Where The Indus Is Young

I read Dervla Murphy in 1989. In a quiet little village called Norbuling in southern Bhutan, by a kerosene lamp. It was Murphy's first book Full Tilt. A description of her journey on an ordinary cycle from Dunkirk to Delhi. It was a fascinating book that stunned me. I think I read it in one go. Norbuling didn't have any electricity back then. Computers, internet and mobile phones would have sounded like cock and bull stories that old men told their grandchildren.

Reading the book in the isolation of Bhutan I was left with just one though. What a woman !!! She rode through the winter in Europe and summer in Pakistan and norht India. This book was lent to me by my Irish neighbour Aisling to whom I am forever grateful for having lent me many books in that remote village. I never got a chance to read another book by Murphy. 

A few years ago I had met an old Canadian couple online who were coming to Calcutta, among other places in eastern India. Pamela Harris and Randal McLeod. The lady brought a few Dervla Murphy books for me as a gift. I think I had casually mentioned reading her and she brought a few of her titles for me as a surprise gift. These books, I must confess, were gathering dust for all these years until during the Covid 19 lock down I decided to go for one of them. Where the Indus is Young. I am yet to actually finish it but I am almost done (finished it on 11th April). 

Murphy went hiking in Baltistan, a very remote and disputed part on the Pakistan India border in 1975. We call it Pakistan Occupied Kashmir (naturally they call the other side India Occupied Kashmir). The journey was made in early 70s with her six-year old daughter Rachel and a polo pony fondly named Hallam that she bought over there. She used Hallam to carry her ration and her daughter and the pony became as much a part of the team as the two humans. The route follows the course of the river Indus and then Shayok (both originate from Manas in Tibet and flow through Ladakh and Kashmir before entering Baltistan). There is a rough hand drawn map given in the book that makes it easy to understand the area and the route she took. These places are not easily distinguishable on the Google map unless you know the precise names of the small towns like Skardu or Khapalu etc. 

I love Murphy's writing style as much as her courage and novelty of her destination. But that's not all that is there to the book. There is a set of human values that she holds very dear to her that comes out strongly in her books. These endear her to the reader. She admits where she gets scared though mostly for her daughter which makes her human like you and me. She does not project herself as a super hero (which many other self declared intrepid adventure writers tend to do). But when you read the book you are left wondering - my God did she really do all this? And all her stories are laced with that supreme understated sense of humour that makes reading her book such a joy. 

Her book is not a guide book - "How To Walk In Baltistan", though you could use it as one, if you were allowed to go there. It is about her travels, about her impressions of the people there and their life. She builds strong bonds with the locals and gets her readers involved in that journey into their bedrooms. It is a very sad sad life of the Baltis that is described in this book. The poverty, illiteracy and the general misery of the locals that she portrays is at times unbearable for a reader who has grown up in a sheltered atmosphere. Being an Indian, I am not new to poverty. I get to see it all the time and grew up seeing it from very close quarters. But I am not too sure if I would like to travel through an area that is so wretchedly poor and helpless. Despite their poverty they are mostly nice people. Very hospitable with whatever little they have and very honest too. 

I am intrigued by just one thing in this book that I find very odd. She seems to find eggs plentiful in this extremely cold and high altitude country. This is contrary to my experience on this side of  the Himalaya where I have hiked quite a bit. In the high mountains no one keeps poultry. I have always been told that they perish in cold climate. If at all you find eggs in high altitude places, you should know they are brought in from the plains. I wonder how Murphy managed to find eggs everywhere she went in this impoverished land in the back end of beyond. 

Another thing about the title of the book. The Indus in Baltistan is not so young really. I have seen Indus in Ladakh. There it is much younger :-) But if I had to sell my house to get a permit to visit that part of the world I would happily do it. I hope one day all wars and human animosity towards each other is settled and everyone is free to go wherever he pleases.

If you are an adventure lover, I would definitely recommend this book.