The Seven Queens

The folktales of Sind are numerous and have many fantastical elements. Lal Shahbaz, born Hazrat Sayad Usman Shah Marwandi in Afghanistan in A.H. 538, dropped his kishta, or begging bowl, into the water, and it became a boat. When he and his friends were attacked by a baker's wife who claimed - falsely - that one of their party, Sheikh Farid Shakar Ganj, had tried to outrage her, the saint changed one of his friends into a deer and another into a lion. He then transformed himself into a peregrine falcon, swooped down, and took poor Sheikh Farid to a place of safety, thus earning the moniker the Red Peregrine Falcon of the Indus Valley. When he died, it is believed that streams of molasses, sugar and milk spurted from the walls of his tomb, but when rich and poor rushed greedily to relish these, the disgusted saint made the streams turn dry. All that remains of them, writes C A Kincaid, author of Folk Tales of Sind and Guzerat, first published by The Daily Gazette Press Ltd (Karachi, 1925), "is a group of stones that look exactly like petrified sugar molasses and milk. These the guardians of the shrine shew to wondering pilgrims as proof positive of the legend's truth."As M. de P. Webb wrote (London, December 16, 1924) in the Foreword to C. A. Kincaid's book: "The stories which have been passed on from generation to generation are, like the legends of the West, to some extent, mythical, but no doubt based on actual incidents in the past, which, in the repeated telling, have been added to and embroidered in a way calculated to impress the minds of the simple folk who heard them; and thus their remembrance and transmission to later generations has been assured."Such myths surround the classical poet, Shah Abdul Latif, as well. Latif, who was born in 1668, is said to have turned himself into a pigeon so that he could coo to the beautiful Moghul girl he loved when her father, Mirza Beg, ordered him off the premises. Mirza Beg was not fooled and threatened to set his falcons upon him.The legend of Uderolal makes for another riveting tale. Born in Nassarpur to the family of Rattan Rao Luhana to save Hindus from the despotic governor of Thatta, Marak, Uderolal is said to have transformed from infant to youth to old man in an instant and risen from the river with thousands of soldiers, horsemen, elephants, and chariots. In Sanskrit, 'Udero' means 'the one who has sprung from the waters, and it is believed the child was an incarnation of Lord Varuna. Uderolal's cradle kept swinging on its own - like the waves of the Sindhu (Indus) river, as one commentator, Shewak Nandwani, described it. Uderolal, therefore, also became known as 'Jhulelal' - the swinging child[1] - the popular appellation by which the Ishtadeva is known to Sindhi Hindus in India today.There is much in these stories that our modern mindsets will find hard to accept. But having struggled with this myself, I believe that these folktales are timeless for a reason; they hold a mirror to the one thing that has not changed over the centuries - human nature. These are stories of love and lust, greed and humility, patriotism and deceit, weakness and strength of character - everything that defines our lives as individuals and as communities. That's why I believe they continue to be relevant.They are also an integral part of the rich legacy of Sindhi culture that we began to lose when the Partition of the Indian sub-continent took place. Few Sindhis of my generation in India have grown up listening to these stories. For that reason alone, I believe they deserve to be resurrected.