India-born South African writer Ahmed Essop’s anthology The Hajji and Other Stories (1978) captures various hues of the Indian community’s life in South Africa. A collection of 22 tales, the opening story, “The Hajji” is about an interracial marriage between a Muslim man Karim and a White Christian woman Catherine and the reaction of Karim’s elder brother Hajji Hassen when Catherine calls him after 10 years of the marriage. As Karim is on his deathbed, he wants to be buried “under Moslem funeral rites and in a Moslem cemetery” (2). However, Hassen does not have any sympathy for his brother who had married a White woman and tells Catherine that his brother “is a white. We live in different worlds” (3). The story critiques holding on steadfastly to one’s religious beliefs. Hassen, for example, fails to forgive his brother for transgressing his religion and does not even see him when he dies. The story paints a picture of a Muslim man for whom nothing else matters but bitter rage for his brother for having turned to Christianity.