Mrs. Zuleikha Mayat in her home in Durban

It is March 1979. Mrs. Zuleikha Mayat awakens from her sleep to find a tragedy unfolding around her: She has been involved in a motor accident, and her sister, Bibi, lies next to her. Her husband Mohamed — pinned between the steering wheel and the seat, surrounded by people who are trying to extricate him with the jaws of life — smiles at her and asks her if she is OK.

Reassured about his condition, her focus turns to her sister, who seems to be the most critical. Bibi is soon lifted onto a stretcher and taken away in an ambulance, after which Mrs. Mayat loses consciousness. "I wake up. I am in an ambulance strapped alongside Mohamed. His hand is caressing mine. We reassure each other that we are well. My concern is about Bibi, we must reach her."

"I see the medical orderly flitting from Mohamed to the telephone. He is speaking softly to someone, then he loses his temper: 'Forget the regulations for once!' Some more swearing, he slams the phone down and comes up to me. 'Mevrou, I am sorry, they are not allowing me to take you to the white hospital nearby. We will have go to Leratong, a little further away.'"

Mrs. Mayat wonders why the orderly is speaking to her and not her husband. It is only when her husband requests morphia, that she notices the ever-expanding huge, wet, blood-red stain on his pale green summer jacket. "Praying feverishly, I stroke Mohamed's hand. His response becomes weaker, his hand is getting colder. The ambulance screeches to a stop. They carry Mohamed out."

Mrs. Mayat is not prepared for the scenes that greet her at the "non-white" hospital: Dozens of people waiting to be treated, among them people with knife wounds and hanging limbs, with blood dripping from their faces and bodies, with no chairs to sit on, as they await attention from the hopelessly understaffed personnel. "I'm sure that the personnel at the white hospital have so little to do; they are busy playing cards."

When her family arrives, she asks them about Bibi and Mohamed. "When I enquire about them for the umpteenth time, Bhai [her brother] takes my hands in his and says, 'You keep on asking about Bibi. She is still on the operating table (she passed away later). It is Mohamed who has passed away!'"

Now 80-year-old Mrs. Zuleikha Mayat can still remember almost every detail associated with that fateful day that took place some 27 years ago. "What more can one say about apartheid?" she asks. "My husband was a man who had given his life for medicine. He was the first non-white to become a gynecologist in this country. He was the first non-white to enroll for a post-graduate degree at the University of Cape Town. And he had to die when he needed medical help. What more can you say about apartheid?"

It was an ugly system, the effects of which the Mayats had fought hard to off-set. Though not political activists themselves, they had often lent a helping hand to various figures who played a pivotal role in the struggle for freedom and justice. Former state president Nelson Mandela was someone who often sought refuge in their Durban home while on the run.

"He used to come in a green uniform. My husband would pick him up. He would spend the night in our house, and we used to drop him off the next morning." This meant that their home was raided by police looking for escaped political prisoners.

Mrs. Mayat also took it upon herself to communicate with prominent political activist Ahmed Kathrada while he was in prison; a thick stack of the letters they exchanged sits in her office, and she has recently agreed to a request from the local university to make this correspondence available to them. "I considered it a fardh kifayah [a religious obligation which rests upon a Muslim community as a whole, but if a few individuals discharge the obligation, the entire community is absolved] to write to him," she explains. She also has fond memories of the time when a white prison official agreed to allow her to provide a group of Muslim political prisoners with a variety of `Eid treats.

"Seven Muslim students from Roodepoort had been brought to a detention centre in Durban. They were regarded as dangerous political prisoners. I went to the person in charge of the prison and said, 'It's our Christmas in a few days' time, I want to bring these prisoners food. We cannot celebrate our feast if we know that anyone is going hungry.' He went into a room, where he probably discussed my request with someone and returned saying that I could bring in only food, with no accompanying literature.

"I went home and told my father-in-law what had happened, and he was so excited that he actually helped me put together little parcels containing sweetmeats, samoosas (an Indian savory) and biryani (an Indian rice dish, often reserved for special occasions). Although the prison official had said no literature was to be sent to the prisoners, I also placed a copy of my book Qur'anic Lights in an individually wrapped serviette for each prisoner.

"When the official saw the books, he said, 'What is a prayer book to them, they are communists!' to which I responded by saying, 'All the more reason to give them a prayer book. Maybe it will change them!' He poked all the food parcels with his knife, and agreed to my request to bring in more food on the next day, after which he said, 'No more.' I did not hear anything about the food after that, until one day, when the father of one of those prisoners sent me two boxes of long green mangoes, from which I understood that the parcels had been received. I later heard from my sister that the prisoners had not contacted me after their release because they were still under surveillance."

And as one of the founding members of the Women's Cultural Group, Mrs. Mayat has played a vital role in creating public awareness about everything from education to culture to religion, spear-heading various noble projects aimed at assisting the disadvantaged, uplifting the wounded spirits of her countrymen, empowering them when they felt disempowered.

Formed on March 29, 1954, by a group of predominantly Muslim women, the Women's Cultural Group has in its 51-year history proven to be a leader in many fields ranging from the initiating of soup kitchens for feeding the poor, to the hosting of educational lectures and cultural events like poetry recitals and plays, to developing the skills of the disadvantaged sector, to the setting up of a fund to assist financially disadvantaged students in educating themselves.

"Five decades ago an Asian women's organization was a rare entity," she says. "For us it was an uphill trudge all along the way. Initially husbands and the entire family clan had to be assured that we would not compromise family, tradition, religion, or community values. Even though some of these male dominated views were totally myopic, we had to tread very carefully. By the grace of Allah we succeeded and managed not only to correct the vision but gained the cooperation and respect of our elders."

Asian tradition also meant that she was unable to pursue her dream of studying medicine, a fact which she says she never regrets. "If I had a career, I would never have been able to get women together to do so much of hard work. The feeling of getting women together to do things for other people is a great feeling."

Much of the money used to contribute towards building an educated South Africa is income generated from sales of Indian Delights, an internationally-renowned recipe book edited by Mrs. Mayat and first published in 1962. About 750,000 copies of the book have been sold to date. "We have never advertised this book, yet we receive orders from all over the world, from places like Australia, America, England, Canada and New Zealand," she says.

She attributes the success of South African Indians in the face of the apartheid struggle to their sense of entrepreneurship, their work ethic, and to a large extent their sense of community bonding. "As soon as someone from India arrived in the country, somebody would help him, they would set him up in a business or get him a job," she explains. "Because of apartheid we had to bond together, it was insulation for us in that ugly system."

• Mayat, Zuleikha M. A Treasure Trove of Memories: A Reflection on the Experiences of the People of Potchefstroom. Durban: Institute for Black Research/Madiba Publishers in association with the Women's Cultural Group, 1996.

• Women's Cultural Group Jubilee Brochure, 2004.

** Fatima Asmal is the editor of the South African-based Islamic publication The Straight Path. Feel free to e-mail her at an_nisaa_publications@yahoo.com.

The articles posted on this page reflect solely the opinions of the authors. Views Archive Advanced Search Views & Analyses