Unity day: In a tide of crimson Ajrak, Sindh’s culture celebrated

People stream into Karachi to party for a third year running.

A corner of Saddar turned into a sea of red, black and white as hundreds of people gathered at the press club from across the province to celebrate Sindhi Cultural Day on Saturday.

They were all swathed in the indigo block-printed Ajrak, patko and Sindhi topis with smiles to match. Women, children, folk singers, nationalists and political party activists all mingled simply as Sindhis as they danced and sang to popular folk music.

People from Dadu, Umarkot, Tharparkar, Khairpur Mirs, Ghotki, Thatta and other areas travelled to Karachi for the event that was organised by the culture department in collaboration with different forums.

A colossal stage blocked the road and folk singers such as Ahmed Mughal, Sanwal and Marwal went up to perform as the crowd partied down below. There was no organised programme - people filtered in and out as the festivities continued through the night and into the next day. The crowd cheered with the arrival of every popular personality and sporadically broke into dancing as music blared from giant speakers. Different pockets of people went about their own little spontaneous choreographies all adding to the celebratory atmosphere.

Deputy Speaker Shehla Raza, MNA Qadir Patel, Bashir Qureshi, Zafar Baloch and others addressed the audience.

Groups of women camped out on the street corners around the KPC as their children frolicked around, breaking into the occasional ho jamalo. “I did not dance at my son’s wedding but here I can’t control myself. I own this day,” declared Masi Sanjha from Malir.

A dozen students from Larkana swirled about in white dresses, caps and ajraks. “We want to convey the message of peace on this day to all the people of the country especially those of Karachi,” announced Ghulam Murtaza, a student from Larkana. This day shows the unity among us as well, he observed. There is no tribal gap and we celebrate it above caste and creed.

Sixty-year-old Punhal Soomro travelled all the way from Dadu. “There was hatred among different tribes but the cultural day has changed this,” she said. “I celebrated this day in my village last year but this time I want to see how attached the people of Karachi are with their traditional dresses.”

An elderly Fatima was part of the group dressed in the elaborate Rajastani dress. Each of these women wore an eye-popping colourful skirt with bangles running all the way up to their shoulders.

Sindhi Cultural Day has been celebrated for the last three years and is generally scheduled to fall in the first week of December. This year it has been moved up to November because of Muharramul Harram.

As expected, no political activist passed up an opportunity to promote their group and supporters of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement, Pakistan Peoples Party, Sindh Taraqi Pasand, Jeay Sindh Qaumi Mahaz, Katchi Rabita Committee, the banned Peoples Aman Committee and others raised their flags and chanted in favour of their leadership.

In Hyderabad, though many political parties and television channels had set up camps and stages equipped with music systems, it was the stage outside the press club that stole the show.

Though the turnout seemed lower than that of last year, a half kilometre long road was flooded by people wearing colourful clothes and caps with the same crimson Ajrak.

In Mithi, a motorcycle rally was held to celebrate the day.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 20^th, 2011.