In Retrospect: From Gurgaon to Bedian

Retrospection can be a good thing, as good as introspection – and sometimes even as bad! Everyone looks back into the past to learn; sometimes to avoid mistakes and sometimes to repeat beneficial deeds.

Some people also like looking into the past and question, ‘What if A did not happen, or B happened instead of A?’ I know one such person. He’s my father. Quite frequently he looks back, usually when he notices a mistake or something going wrong there (in retrospect of course), and propounds that if the mistake hadn’t been made things would have been so much better.

I personally never get this reasoning, especially when the (new) consequences are altered. Mind you, I have no issues with the idea that consequences can definitely be affected by changing even the slightest of historical facts. But knowing exactly what the consequences would be; that I surely have a problem with! The simple reason being that one fact doesn’t exist in isolation, it’s a complex of innumerable facts, most of which are unknown, that determine the progress of history, and, in fact, are part of history itself.

I learn this much clearly today. Especially when I see the world change so fast; even more so when majority of the paradigms (developed by so many humans) that chalk out a path of ‘progress’, are falling flat on their face – like frog rain!

Nicholas Nassim Taleb gives an interesting insight into the reasons behind this flawed reasoning. Do check out his work.
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A few days back me and my dad went to Bedian to get our land measured and demarcated properly. We are thinking of building our last and final abode there (there is a very interesting story to all this, but I will share some other day; the topic of today is a bit different).
For this task we had to utilize the services of the local Patwari.

First of all it was interesting to see how the Patwari pulled out this huge map, made on a piece of cloth, which had property demarcations of the entire village (Mauzaa). It seemed as if we were out on a treasure hunt!

But more significant, for this piece, is the fact that he, along with an entire family of near relatives, had migrated from India at the time of partition. They come from this place called Gurgaon, which, just like Bedian, is a suburb of Delhi.

Now I have visited Delhi, and I have (almost) visited Gurgaon. The suburb is blooming like anything: huge malls, Cineplex’s, beautiful apartment and residential complexes with state of the art infrastructure – a truly modern place (I am afraid I have nothing to compare it with inside Pakistan).

When I mentioned this fact to the Patwari, he was amazed, and the very next thing he said was that ‘had we not migrated, we would have been billionaires by now’, as they owned hundreds of acres in that locality. While in reality, he earns max Rs. 10,000/- a month, and then some ‘additional’ income (he is a very important person nonetheless) with which he has been able to purchase a Suzuki Mehran.

It is this statement of his which got me thinking about what I wrote earlier. ‘Maybe he is right, maybe things would have been different, but I can’t be so sure if he would have been a billionaire, or even very well off. I really wish he would have, but there are just too many factors involved here.’

History is always a chain of cause and effects. A change in one single cause/effect in the chain can alter the entire course of subsequent causes and effects. And then add to that a complex of causes and effects interacting simultaneously at a certain point in time. One just can’t figure out the changes which would have taken place instead (of what actually happened), unless, of course, we can account for each an every detail of the process, which, for any sane individual, is almost near impossible.

I sometimes ask myself: ‘What if this partition hadn’t taken place?’ ‘What if Jinnah had lived another 5 years?’ ‘What if laziness combined with evil opportunism, were not the foundations of Pakistani culture?’ ‘What if the industrial revolution and the renaissance had come in South Asia?’ … and so on and so forth!

There are just too many trajectories to come out from a single alteration in historical facts. But then I ask myself… Why the hell do I need to figure all this out in the first place? This kind of retrospection seems to be nothing but a waste of time, and mental energy!
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So what was the point of all this?

I guess it makes me accept present reality as a consequence of the past. It makes me understand that what’s done is done and that no one can change that. But most importantly, it further strengthens my urge to work for the future, learning from the past but not indulging in it just for the sake of an intellectual joyride.

Let those who can relate to the finer aspects of what I say, utilize this realization and avoid wasting time in the future … this is a personally learnt lesson, if you get what I am saying

Tags: Bedian, Delhi, Gurgaon, Lahore, Retrospection