30 My First Glimpse of Racism

I must have been about 12 years old and lived in an idealized world of my imagination. This idealized world was peopled by characters from the Enid Blyton books: the wonderful school boy tales of Billy Bunter; and the derring do of Biggles and the members of his Squadron! This world of the white man that I had idolized through books came abruptly to an end with an incident at the Gateway of India in Bombay.

My Father always took me on Sundays and holidays to different parts of Bombay – we went mainly by BEST buses, else trams and occasionally suburban trains. On one of these Sunday rambles, we were at the Gateway of India and watching the small boats which were lined-up alongside the steps of the embankment. At one of these spots, I noticed a foreigner who I guessed was a Britisher either staying at the Taj or the nearby Yacht Club, all togged up in tropical dress including khaki shorts and a tee-shirt. I saw this red faced man screaming at a young hapless Indian lad who was trying but failing to moor his boat alongside the steps. And clearly across the water I could hear him holler “you stupid Indian bastard!” This shocked me greatly and at that moment I realized that this white man had a colonial hangover and had no qualms in berating a brown kid for a minor mistake!

This traumatic incident at the Gateway was a Gandhi and Pietermaritzburg moment for me, which made a deep impact and opened my eyes to the prevalence of racial inequalities and racial discrimination in the world. By now I had developed the habit of reading the daily newspaper regularly in-depth. I soon discovered that in South Africa there was state sponsored segregation called Apartheid, where the Coloureds were separated from the Whites whether at play or at work. I read about names like Mandela who was imprisoned because of his fight against Apartheid, and I also learnt about the cricketing ban because of which India refused to play Test Cricket with the Springboks.

Again from the newspapers, I got to know about the Civil Rights movement in the US, and of Dr Martin Luther King where he was spearheading this movement and had a dream of setting his people free. And of the dreaded Ku Klux Klan and the white supremacists. Nearer home, I discovered in our own city of Bombay there was a Club that did not admit Indians but was exclusively for whites – the Breach Candy Club and Swimming Pool! It was astonishing that even after 20 years of Independence there could exist in our own Country an institution which discriminated on the basis of colour.

This first glimpse of racism angered me to a point where I decided at the young age of 12 that never would I migrate to another country come what may and I have kept this promise for the last 55 years or so – even as we shall see in my memoirs when many times I could have solved problems by simply agreeing to migrate overseas. But I did not!