Hostile Witness: Palace Talkies

Her only passion back home in Karachi, was watching cinema. So immense was Harneet's shock of leaving her home and people when she arrived by ship from Karachi, she never set foot outside her home in Bycullah. Palace Talkies however, was sharply etched in her memory of Bombay city. Rubina who left her beloved Bombay remained restless on the shores of Karachi. 

Shabbir was 4 when the partition happened, he doesn't remember the riots and the looting, he only remembers blackouts and sirens in Bycullah. The people who left and arrived in ships, he has only heard about them. His parents didn't leave, 'no one would understand marathi there ' his father had said. Shabbir shares a paper thin wall with Chaughle for decades now. The wall is so thin, they can hear the others fears well. For there fears speak in the same language. 

R recalls the afternoon shows her father took her to after visiting the psychiatry ward of Masina. No one acknowledged that R had become a bird. Except for her father.This was many years ago. She now calls herself an old bird and laughs.