Daily Times

Tariq Baloch Sehrai acted upon the advice of the famous writer Bano Qudsia to write every day, even if it was writing one sentence.

He also acted upon the advice of Bano’s husband, writer Ashfaq Ahmad to throw bread pieces on the seashore daily in order to attract fish. So by following this simile, writing daily, the creativity dawned upon him continuously. Tariq Baloch has therefore come up with a short story book titled Sawal Ki Maut (The Death Of A Question) published by Sang-e-Meel Publications, Lahore. Bano also observed that one may have come across many people who never get tired of talking about them but Tariq Baloch is not one like that. He desists doing that. Instead he is full of respect for his elders. The first short story ‘Zarf’ (valence) revolves around a youngster taking the advice of an elder on the concept of love. The advice is not to love unless you have the temperament to absorb disappointments wholeheartedly otherwise you shall keep on wondering all your life as to where you went wrong.

The second story ‘Hijrat Ka Sikander’ is also related to the theme of the first story. On a query to an elder by a youngster as to how to become the conqueror of the world like Sikander, the elder tells the youngster that America was spending billions to maintain supremacy over the world. If it were to spend half of that amount on the poverty alleviation of poor countries, it could rule the hearts of the poor. He argued that he too wanted to conquer the world like Sikander did but if that were to be; it would be at a very high cost. So the youngster should not sell anything at a price that is less than the price of love. The third story ‘Kuta Race’ is about keeping the link alive with your fellow beings by remaining in continuous touch with them. When a kid, the writer remembered sitting with Baba Illahi Bukhsh on way from school and listen to his conversation. He did not understand the logic behind most of his conversation then but now when he recalls it, he is astonished at the strength of reasoning Baba had offered. As regarding advancement in society, he used to call it Kuta Race (dog race). His logic was that whoever won had to be a dog as it was a dog race. Turning to another common face prevalent in our society, the writer talks about ‘Ashraf Malang’ and tries to extract wisdom from such persons who are considered either autistic or abnormal. Because of the selection of such uncommon themes, Dr Muhammad Kamran finds Tariq Baloch Sehrai a unique writer.

The love for one’s mother is considered next to the love for God. The writer recalls love of her mother and her beloved Neelum whom he could not marry as both knew in advance as to what was the problem with him. The story ‘Aleem-o-Khabeer’ revolves around this theme. This reviewer remembers a quote by Kyung-Sook Shin, “You realise that you habitually thought of Mom when something in your life was not going well, because when you thought of her it was as though something got back on track, and you felt re-energised.” The story of ‘Janazgah’ (graveyard mosque) deals with the anxiety and depression inherited by Zeeshan from the unhappy life of his parents and he always felt as if there was a graveyard inside him. He refused Sadia for marriage as he did not want them to lead another unhappy life. Tariq Baloch Sehrai seems to be a perturbed soul as he looks for thorns where ever he finds flowers. This can be deciphered from most of the short stories in the book under review.

In the short story ‘Sawal Ki Maut’, Akhlaq Qureshi buys a call girl Chambeli for a night but not to sleep with her but to speak his heart out to her. He speaks of his frustrations but during the conversation he questions Chambeli as to what was she missing in life. She responded that she missed love and security in her life which she could never get hold of. He said that the problem with women was that they could distinguish between love and sympathy. A woman needed to confront a man if she were to acquire love. Secondly she could only have a choice to pick either freedom or security. The following day’s newspaper gave the story that Chambeli had found refuge in ‘Dar ul Amaan’ (house for destitute women). Perhaps that is why Dr Kamran stated that the writer himself posed a question and the answer was readily available with him.