Love across the border

‘A book of verses underneath the bough, a jug of wine, a loaf of bread – and thou, beside me singing in the wilderness, oh, wilderness were paradise enow!’
This verse from the Rubaiyyat says it all for those in love. To be in the warm company of your lover is akin to being in sync with the lord above and nature below. Love knows no barriers, no boundaries, it knows no colour or creed, all it knows is the heart beating to the sound of the other.But at times, lovers can be unfortunate and fall victim to anger, noise and frustration...
Down generations, many couples from India and Pakistan have fallen in love. While celebrity romances have made headlines, there are numerous other ordinary people who are lost in the annals of time. While some have courageously fought fate and ended up marrying their lovers from that side of the fence, some have given up hope, and some times life, of ever meeting.
Take the case of Javed Khan, originally from Peshawar in Pakistan, who grew up in the same lane as Zeenat Azim. The two only realized their love for each other after the India Pak fallout in 1947, when it was time for Zeenat’s family to move to India. Javed even traced Zeenat to present day Meerut, but he reached there a year too late as Zeenat was by then married off to Imran Shaikh. Embittered and lost, Javed returned home. Today he is married with three kids, but still remembers Zeenat with a tear in his eye.
There are numerous such poignant stories and very few with happy endings. It is bad enough that the nations had to be divided, what is even worse is that lovers have been separated, their love nipped in the bud.
Can there never be peace for people in love? Do they always have to tread carefully as they tread on someone’s dreams...?
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