westwards in search of a livelihood. But he is not sure exactly when they moved. “My father got married in Barmer and shifted to Sindh soon after as there was severe drought in western Rajasthan. I was born in Pakistan. We must have lived there for at least 80 years,” he recalls. “Several of my relatives live in Barmer and Jaisalmer, while many others shifted out from Pakistan to Jodhpur and have since become Indian citizens. My parents too wanted to shift back to India but could not afford to pay for the passports, visas and other expenses.” Having grown up in Sindh, Ram Chand’s Marwari is laden with Urdu. He can barely read or write Hindi and has to depend on friends and relatives for all official paperwork. Over the past few months in this migrant colony, the family has made new friends, participating in social gatherings and weddings. But never once have they forgotten what they left behind. “Not all people are bad in Pakistan. We all miss some of our friends, neighbours and relatives back in Hyderabad. That too was our home. The only difference here is we sleep in peace,” says Jetha Nand.
