In Search of Peace

By Rani Dagar Khan

After the 9/11 attacks, friends belonging to different faiths come together to spread their vision of peace. When a young Jewish woman befriends a Muslim woman to expose the hidden political agenda, they are looked upon with suspicion and labeled as traitors. Can they make a difference to bring about a change in the minds of people? Will they be successful in bringing an ever lasting peace in the world, where terror and wars remain the order of the day?

Based on real-life events, the author takes you on a journey to unmask the hidden secrets of masters of deception. Religion is just a pretext. A shocking revelation about population control will make you think, are we being misled under the guise of war on terror?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Partridge Publishing India
• Release date: Jun 29, 2015
• ISBN: 9781482850437

Rani Dagar Khan

Rani Dagar Khan is a self-proclaimed writer. Her passion for writing started at an early age, when she had scripted a short play for her class in her school days. She is a New Age writer who expresses her thoughts in a simplistic way, without using big words so that people with basic education can understand her work. Rani also tried her hand in fashion designing for almost a decade, but her passion to write made her give up the fashion industry so that she could pursue her passion. Her mother belonged to the royal family of Rampur, and her father was the famous, world-renowned Dhrupad artist.

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In Search of Peace

RANI DAGAR KHAN

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Copyright © 2015 by Rani Dagar Khan.

ISBN:      Hardcover      978-1-4828-5044-4

                Softcover        978-1-4828-5045-1

                eBook              978-1-4828-5043-7

This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, names, incidents, organizations, and dialogue in this novel are either the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Partridge India

000 800 10062 62

www.partridgepublishing.com/india

CONTENTS

Yasmen

Reema

Melanie

Pooja

Rachael

Yasmeen Khan

Rachael

Yasmeen

Rachael

Yasmeen

Mumbai.

Rachael

Melanie

Pooja

Reema

Yasmeen

Rachael

Yasmeen

Media

Yasmeen

Reema

Melanie

Pooja

Yasmeen

Srinagar

Pahalgam And Gulmarg

Rachael

Yasmeen

Yasmeen / Rachael

Rachael

Yasmeen

Rachael

Yasmeen

The Show

YASMEN

MUMBAI.

My world revolved around love, I was living in a dream world, far away from reality.

The kind of love I was looking for did not exist. I loved to romanticize with the idea of love; in fact I loved to be in love, with the concept of love.

I was in a spiritual trance; in awe of the Almighty, being in love with the Creator was Heavenly, it was pure magic!

I sat myself down on the couch in the balcony with a hot mug of coffee, the sun was setting and the view was awesome, I had often painted this picturesque splendor in my teenage years, now, I was a self proclaimed writer with a lot of passion, often expressing myself through poems and my thoughts.

After penning down my poetic expressions, I read it out loud, it sounded okay, yet, mere words were not enough to glorify the Creator’s creation, I was only stating the obvious.

I was still under His spell, in love with Him, wanting to see Him, wanting to talk with Him, but I was not a Prophet nor a saint to experience divinity; I was just an ordinary mortal, hoping for some divine revelations and intervention for a peaceful existence.

I was gifted with intuitive powers, so I thought; I often tried to make good use of it, the one thing which I wanted the most was, peace for the entire universe.

Ammi was a sweetheart, she pretended to be tough, but was a softie at heart, all moms are, so was mine. I was a mom too, but I was different; I was a hip mom to my two adorable kids; Ayesha, my five year old daughter and Amin my three year old son.

I had been insanely in love with Tabrez, our so called love marriage was a disaster.

We were two completely different individuals. I was this dreamy eyed naive girl and he was the sex only kind of a man; our kids were the only saving grace to a rotten relationship, needless to say love flew out sooner than later and I walked out.

There was no question of custody battles, as Tabrez was more than happy to be a bachelor once again. He did not want the baggage of kids to hamper any of his future sexepades. He was ecstatic to be a free and available man to satisfy his ‘lusty appetite’ all over again.

I was happy to have my kids! Ammi was my rock of Gibraltar she had embraced me with open arms, when I had landed at her doorstep with my two kids. I had nowhere to go. Although she had tried to patch things up between Tabrez and me for the sake of the kids, but it did not work. We were still married legally, but lived our separate lives.

The kids had been disturbed initially, but later they had adjusted very well at ammi’s peaceful home; my birth home, my heaven on earth. Ammi adored and loved the kids, the two had become the means of her existence. As for me, I was once again ‘me’

This was my world.

Abbu had died when I was a little girl and Ammi had decided not to remarry; I was the only child, hence I was a bit pampered, but not spoilt. I went to the best school in Mumbai. Weekends were for religious studies but I had the freedom to tell the maulana to give me a break if my heart was not in it. Ammi believed that there was no compulsion in religion, to my good luck I had a religious teacher who held similar views as well. I was truly blessed.

Reema and Melanie were my school buddies; I had met Pooja during our school trip to Kashmir, that was the beginning of a new friendship and then there was Rachael, an American/Israeli who had moved out of Israel and had settled in America, she was always on the move. I was more than happy to have my set of friends, in this age and time people found it difficult to even vouch for a single friend, I was lucky to have my gang of girls.

My friends had decided to come over, besides Rachael, who was in America, the rest would be spending the day at my place. I was looking forward to being with them, ammi along with anu bi were busy preparing biryani and kebabs for them and the kids were very excited, they loved my friends.

REEMA

Reema was an executive in a beauty salon, she was religious and spiritual; she was drawn towards Sufi teachings and had often found solace in it. Sufism had a divine spiritual affect on her, it gave her peace of mind, connecting her with the Almighty.

She worked in a salon as a beauty consultant; she loved to make people look and feel beautiful; she had always connected inner and outer beauty with spirituality, it was no surprise then, that she had chosen this profession.

Melanie and Yasmeen were from the same school as hers; they had been the ‘South Mumbai hip girls;’ people often called them the three musketeers of Green Field High School. The three were as ‘thick as thieves.’

Reema lived with her parents, being the only child she was the apple of their eyes.

She worked because she wanted to be independent and not for monetary reasons.

Her father worked for a multinational company and her mother was of course ‘the modern day house wife. She loved her parents dearly.

She had always been closer to Yasmeen and had often wondered ‘why the hell was she wasting her talent?’ Yasmeen was gifted, her poems were soulful.

Melanie and Reema were the wild ones, falling in and out of crushes at the drop of a hat. Reema found romance in everything, unlike Yasmeen, who loved to be in love with the idea of Love. Her love marriage had shattered her dreams, she lived for her kids and ammi, Reema had a special bonding with her.

Reema’s parents had wanted her to get married too but she was in no hurry, she had not found her Mr. Right yet.

Life was beautiful and she wanted to enjoy every bit of it, marriage was not on her agenda as of now.

She had taken the day off to spend time with Yasmeen and the kids.

MELANIE

Melanie worked as a fashion designer for an export house. Her designs had become a rage among the Asian communities in the U.K. She was always working round the clock to meet deadlines, it was tiring, but she loved her work passionately, hence she coped with the odd working hours.

She lived with her parents and siblings in a spacious British built house in Colaba.

Her dad was a retired merchant navy officer and mom was a legion worker, her brother was a model and sister worked in an advertising agency as a secretary.

Hers was a religious family, but Melanie rarely went to church; she preferred to connect with God in her own way.

Melanie was a huge George Michael fan and used to freak out listening to his albums.

She had almost fainted when she learnt about his homosexuality; the news had broken her heart and shattered her dreams. Wham! That had been a big jolt!

Friendship was the only precious gift that she valued the most; Yasmeen, Reema and of course Pooja were very close to her heart, she never ever wanted anything to change. She loved to spend time with them whenever she could.

She was ambitious and wanted to make it big in the fashion industry, but did not like to socialize with her colleagues; she hated all the superficiality and hypocrisy along with the bitchiness; designers like her were destined to being ignored, no shows to showcase her work, nor any tie ups etc. she did not adhere to any gimmicks, to make it big the way others did, she was different.

She dreamed of making it big on her own merit and talent, maybe she would one day.

Melanie loved her job and hoped to have her own designer boutique someday.

She wanted to spend the day with Yasmeen and the kids and was looking forward to the kebabs and biryani especially prepared at her place.

POOJA

Pooja was a Kashmiri; her family had to leave Kashmir due to ethnic cleansing by the militants; the militants were demanding for an independent state and were being covertly supported by ISI. The militants often spoke about atrocities being meted out to them, but their own actions against the Pandits and the Hindus in the valley was equally appalling.

She hated the militants but she did not support the acts of atrocities against the Kashmiris by the Indian armed forces; thousands of innocent Kashmiri youths had disappeared or had been killed in false encounters. Both sides were killing innocent people. There was no denying the horrific acts of the militants but some of the army men were equally bad, Kashmir was burning and there was no solution in sight for an everlasting peace.

Her family had fled Kashmir in the nineties, leaving behind everything, their home and business. Initially they had been completely devastated; they had shifted to Delhi, where they had to start all over again.

She had met Yasmeen, Melanie and Reema in Kashmir; the girls had come on a sight seeing, school excursion. They had met up in Pahalgam and hit it off instantly. There after she had visited Mumbai often and loved the city, without realizing that one day it would become her permanent home.

Kashmir had been the tourist destination, heaven on earth for one and all. Now, the same heaven on earth had been turned into hell on earth. She missed Kashmir and longed for peace in the region, it seemed like an impossible dream, but she had hope.

Pooja had dreams and aspired to be a model; she was beautiful, talented and hard working, she had got her big break with an international cold drink company. Soon she landed in Mumbai, the city of big dreams. With her dedication to succeed she put in a lot of hard work to reach her goals. Her career was going great guns, she had been offered movies, but it was not on her agenda for now. She was making good money and saving it up to move into her own apartment and dreamed of bringing her parents down from Delhi, she missed them.

The girls had decided to spend the day at Yasmeens’ and she was looking forward to it.

RACHAEL

NEW YORK.

Rachael was a human rights and peace activist. She loved music and was a great admirer of Gilad Atzmon, great musician, who was also a political activist she identified with.

She was born and brought up in Israel, but had left Israel and settled down in America.

As an Israeli citizen, ‘you either had to enroll in the army or go for religious studies’, she did not want to choose either, hence she decided to leave Israel. She still had her Israeli citizenship; her parents still lived there, she visited Israel often, to meet them and to support the Palestinians in their struggle for an independent state.

Her activities were always under the strict watchful eyes of the intelligence agencies.

She didn’t care a damn and often smirked at the pseudo only democracy in the region tom tommed by Israel at all times.

Israel, in her eyes was not a democracy but an oppressive state. Her region was engulfed by terror. Suicide bombings and state terror, both were interlinked and both terrorized and killed innocent people in Israel and in Palestine.

She hated the complete dominance of Israel in world politics. The world was made to believe that the Palestinians were terrorists and Israel was the victim, the truth was different, the Palestinians were the victims of hate and propaganda, marketed and sold by the government of Israel to further their political agenda to get rid of Palestinians from their own land. The Palestinian fight for freedom was labeled with a ‘terror’ tag to suit the Israeli governments agenda, to grab all of Palestine. She along with a lot of peace loving Israelis were opposed to it, hence she chose to become a peace activist and fight for their rights. She wanted Israel to be loved, not feared globally.

She loved traveling. In one of her visits to Mumbai, she had spotted the girls at the coffee shop. The place was full; she had gone up to the girls, introduced herself and asked them if she could share their table as there was no place to sit, the girls had agreed and that was the start of her new friendship in India. The friendship grew over the years; it was a rock solid eleven year bond.

YASMEEN KHAN

MUMBAI.

2001.

Ammi came rushing in, Yasi, when are the girls coming? Ammi would always be worried stiff if people did not turn up on time, which included me as well.

The sun had set and the girls had not returned, They will be here ammi, maybe they have got stuck in the traffic. I answered in a relaxed manner.

The problem with you youngsters is that you’ll are always so laid back, in our times things were different, we always valued time, but…

Ammi, just chill I sounded like the hip hoppers, who she detested!

Yasi, I hate it when you start talking like a teenager, you are thirty, when will you grow up? Let the girls come, I will give them a piece of my mind. She stormed out in a huff!

She went back to the kitchen to inspect the biryani and the kebabs which she had especially prepared for the girls, I knew that she would be back again, with the same question and I was right.

Yasi, where are the girls? The movie must have got over, they should have been home by now, I told you to go with the kids, but you never listen, do you? she was restless.

Ammi relax, they must have taken the kids for some shopping, you know how they love to spoil the kids. I knew ammi was getting worried about the kids, well, my friends were part and parcel of that concern too, but it was the kids she was really worried about.

Ammi dashed for the door at the sound of the doorbell. Soon the house was filled with laughter and chatter, the kids came rushing in.

Mummy, aunties bought me my favorite Barbie doll. Ayesha was thrilled with the beautiful Barbie, she loved dolls and the fashionable clothes that came with it. The three aunties entered along with Amin, who had a Superman toy in his hand.

Aunties, did they say thank you? I asked.

Yes mummy, they did. The three aunts’s replied together.

I was very worried, you should have come back home after the film, I was really worried you know. ammi did not sound as worried now, as she had been earlier.

Pooja looked at ammi sheepishly, Sorry, ammi we decided to take the kids for some shopping.

Ammi, they are back in one piece. I butted in with a ‘I told you so’ look.

Okay! Never mind, you girls will not understand. she had calmed down by now.

Ammi we understand. Reema gave her a big bear hug, she loved and adored my mom.

The kids gave their aunties and me a big hug and left. the room with ammi; they were overly excited, giving her a detailed account of their outing.

I looked at my buddies, hope they didn’t trouble you?

Yasi, cut the formality out, they are angels, darling. Melanie replied in her usual tone.

That shows that I’m not such a bad mom. I gloated.

Well, in a way, but now ammi has taken over, so the credit goes to her, not you.

Reema winked.

Have you finished with your poem dearie? The one and only Yasmeen Khan the great writer! Pooja asked me.

They were all having fun at my expense and I was enjoying being their target. Yes I have… before I could say anything further the phone rang.

It was Rachael from New York.

Hi, Rachael, long time no news! Is your trip still on? I asked.

Hi, Yasi what time is it there? the urgency in her tone could not be missed.

I looked at the clock, quarter past nine, why? I asked.

Switch the television on, Yasi, gosh! I can’t believe it, you don’t know what has happened? she sounded shocked.

No, why, what the hell is the matter? Has the world crashed? Has Israel finally withdrawn from Palestine? I joked.

Yasi, switch the television on, any news channel, the Twin towers have been hit, just switch it on, I think I’ll have to postpone my trip for now, okay, bye, tight hug to the kids and love to aunty, take care, bye. She hung up.

What happened, Yasi? Reema asked.

Quick pass me the remote. I was anxious to know what had happened.

Why? Melanie wondered about the urgency in my tone whilst passing the remote to me.

I switched on to CNN; America under attack.

What the hell is this? we all looked at each other; we were totally shocked, the images on the screen were scary. The Twin Towers in the United States of America had collapsed. The Pentagon had been hit! It was like watching a horror movie.

All of us were glued to the television screen, we kept surfing, it was on every channel.

America was under attack!

Is this real? Gosh! Hey Yasi, lets find out what actually happened? Melanie took the remote from my hand, Let’s see she stopped, the planes hit the towers? as we learnt the gory details, there had been four planes; the reporting was non stop, on every channel, everywhere!

Just then ammi came in, are you girls going to eat now or later? she asked. What is the matter Yasi, are you listening? she turned around and looked at the television screen, What is this, Ya Allah, Yasi what is all this? Where is this? she asked.

America, I answered, can’t make out what this is all about ammi, it seems that something drastic has happened there? my eyes were glued to the screen.

Ammi, we are not hungry, Reema went up to her, let’s go and see what the kids are doing? she did not want ammi to watch the horrific images.

But what has happened? Why are people covered with dust? she asked.

We have just switched the television on, ammi, I’ll let you know the whole thing after I find out what happened. I just couldn’t get my eyes off the screen.

Reema led ammi out of the room, some planes were involved…. Reema was telling ammi as she led her out.

Ammi turned around and said, Planes? What happened, many people must have died?

Ammi wanted all the info. "You will all spend the night here is that clear, the world is becoming dangerous and I will not allow you girls