My Lessons of History in School

I consider myself singularly lucky and blessed that the lessons in history - and poetry- started for me much earlier in life than for most people. I was myself, however, innocently unaware about all this at that time.

To begin with, take the case of the date of my birth. It was determined as 15th November, 1943 - perhaps, a year less - at the time of my admission, in October 1949, in the District Board (soon changed to be ‘Government') Primary School of the neighboring village, located in what was still called the Angrezi Ilaqa (British Territory). It was a school with one kutcha (made of mud) room; a small court yard which had low (less than three feet high) mud wall around it; two teachers and four classes. The school had about forty students from the surrounding villages.

The name of the village is Sohian, near the old town of Malaudh, about 30 Km from Ludhiana. I do recollect that the senior teacher Pandit Lachhman Dass Ji had asked my father whether he had thought for me a plan of higher education or putting me in some job soon after my matriculation. My father had replied, in a very polite but deeply determined voice, that he would like me to go for the highest possible education.

I was to come to know 55 years later - a few years after my own retirement at age of 60 - that this popular but strict disciplinarian teacher who had commanded deep respect among generations of students had served in the same school for his entire teaching career!

It was in this school, I had heard the couplets of the first folk poem by a senior student, Jagga Singh, praising Mahatma Gandhi to be clever enough to ‘outwit' the foxy white rulers!

The white Kothi (mini-palace) with high walls and surrounded by the thick lines of tall trees of a Sardar (petty chief, feudal lord) called Kaka Ji of Sohian was visible from the school. It was, however, more a like a mysterious fort for us, the young students- something like the complex buildings I was to see later in the horror films. I had, however, come to know that the Young Sardar-Kaka Ji has been recruited as a Poolas Kaptan (Police Superintendent) by the Government of Independent India. Later in life, my efforts to meet the then octogenarian, Sardar Narinder Singh Phulka, IPS (Retd.), could not bear fruit, in spite of the fact that one of his sons-in-laws, now retired in anonymity from the IAS, had been a friend from my college days.

The next historic turning point for me came in May 1951 when I was admitted in the third grade in the High School in Ahmedgarh, the nearby town. The family took some more time to shift there from the village. I felt quite at ease being exposed to a refreshing atmosphere of freedom, patriotism and nationalism surcharging this school named, soon after Independence, from Public High School to 'Mahatma Gandhi Memorial National (MGMN) High School'.

The eight years of the continuous studies in the school provided me with ample opportunities to look all around far beyond the lessons in the class rooms. I must thank Master Ashni Kumar, a senior teacher of English and Social Studies who had started mentoring me right from my sixth class.

The town of Ahmedgarh (named after Nawab Ahmed Ali of the tiny state of Malerkotla (1881-1947) had been founded in 1905 in the wake of the construction of the revolutionizing rail link connecting Ludhiana to the southern-eastern belt of Dhuri-Jakhal and beyond. The new look town regularly witnessed, as if it were a typical Greek city state, debates and dramas in the school which were often joined by the chaudhris (elders) of the town too.

The local wings of political parties - Congress, Socialists and Jan Sangh in particular - seemed to be vigorously competing to bring their national leaders to address the people in the Gandhi Chowk, in the miniature Connaught Place of the town, proclaimed to have been planned after Montgomery! The location of the town on the cross-borders of adjacent Riyasati (Princely) and Angrezi (British) pockets of territories had made it a favorite and strategic meeting place for freedom fighters playing grim games of hide and seek after daring protests and acts of defiance including an act of loot - at gun point - of the government funds in a train robbery between Ahmedgarh and Malerkotla!

In terms of history, I must refer to the tragically maddening times in the wake of Partition. My great grandfather Param Sant Vaid Bhushan Pramatma Nand Ji had passed away on October 19, 1947, a day after the death of Nawab Ahmad Ali of Malerkotla. I can vividly recall how the mourners at the Bhog ­- the last prayer - were cursing the kaliyuga (Evil Epoch) for the calamities befalling the nation and her noble people. I could later notice that many houses had been burnt down in my mother's village - apparently belonging to Muslims. The mosque had been quickly converted into a Gurdwara!

I was luckier as a child to be spared the trauma of witnessing the scenes of murders and violence. But what about the feelings of a ten-year-old boy who was witness to his father getting critically wounded when he fell down trying to board an over packed vehicle leaving Sialkot for India? He had been left behind as dead on the road. The boy turned out to be a brilliant student and rose to the highest professional position for an engineer in India. But how would the pain of losing a father in that cruelest way ever go away - even though in retirement, he became Director of Gandhi Museum, opposite the Raj Ghat!

I do remember that I was able to broadly read, when I was in the fifth class, the Golden History of India by Vishva Nath, M. A., B.T., and Jagan Nath Grover B.A., B.T., senior teachers of History, Arya High School, Ludhiana. It was a popular text book for high classes and belonged to my uncle appearing for matriculation.

I remember vividly how among brief sketches of the contemporary historical personalities: Winston Churchill was described as the plain and blunt speaker; Joseph Stalin was the son of a cobbler of Georgia; De Valera was a great revolutionary freedom fighter, and so on.

Among the teachers of history at school, Master Ram Kishore - in his typical Poadhi dialect of Punjabi - would become deeply emotional in praising Chanakaya, the great teacher and his gifted disciple Chandra Gupta Maurya. Then, he would blame all the current ills of the country on the lack of respect for the teachers! Kishori Lal Sahir would quote couplets of Persian and would turn the lesson into play - assigning the students roles of characters of history, e.g., showing Hemu getting wounded with an arrow in the eye by covering the eye of a student with the corner piece of his turban!

Giani Romesh, known for punishing students with Bhrind - painful pinches, would often use the idiom, Dushmanan de Dand Khatte kar Ditte (leave a sour taste in your enemy's mouth).  It was not by making them eat tamarind, but putting up a brave fight.

The most reputed teacher of history / Geography and English in our school was, however, Master Ashni Kumar, a skeleton-thin person known for his razor sharp intellect and sharp satirical remarks. I was destined to be his favorite student and remain so for more than four decades till he breathed his last at a ripe old age in 1999.

In the tranquility of the years of my retirement, I have endeavored to reinvigorate my interest in the history of the select historical personalities and places-particularly in the more intimate region of the Punjab. My childhood interest in Sirhind was strongly reinforced when, during my posting to Pakistan in 1993, I had to facilitate the visit for a pilgrimage to the city by Prof. S Mojaddid, a former President of the Interim Govt. of Afghanistan after the Soviet withdrawal - the family claims 14 generations to have been buried there! The city with a significant strategic location has the most fascinating and absorbing history of the rise and fall of its rulers. The Ambala-Ludhiana-Sirhind section of the Delhi-Lahore railway line was opened on Oct.1, 1869.

Sirhind has turned a new page in its history with the recent establishment of excellent institutions of higher education including the Shri Guru Granth Sahib World University. A sort of personal history was made for me when, on 8th of November, 2011, the Acting Vice Chancellor, Dr Gurnek Singh, welcomed me to the University with a very special personal warmth and affection. He surprised me by telling me that he was my student in 1968 when I was a lecturer in the Govt. Rajindra College, Bhatinda. After the privilege of crisscrossing the continents representing India in distant alien lands, it is a very special soulful delight to rediscover the deeper eternal roots of friendship and love in the soils nearer home!

The learning - and teaching - of the History of India with a balanced and dispassionate approach is a great challenge. The average individual in society rightly seems to consider the past dead and gone; and the future all day dreaming! It is, therefore, all in the present and near future which is relevant for thought and action. But our battles in the present are often fought over the different versions the past and visions of the future. When I remember the school books and the teachers, so many live images flash before my mind's eye. Alexander, the great, impressed us as students as the most mesmerizing figure of the earlier era. Ashok and Akbar seemed to define the essence of India. Whatever may his later day critics say, for most of my generation Jawaharlal Nehru certainly qualifies to be called the architect of modern India.

Epilogue

The history is continuously in the process of being re-evaluated; the state-craft is such a gigantic entity ­- the search for the total and un-alloyed truth in the affairs of the state would remain a noble pursuit. The pursuit of power and the greed for riches would seem to know no limits - the truth for the cash loads for votes in the Parliament House gets more and more mysterious! The Right to Information has been emerging as an interesting search-light to illuminate deeply hidden dark spots in the files of current history.

Let us hope for better times ahead in terms of truthful history.

References to this article

• This article was included in the collection "India of the Past, Preserving memories of India and Indians"

A Life Enshrined as a Pilgrimage of Love

This article was published in the July 2015 edition of Identity magazine.

Amrita Pritam

An enigmatically popular and proverbially ‘pretty-petite-poet’ of the partition-poisoned five rivers of the historic Punjab, Amrita Pritam - b. Aug. 31, 1919; d. Oct. 31, 2005 - had indeed enjoyed a larger than life image as one of the most prominent literary personalities of modern India. She was widely recognised as a pioneer, powerful and an authentic voice of feminine protest in expressing the horrors of the Partition of her beloved Punjab and the eternally atrocious gender discriminations in the globally patriarchal social orders.

She had subtly succeeded in cultivating and nourishing a significant constituency of readers and a large circle of influential individuals surpassing divides of languages and national boundaries. She had been conferred the most sought after honours including the Padma Vibhushan and the membership of Rajya Sabha, not to speak of Jnanpith Award and dozens of honorary Doctorates and other prestigious distinctions in India and abroad. She had indeed been deservedly hailed to have lived her life to the fullest as the ‘grand lady of letters’ - on her own terms - both in her literary accomplishments and the ultimate fulfilment of her socially unconventional love.

And, yet there were deeper perceptions among both her ardent admirers and determined detractors of an apparently vast void in her life. It was something of the agonisingly soulful kind - her wounded and bleeding feminine destiny and an unfathomable anguish over implied disapproval of her way of life among her dearest and nearest. Amrita’s life could certainly be categorised as the ‘mysteriously volcanic and an eerie dreamy stuff’ of which strange tales of romance, triumph and tragedy are made of. Her enormously large literary output - 21 anthologies of poetry, 10 collections of short stories and, surprisingly, 25 novels, not to speak of three titles of autobiographical writings, have all been hugely interpreted in terms of their excruciatingly experienced personal emotional overtones.

Amrita had indeed played a uniquely inspirational role for decades in spotting and grooming so many budding and promising Punjabi writers, providing them the forum of her popular monthly Nagmani - Serpent’s Jewel. The Punjabi Lekhak Kosh, 2003 - A Directory of Punjabi Writers, edited by the venerable scholar Prof Pritam Singh - has more than three pages of the entries of her writings in original Punjabi and translations in dozens of Indian and foreign languages.. Her abode for decades - K-25, Hauz Khas, New Delhi - had remained an extraordinary literary pilgrimage till her last for her dedicated readers, fraternity of writers, fellow travellers, sisters in sorrow - from India and abroad - and plain ‘Darshanarthis - the onlookers of her magnetically pretty looks!

I do vividly recall how, as an elementary school - child, I had chanced to read her poem - a pretty picture of her adorning it - in a Punjabi monthly ‘Veer Bhumi’, sometime in 1950. Then for a several years in the mid-1950s, her measured and soft voice as an anchor of the 15 minutes program in Punjabi on All India Radio, Delhi had become captivatingly familiar, as if in uniting the two sparring, grieving and singing Punjabs. It was, however, on 22nd November 1970 that there was an opportunity for me to listen to her live. It was during the Mushaira of the Golden Jubilee of my college - Govt. College, Ludhiana - Sahir’s own proud alma mater.

Sahir Ludhianvi

The Mushaira, compered by the legendary Kunwar Mohinder Singh Bedi, had started on a note of an absolute disaster of ‘Band-o-bast’. The restrictive arrangements of entry tickets had crumbled in no time in total chaos. Anyway, the huge and roaring audience, by then more in a rebellious mood to hoot than to listen, had consolation of having glimpses of shining star poets like Jan Nisar Akhtar, Mohan Singh and Amrita Pritam doing the empty ritual of recitation of their poems. Even Shiv Kumar Batalavi, the prince among new poets, had to be cajoled to recite her poem after an initial hooting. However, Sahir - the ‘old- boy-hero’ of the College in 1930s - had mesmerised all with his poem titled, ‘Ae Nai Nasl - O, New Generation’, dedicated to Principal Pritam Singh and addressed to all the past and present students. Sahir was indeed at his magical best when he poetically pierced into the hearts of the Ludhianvi audience with the lines:

Naam mera jahan jahan pahuncha / saath pahuncha hai iss dyaar ka naam.
Main yahan mezban bhi, mehman bhi / app jo chahen dijie mujhe naam.
Nazar karta hun in fizaon ko / apna dil, apni rooh, apna kalaam...
Kal jahan main tha, aaj tun hain vahan / Ai, Naee nassl! Tujh ko mera Salaam!

 
My golden College of that day, now named after ‘old-boy-scientist’ Satish Chandra Dhawan and with the main Hall named after Sahir, is struggling to breathe - and survive to celebrate its Centenary due in 2020!

My ‘real and historic’ Amrita moment was, however, destined to be on August 31, 1992, just on the eve of my departure for Pakistan, as India’s Deputy High Commissioner. Pandit Krishan Ashant, the poet-philosopher turned Jyotishcharya - astrologer - an intimate good old friend of my family had kindly taken me and my wife Aradhana to pay a respectful courtesy call on her. I had asked Amrita about some Pakistani writers whom I might meet.  She had mentioned a few names including some of women friends based in Lahore and short story writers Mansha Yaad and Mazhar Khan who was Director of the popular Pakistani Folk Art Museum, Virsa. Imroz, an incarnation of serenity and sincerity, was around and had kindly served us the famously mandatory magical tea. We had felt privileged that we had the good luck to preserve forever the precious memory of Mulaaqat with an iconic figure, a veritable literary queen of her time!

The love legend of Amrita, particularly her self-confessed decades-long passionate attraction for Sahir, has been one of the most written about and celebrated affair in the popular literary imagination in India. The year 1960, according to Amrita’s own account, was the saddest time of her life. She mentions how the report in the ‘Blitz’ about ‘a new flame of love in life of Sahir’ had totally devastated her, plunging her into dark despair. This development had, perhaps, as if in a rebound, made it possible for Amrita to attach her destiny of ‘life-lasting-soulful-love’ with the younger painter friend, Inderjit. He was soon assigned the metaphorically popular name, ‘Imroz’ - the Persian word meaning ‘today’. This unique ‘undefined’ partnership of ‘understanding’ lasting more than 45 years proved to be the most intensely enduring for the mutual esteem, affection and awesomely creative in terms of Amrita’s literary output and picture perfect of ‘made-for-each-other-soul-mates’. Such supposedly ‘idyllic’ life would only be waiting to be sung and celebrated about, not only in sweet, sentimental and eulogistic notes but also to be written about in a plaintive and poetic mix of fiction and reality.

Ek Janam Tumhare Lekhe

The lives of writers and artists have indeed been a source of immense fascination everywhere -  not only for readers and audience but also for fellow writers and critics and commentators. In the case of writers, ‘aside from their works, there are even autobiographies, letters, diaries, and memoirs of those who knew them best... others have taken  it a step further, painting a  portrait of a literary genius through those who knew him / her best’. Enters here, Gurbachan Singh Bhullar (b. 1937), an eminent short story writer, editor, and columnist, Sahit Academy Awardee in 2005, with roots in Malwa region of Punjab. He had been an alert insider in the various forums of the Punjabi writers since arrival in the capital in 1967 to work in the Soviet Information Department. He would have been privy to all the literary intrigues, factional feuds, scramble for awards and personal rivalries that always plague the atmosphere of community of writers and artists everywhere. He enjoys reputation as one of the select writers in Punjabi who are well read in literature of other languages and are painstakingly diligent in paying attention to the most appropriate vocabulary and idiom in Punjabi. It is indeed very interesting how my most favourite short storywriter and columnist decided to be a novelist. Please permit me to quote from his own 11-pages declaration, ‘How and Why I wrote the novel, Eh Janam Tumhare Lekhe - This Life I lay at thy Feet’:

“18 of March 2014 was my 77th birth day... this juncture of life can often make a person sad, even frightened... but I had felt full of enthusiasm. I had conceived the woof and warp of my maiden novel and had started designing, naturally, the flowers and petals and even the thorns... Friends had often advised, ‘A short story writer attains perfection only by writing a novel... you have plenty of stories and experiences of social life and an appropriate idiom to tell them, you must write a novel’.”

Gurbachan S Bhullar

Bhullar quotes at length many foreign writers and critics to highlight the subtle points of crafts of short story and the novel. He cites examples from the narrative traditions of epics of India and folk tales of love and how human life revolves around Arth — subsistence, Kaam - sexuality and Dharam - morality. The four word title of the novel, according to Bhullar, was decided at the very beginning. It is taken from the hymn of celebrated Dali poet Bhagat Ravidas in the Granth Sahib, “Bahut Janam bichhure the Madho, eh janam tumhare lekhe - Separated since several births, O lord, this birth is solely dedicated to thee”. How the characters of the novel would stand up to the test of this dictum of total surrender was going to be challenge for the novelist. Bhullar asserts that there are no conventional individual hero or heroine in the novel: the moral restraints prescribed by society at large and their clash with the feminine way of thinking about freedom constitute the crux of the thematic world of this novel.

The protagonist of the novel is Jagdeep - a poet, does not pose much of a difficulty to be identifiable as Amrita Pritam. It is also, interestingly, the name of a character in her novel, ‘Ek Savaal - A Question’ who has a shade of Amrita in losing her mother an early age. The names of poet Mohan Singh (1905-1978) and Sahir Ludhianvi (1921-1980) have been retained in the novel along with the use of their select poetry. To keep the fictional façade of Jagdeep intact, Bhullar has composed some poems himself and used some of the verses of Sukhvinder Amrit (B. 1963). The other characters - easily recognised among the ‘who is who’ of all the prominent friends - some turned foes - and relations of Amrita. They have been assigned meaningful names: Imroz as Inderjit-Charanjit-Navrang; her husband Pritam Singh becomes Gurmukh Singh; Bhapa Pritam Singh of Navyug Press is named Harprit Singh ‘Hiteshi’; Balwant Gargi is Kulwant Bani; Devinder (of AIR) as Harvinder, etc. The chapters about Editor of ‘Shamma’- name in novel ’Chiragh’- provide enjoyable comic and witty relief in enlarging character of Imroz’s earlier life. The cover design by artist Satwant Singh Sumail is indeed attractive in symbolising the theme of the novel - the feminine flutters for freedom of choices and the social constraints of moral behaviour.

It is after gap of many years that I have been able to read a novel in Punjabi running into exactly 400 pages. I had been presented the signed copy - ‘with intimate affection’ of the novel by Gurbachan Ji on March 16 and could finish it at my enjoyable pace on April 11, 2015. The seventeen parts of the novel, further subdivided into 3 / 4 chapters in each, make an engrossing reading with the ebb and flow events of a real life legend. Necessary liberties of the fictional kind have been taken here and there as required to enhance an atmosphere of verisimilitude. We get introduced to a gallery of unforgettable characters, majority of them ‘recreated’ after the real life dignitaries of Punjabi community of Delhi who had been closer to Jagdeep-Amrita!? - the protagonist of the novel. Since my first arrival in Delhi on June 16, 1969 and then 16 years - 11 of them consecutively now - of stay in Delhi, I have been witness to a procession of passing away of the pre-partition generation of so many distinguished Punjabis. They had been instrumental in shaping the contours of Punjabi literature and culture. The mindless violence for decades in Punjab; the 1984 anti-Sikh riots in Delhi and the consequently continuously ‘shrinking’ role of the present truncated Punjab in the national life has posed serious new challenges to the traditionally imagined values of Punjabi literature and culture. Amrita, a purely Punjabi phenomenon, had passed away proclaiming herself, perhaps, as more popular ‘original author of Hindi’!

Gurbachan Ji had brought to my attention on November 15, 2014 his masterly article on Amrita Pritam published in the September-December issue of prestigious Punjabi quarterly, ‘HUN’ (Now) dwelling on the touching theme of ‘The Triple Death Tragedy’ of the ‘Priestess of Love’ in Punjabi literature. Apart from the natural death after a protracted sickness and a long confinement to bed, her abode of ‘love-nest’ so artistically adorned by ‘love mate’ Imroz was soon got torn apart brick by brick by Amrita’s ‘emotionally-conflicted’ son - he had once questioned his mother if he was indeed the ‘biological’ son of Sahir! He was mercilessly murdered on September 20, 2012 in shady circumstances in the mean world of Bollywood. I did not know at all - nor could imagine - that this article was a subtle precursor - curtain raiser - to Bhullar’s ambitious maiden novel on the eternal theme of human conflict: the fate of femininity fluttering for freedom against the gravitational forces of patriarchal social order. She was born as the only child of a reclusive and religious couple and married at sixteen in a closely related orthodox Khatri Sikh family. Amrita, according to Khushwant Singh, “was a pretty girl with almond shaped eyes, fine features... petite... barely five feet tall... she became the toast of Punjabi literary circles (of Lahore), largely because of her stunning good looks... Ode to Warish Shah was her defining work. Much of the rest was sheer atmosphere”.

To quote from Bhullar’s elucidatory article, Amrita had once put, in her peculiarly poetic way, “In all, I have had one and a half love affairs - one with Sahir and half with Jeeti... but his half is equal to Sahir’s one full!” Amrita had written, in Punjabi, her autobiography - rather disjointed chapters - titled ‘Raseedi Ticket - Revenue Stamp’ in 1976 - which has run into a dozen editions - three after her passing away. The Hindi editions might be even more. The translation in English - apparently a hurried and poor job - by Krishna Gorowara may still be quoted, “Imroz is six years my junior... God grants too brief (a) period of youth to one and all; to me He has, in His greatness, granted two! Mine petered off; Imroz’s came on! After fourteen years... I have no regrets about the path chosen by us”. Further, Amrita says that “Imroz’s personality is like the flow of a river uncontrolled by locks and sluices... a relationship with him can last only so long as there is nothing to bind it. Unfortunately, in life there is not much natural freedom. There is society and there is the law... My suffering is the lesser truth when weighed against the greater truth of happiness of life with him...”

Bhullar has proclaimed in the blurb of his novel-in its 2nd edition within six months of the 1st - exactly a similar dilemma with the  heroine representing “feminine-way-of- thinking, the centrality of which is the longing, the desire and an attempt to live a life according to the dictates - full freedom - of her mind”. He further adds that, “the feminine thought process, in majority of the cases, gets reconciled to the 'circumscribing limits' accepting them as 'Destiny' and suppressing the urge to 'fly' - but in stray cases there are revolts too...According to science, the astronauts, who break the sphere of the gravity of the planet earth, undergo a process of powerful effects on their body and mind, Whether, according to psycho-processes, the women who dare break the circle of 'social gravity' also undergo a similar transformation of their bodies and mind, is the moot point of this novel”.

Long, long ago, while studying for my post-graduation in English literature, I had immensely enjoyed the recommended slim book, ‘Aspects of the Novel’ by EM Forster. Originally published in 1927, it has remained my favourite book till today. Discussing at length the aspects of Story, People, Plot, Fantasy/ Prophecy, Pattern / Rhythm, the Nobel novelist elaborates on the themes of birth, food, sleep /dreams, love / marriage and death as the essential elements of the structure and craft of novel. Forster points out that love and marriage - the most defining event of human destiny turns out to be the most unpredictable development. The modern science has been hugely impacting our entire approach to love and sex but the scientists are still wondering to know, ‘what fosters long-term attachment... what, really, is this thing called true Love.’ The much used – rather abused - terms like romance, attraction, bonding, passion would seem to defy all reason and logic - that is the unique beauty, as well as the inexplicable tragedy in as many cases, in every culture and civilization.

In 2019, the literary and academic institutions in India would be gearing up to celebrate the birth centenary of Amrita Pritam. Bhullar’s novel has lit up the first candle for a really enlightening revaluation of the literary output of this dear daughter of Punjab. The debates would need be as broad based as the human reason and imagination can be stretched in the multidimensional contexts of the era she had belonged.

Blessed with Punjabi as my mother tongue, I may conclude quoting the following lines of Amrita - they have been my favourite since I took the first fearful and hesitant step into the imagination of my youth:

Pher tainun yaad keeta, agg nuun chumian asan;
Ishq piala zehar da, ik ghutt phir mangia asan …
Your memory has descended on me again, and I have kissed the flame;
I have asked for a sip again, out of the goblet of poison of love!    

Inching towards His 100th Year - ‘Whiskey-ing’, Ogling and Laughing in His Sleeves

This article appeared in the monthly magazine Identity, October 2013 issue

Sardar Khushwant Singh, once the young and struggling Sikh lawyer in the legendary Lahore – now batting at a dazzling score of 98 of an eventful life – indeed personifies an epochal transformation of himself over the many years as India’s most popular ‘money-spinner’ ‘author in English’. He has successfully worn an amazing variety of colourful turbans of being a novelist, historian, journalist, translator and, above all, ‘not a nice man to know’ who has always believed, with a childlike genius for mischief, in spreading the laughter all over the planet ‘at all costs and even high risks’. He has attained - with a devil’s diligence and an ascetic’s discipline - as an author the exalted stature of a ‘living human monument’ in the capital of Hindustan. He has been hailed as a wizardly-literary- monarch gifted with a rare impulse to feel the pulse of his vast empire of readership-cutting across all divides of age, gender, religion and international borders. The countless souls in India and abroad wonder - and pray too - whether he is destined to celebrate his so richly deserved century of life with the Nobel Prize for Literature - almost a century later than RN Tagore! 

Khushwant - even with his two sets of dates of birth of different years - happens to be several years senior to my poor but scholarly father who had passed away in 1978. I can vividly recall how I was introduced to Khushwant in the 1^st year of my college in 1959 by Shri A B (Arun Barun) Shome, a young and bachelor (soon to fall in love with a well-endowed Punjabi lady) teacher with an MA degree who had joined the High School in our small town, 20 KM from Ludhiana. He, a studious Bengali and I, a fresh collegiate, became quite friendly. Shri Shome had kindly suggested to me a reading list of books - novels and short stories - in English authored by the Indians. I recall that the names of Bhabani Bhattacharya, Mulk Raj Anand, Kamla Markandaya, RK Narayan and Khushwant Singh. I was soon able to obtain Train to Pakistan (1956) issued from the College Library and read it with a deep sense of awe, wonder and intimacy. I was then a daily commuting student from Ahmedgarh to Malerkotla and impressions of anecdotes of blood shed of innocent passengers in trains - to and from Pakistan - seemed still smelling in the air of Punjab. I had read some stories of the saddest and shameful spectacle of partition by Krishan Chander (Ham Vahshi Hai - We are Barbarians) and several other writers of Punjabi and Hindi. The Train to Pakistan, however, had left a uniquely lasting impression on my teen age mind. Being a student of the non-English medium school, the book made me familiar with a vastly new range of vocabulary and tons of tragi-funny usages! I had particularly shared with friends the translation of a popular film song - “In the breeze is flying, my veil of red muslin, o sir, o Sir…” and many typically naughty-including four-letter Punjabi expressions rendered into English. I have ever since been a dedicated - though at times a grudging and a protesting one too - reader of the inimitably thought provocative writings of Khushwant Singh. Another book in English by an Indian author which I had immensely enjoyed reading soon after - in the summer of 1960 - was Khawaja Ahmed Abbas’s semi fictional autobiography titled, ‘Inquilab’.

The Sikhs Today (1959) by Khushwant Singh, an attractively produced slim book with photographs of eminent Sikhs, was a very interesting and informative reading for me - particularly for the explosive foreboding that the symbols of Sikh identity might not last more than a few decades. During the next several years of my higher studies and till my entry into the Indian Foreign Service in 1971, I was more intensely occupied with the subjects of the curriculum but always enjoyed Khushwant Singh’s journalistic writings /columns particularly in The Illustrated Weekly and later the two national dailies, The National Herald and Hindustan Times. Khushwant Singh’s proximity with Indira Gandhi’s government and particularly his support of Sanjay Gandhi and the infamous Emergency earned him the title of ‘Khushamad’ - flatterer/sycophant - Singh. He had been awarded Padma Bhushan in 1974 and was also made a member of the Rajya Sabha for the term of 1980-86. The decade’s long extremist violence in Punjab witnessed Khushwant Singh taking a bold stand against perpetrators of communal violence. He wielded his powerful pen to voice reason and secular values and had to be provided security by the government against the hot headed of his own beloved community! 

The worst turmoil of eighties involving ‘Operation Blue Star’ and the assassination of PM Indira Gandhi by her Sikh body guards followed by the barbaric killings of the Sikhs must have left Khushwant totally shattered and perplexed. The publication of Delhi: A Novel in 1990 was marketed as a major event of literary career of the author – Khushwant claimed that it took him almost twenty five years to complete this work. He dedicated it to his son, Rahul - a confirmed bachelor - and his ‘long-time girlfriend’, Niloufer Billimoria. Khushwant further stated, in his trade mark style, that, ‘History provided me a skeleton, I covered it with flesh and injected blood and a lot of seminal fluid into it.’ I was destined to read this ‘seminal’ Khushwant work while posted in the distant canal country of Panama, sometime in 1995. I indeed pondered over each word and page of it. The history, society and culture of the legendary capital of Bharatvarsha-Hindustan-India is ruthlessly dissected and laid on the table as if for a class of interns for lessons not only in human anatomy and physiology but the entire gamut of life, particularly the perversities and depravities of the flesh juxtaposed against the sublimity and serenity of the human spirit. The narrator’s - suggestively Khushwant himself, disguising as an aging and foreign returned journalist’s - relationship with a hijra-eunuch, hermaphrodite whore, who is neither male nor female but possessed a ‘uniquely exotic sex appeal’ provides him the role of a classic Sutradhar to explain all the travails of the ‘damned-damsel - Delhi’ through Time, right up to the Sikh holocaust of1984. Some serious minded readers felt angry and disgusted over the overflow of ‘extensive erotica’ in the book and dubbed the 300+ pages as ‘nothing but sleaze.’ However to quote a learned critic, “The text seems to be liberating itself from the high seriousness of history… history is parodied, transvestited and travestied. The novel could be hailed as Singh’s significant contribution to English fiction for its erudite content and insightful recreation.”

Khushwant’s long-awaited autobiography titled Truth, Love and a Little Malice (2002) had remained mired for years in legal injunction obtained by the once protégé and friend Maneka Gandhi against its publication ‘for invasion on her privacy.’ “No autobiography”, according to erudite author-columnist Dilip Bobb, “has been awaited with as much tongue-hanging anticipation.” I rushed to obtain a copy of it while posted in New Zealand, and most interestingly, had read some of its chapters in the same room of the enchantingly located elegant home of Barrister Santokh Singh Bhullar in Tamaranui where Khushwant Singh had also stayed a few years earlier! The book was indeed a deep delight, great instruction and a sort of emotionally cathartic experience for me. After finishing the book, I tried to ponder over the years of my own life. I felt that every one’s life has its own riddles of plus-minus; multiplication-division and various kind of brackets - and one has to struggle to solve one’s own particular problems of the ever evolving body and calls of the mysteriously invisible soul too. I am inclined to agree with Dilip that the best parts of the book are the accounts of his early life, ‘as a pampered son of a prominent, affluent father…’ Interestingly, German Ambassador Riedler in New Zealand, my friend since our postings together in Pakistan and Panama, was a voracious reader of Khushwant and was immensely delighted to receive the gift of ‘Delhi’ from me!  

Khushwant Singh - In the Name of the Father
by Rahul Singh

In my years of retirement since 2004, I have been meticulously looking for reading Khushwant’s articles. I have enjoyed reading Rahul Singh’s, ‘Khushwant Singh - In the Name of the Father’ (2004) containing rare old family photos, published by Roli Books, in the Family Pride Series. Rahul details many intimately touching aspects of the personality of his father. He describes how Khushwant had tried to keep in touch with his Muslim friends in Pakistan and that brilliant Barrister Manzur Qadir and Mrs Asghari Qadir were his parents’ dearest friends. It is mentioned that Khushwant had ‘managed’ to pass BA from the Government College, Lahore in the third division and, therefore, did not qualify for admission in Oxford or Cambridge - “So, the choice fell on the King’s College, London University, where he enrolled for an L.L.B. while applying for admission to the Inner Temple to qualify as a barrister.” Rahul, like his father, has no hesitation in writing,  “Mangat Rai (E.N., ICS) was enamoured of my mother even after he married Champa… There was a time when my mother seriously considered leaving my father and marrying Mangat Rai. But, perhaps, because of the trauma it would cause my sister and me, they held back.” Rahul confesses that, “Delhi and The Company of Women got such scathing reviews that I decided not to read them… though both became best-sellers.” Rahul opines that Train to Pakistan remains to date his father’s finest work of fiction while in the two-volume A History of the Sikhs, Khushwant is at his scholarly best. 

My life-time ‘Khushwant - moment’ was destined to come, expectedly - where else, but in Pakistan in November 1993. Manzur Qadir’s son, Basharat and his wife Bambi had become our kind friends during posting to Islamabad. They had hosted an intimate dinner in honour of Khushwant Singh at their home - No.14, Street 37, F-7 / 1. I was seated with Khushwant and Begum Asghari Qadir and enjoyed intently listening to their conversation replete with references to their shared great pre-partition times in bubbling Lahore. Khushwant had to repeat himself and speak louder because Begum Ashgari had become audio-challenged. I could obtain Khushwant Singh’s autograph on the invitation card - it has been carefully preserved as a rare memento. 

I may raise a toast to ‘Mr Khushwant-Global Singh’, wishing him a reasonably O.K. health for his age and power to his pen! I am tempted to quote from his book, Absolute Khushwant (2010), “I would like to be remembered as someone who made people smile.” Musing over death, he had stated, “All my contemporaries - whether here or in England or in Pakistan - they are all gone… All that I hope for is that when death comes to me, it comes swiftly, without much pain, like fading away in sound slumber. Till then I’ll keep working and living each day as it comes. There is so much left to do. I content myself by saying these lines of Iqbal:

Bagh-e-bahisht se mujhe hukm-e-safar diya the kyon?

Kaar-e-jahaan daraaz hai, ab mera intezar kar.
Why did you order me out of the garden of paradise?
I have a lot left to do; now you wait for me. 

Khushwant had written his own epitaph many years ago:

Here lies one who spared neither man nor god
Waste not your tears on him, he was a sod
Writing nasty things he regarded as great fun
Thank the Lord he is dead, this son of a gun.

Zindabaad, Sardar Sahib - Long live, Sir!

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Links:

• WorldCat catalogue
• Wikipedia
• Goodreads page

Triumph and Tragedy of Being Balraj Sahni

This article was published in the monthly magazine Identity, May 2013.

Going by all the tons of authentic accounts available, Balraj Sahni was one of the most decent individuals, the noblest intentioned patriot and the most magnetically charming personality of the 'glitteringly glamorous' but also the 'big bad, mad and sad' world of India's 'dreams-selling' industry of Bollywood. The life story of Balraj (May 1, 1913-April 13, 1973) can certainly be interpreted in terms of the larger history of India. The period of his life indeed encompassed the complex struggle for Independence culminating into 'freedom at midnight' that was tainted by the most shameful killings of innocent people in the wake of the Partition of the country. The first quarter century of India's 'tryst with destiny' was dominated by the leadership and legacy of Jawaharlal Nehru, Balraj's personal idol. Balraj's journey of being 'a card holder' to 'a committed cultural activist' of the Communist Party of India can be acclaimed or faulted in the light of one's personal ideological prism.

I had the first and the last glimpse of Balraj sometime in 1969 at an Indo-Soviet Cultural Society (ISCUS) Conference in Ludhiana. Shri VK Krishna Menon, Nehru's once trusted friend but later a disgraced Defense Minister during the India-China in 1962, had been, perhaps, touted as a star crowd puller but his speech in English proved listless and required to be redeemed in translation for the audience, mostly the Punjabi peasants. As a young college lecturer in English, I remember that some HD Malviya had done a reasonably good job in rendering Menon's speech into Hindi. I do recall that Menon had said that the USA would have used Atom Bomb in the Korean War if the Soviet Union had not developed its nuclear bomb by that time and that the strong Soviet Union was the guarantor of the world peace against the imperialists. It was, however, the speech by Balraj Sahni, in chaste Hindustani with sprinkling of pure - theth - Punjabi, which had the audience spell bound. Then onwards, I started taking the 'pro-poor' popular actor more seriously. I had, however, not been fond of watching films considering it a waste of time and money and I was too busy preparing for my IAS / IFS, etc. examination.

It was in November 1972; I had arrived in Delhi a year earlier after joining the Indian Foreign Service. The capital of India was agog over an unconventional convocation address delivered in the recently established prestigious Jawaharlal Nehru University …by whom? It was by the actor-activist Balraj Sahni. Addressing in conversational Hindustani, Balraj had spoken from the heart and disarmed the determined protesters of the CPI(M)'s wing of students union. He said, "…l may just say that I could gather courage to speak to you because I deeply love the personality after whose name this University has been founded ... if I had been asked to clean up the floors and stairs of this august institution, I would have felt as fortunate as I feel now to stand up to address you ... when I was a student, our British professors made every effort to inculcate in us that making good films and producing quality plays and literature was the privilege of only persons with the white skin ... today we have film makers like Satyajit Ray and Bimal Roy and our artists and technicians have earned international reputation ... but in spite of all this, what we lack is the fact we are still copy-cats. We still use foreign formulas to make our films ... Today we are again in need of a Mahatma Gandhi who could inspire us to give up the impulses and instincts of the slavish mentality and embrace the ideals and values rooted in the culture of freedom..." Balraj carried the day with his sincerity and his straightforwardness; he concluded quoting the lines of Guru Arjan Dev Ji, “Blessed are those who serve the masses; mingle and rejoice with them/ The dust of feet of toilers is sacred for face and forehead; All the waves of desires are calmed by serving humanity.”

Balraj Sahni and Damyanti, 1936

Balraj has written at length and with a lot of relish about his family and friends in Rawalpindi; his education in Lahore and travels in the pre-partition Punjab. Born after five sisters (only two had survived), Balraj's original name Yudhishthira had to be discarded, being difficult to pronounce, and the family was overprotecting towards him. He was admitted initially in the orthodox Gurukul Ashram School but he protested successfully in getting himself shifted after three years to the more modern DAV School. .He passed matriculation in 1928, standing second in the district and earning a scholarship. He was deeply impressed by Prof. Jaswant Rai, a liberal minded teacher in the local DAV Intermediate College, who was also a good friend of the family. He travelled to Lahore in Dec. 1929 to listen to Nehru who, as the youthful President of the Congress Session, had bravely announced the adoption of  'goal of Pooran Swaraj - Complete Independence' of India. Defying family pressure for joining a professional degree course, Balraj joined Govt. College, Lahore and completed BA (Honors) followed by MA in English in 1934. Having no other option in hand, he reluctantly joined, for some time, the reasonably flourishing family business of 'import and export'. Meanwhile in December 1936, Balraj's marriage was solemnized with Damyanti (Dammo), the youngest sister of Prof. Jaswant Rai. In spite of the severest opposition of his father, Balraj and Damyanti departed from home in September 1937 to 'try their luck' in the wide world in the field of their natural interests - literature and art of theatre.

After a short unsatisfactory spell of attempts in writing and theatre in Lahore, they moved to Calcutta. Balraj was helped to take up a teaching job in Tagore's Shanti Niketan at fifty rupees per month. They found the literary and artistic atmosphere of the place quite consoling and reassuring. Balraj has candidly written about Tagore's advice to him that he should adopt mother tongue, Punjabi, for his literary expression instead of hankering after English or Hindi. He could not fully appreciate Tagore's advice at that time. Balraj and Damyanti became parents to a son, Parikshit, in July 1939. They escaped to serve in Gandhi Ji's Sevagram for the 'Naee Taleem'. Lionel Fielding, Director General All India Radio, during his visit to Gandhi Ji, impressed upon the Mahatma that Balraj could better work for the new India section in the BBC to be established in the wake of the need for broadcasts to Indian Defense Forces serving in the far flung areas of the world. The Sahnis soon set sail for Britain and had a life transforming time there till 1944. Both become dedicated followers of Marxist philosophy, thanks to their closer friendship with the British communists, progressive thinkers and writers like Harold Laski, TS Elliot, George Orwell, etc.

The chance meeting in Srinagar with Chetan Anand, an old friend since college days in Lahore, resulted in an offer of acting in his film, Neecha Nagar. They soon became part of the Indian Peoples Theatre (IPTA) and inducted for roles in several plays and the film Dharti Ke Laal. The role for Dammo in Prithvi Theatre production Deewar made her a star. When things had just started looking up for them, the sudden death of Dammo in April 1947 devastated Balraj's life. He even blamed himself for being neglectful and insensitive towards his young and most talented life partner. The catastrophe of Partition deprived the Sahni family of their home and hearth. Back in Bombay, Balraj struggled for work; he scripted and acted in a highly 'popular' play, Jadoo Kursi Ka - the Magic of Chair, reflecting the line of the Communist Party - making fun of policies of the Nehru Government. Balraj was later full of remorse about this play and made sure that all its copies are destroyed!

Do Bigha Zamin, 1953

After resisting pressure of relatives, he got married in March 1949 to Santosh (then divorced), his first cousin, who was his love of early youth. He had to undergo imprisonment for several months for his activities as a communist. He was completely broke: some relief came when he wrote the screen script of Chetan's Baazi, 1951 and dubbed a Russian film with Santosh (Toshi). The making of Do Bigha Zamin - Two Acres of Land - in 1953 by Bimal Roy changed it all for Balraj. He, at long last, arrived as the screen super star of a different kind of dazzling brilliance: by his sincerest portrayal of a rickshaw puller. He had worked in 10 films between 1944 and 1954. The number was impressive 125 for the next two decades of his life, including many commercial hits. He had flowered as the finest character actor - Kabuliwallah, '61; Haqeeqat, '64; Waqt, '65 and his swan song classic on the theme of Partition, Garam Hawa - the Hot Breeze - '73 are among his many ever green great films.

Kabuliwala, 1961

Garam Hawa, 1973

Once when asked about his greatest ambition in life, Balraj had replied, "Oh, I wish I had been a beloved poet of people...” He was quintessentially an artist yearning to express his abundant love of humanity and unfathomable beauty of nature in its myriad manifestations. He was a dream merchant who was ever eager to share his passion for life with the lowliest in life: his heart was always beating for the most deprived and mind ever trying to understand root causes of injustice in society. He had turned to scientific socialism via the routes of Tagore's universal humanism and Gandhi's path of the basic commonality of the morality of all religions and an impeccable faith in nonviolence.

With brother Bhisham Sahni, 1940s

With son Parikshit Sahni

Finally, fully convinced of Tagore's advice, he had determined to make a mark by writing in mother tongue, Punjabi. There are 13 books by Balraj published in Punjabi; four in Hindi and occasional essays, belle letters and columns for daily news papers of different languages. Balraj's Meri Filmi Atamkatha was first serialized in popular Punjabi monthly, Preet Larhi. His ambitious novel, A journey, a Story remained unfinished due to his sudden death by heart stroke. The autobiographical overtones in all his writings make them authentic, colorful and extremely readable. He had become a regular traveler to Punjab in the last decade of his life and dreamt of living in Punjab as a full time author of Punjabi. He enjoyed close personal friendship with all the prominent writers of Punjabi and was a steadfast crusader for the cause of Punjabi language. His book Samen di Pairh - Footprint of Time - has a deeply touching and prophetic interview, circa 1969, with novelist Nanak Singh on the communal-linguistic conundrum of Punjab. The two giant and full blooded Punjabis were dismissive of creation of a shrunken state on the false premises of language and culture.

It was again on the 1st of January this year, as since my many years in retirement in Delhi, that I attended the day long annual Safdar Hashmi Memorial Trust (SAHMAT) function. The theme for the year long celebration of the birth centenary of Balraj was unveiled with the release of SAHMAT publication Balraj & Bhisham Sahni - Brothers in Political Theatre. I realized how the name Balraj forgetting his original name, Yudhishthira, had become a metaphor for the most decent values in life in a nation which has witnessed a steep and sharp decline in public morality and integrity at the altar of pursuit of political power. Tears trickled in my eyes remembering another Balraj, a Thanedar - Police Inspector- of my home town of Ahmedgarh. As a lecturer in college in Bathinda, I spent a month with him in his dormitory in the Police Lines. I noted that all his colleagues called him Sahni Sahib for his high qualities of character and excellence in the tough profession. Interestingly, Balraj was the personal hero of my mentor - my school teacher, Ashni Kumar (1916-99, born in Gujrat of legendary Sohni), a skeletal giant of knowledge, a Nehruvian like Balraj who taught me that Karl Marx could have been a reincarnation of Gautama Buddha for the modern epoch! And, I had been lucky to roam about in the streets of Balraj's 'Pindi as a representative of India!!

It is well known that Balraj loved the 'city beautiful'; many senior Chandigarhians would tell tons of charming tales of his visits here. Master Sohan Lal Bansal, the legendary teacher of Mathematics and a dedicated Comrade, shared with me how Balraj had walked into his house in February 1971 while on a campaign for Amarnath Vidyalankar for the Parliamentary elections. He was indeed overwhelmingly polite, without the slightest sign of any fuss or airs. Looking from the windows, he complimented Master Ji for the blessings of sun light and green trees and quiet atmosphere around his home, the real luxuries mostly denied to him in big city. It was an uphill task how to escort Balraj to the venue of public meeting, without the crowds taking him a hostage on the roads. Instead of Master Ji, as asked for by Balraj, guarding him against milling crowds, it was Balraj who had to help in tracing Master Ji on the way to the venue of his speech! My Guru in Foreign Service, another 'Pindian Sahni' who has been living for decades in the city would certainly have many more authentic anecdotes of the darling magician of the masses, Balraj. The centuries have to await when the angelic human beings, like Balraj, visit the planet earth ... the world indeed remembers you most sincerely, Balraj, on your 100th birthday!!

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Further links:

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balraj_Sahni
• http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0756379/ 
• Balraj Sahni’s Convocation Address at Jawaharlal Nehru University in 1972
• Balraj Sahni Autobiography
• WorldCat book list of author Balraj Sahni
• http://anuradhawarrier.blogspot.in/2011/04/greats-balraj-sahni.html

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Ambassador of Extraordinary Dignity and Abundant Humanity

This article was published in the monthly magazine Identity, November 2012

The virtues and status of a career diplomat of India would not register easily in the minds of a vast majority of Indian citizens: the occupation of 'lying abroad for the good of the country' has, perhaps, still to sink into the imagination of not only an average Indian mind but even of highly educated Indians. It is the Deputy Commissioner / Collector and the Superintendent of Police - and the Income Tax Officer in the current scenarios of India - who would seem to symbolize for the common people the currency of power and prestige of state rather than a First Secretary, Consul General, Minister or even an Ambassador in one of the far flung 178 diplomatic missions.

The Indian Foreign (read: Diplomatic) Service was launched vide a cabinet decision of October 9, 1946 for the soon to be independent and sovereign India, with a regular recruitment starting in 1948. Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru chose not only to be his own Foreign Minister but continued to take a deeply personal interest in the selection and grooming of the personnel for the newly created service to conduct diplomacy and promote the national interests of India in the international arena.

Apart from the Officers of the ICS/other Central/Princely States Services and the Defense Services, PM Jawaharlal initially inducted a number of eminent academicians/journalists and quite a few Princes/aristocrats for a career in the Foreign Service. It might be surprising to note that out of the 294 Indian Foreign Service Officers in the cadre till 1968, more than 200 might have been personally interviewed for selection or called for discussion of files by the Prime Minister as Foreign minister. PM, as per the popular story, had to make a strong intervention in 1957 to enable Syed Shahabudd to join the Foreign Service over-ruling the police report against him as a student leader in the Patna University. Shri KR Narayanan, born on Oct. 20, 1920 of a humble origin but a bright student, later to be a favorite pupil of Prof Harold Laski and Sardar Gurbachan Singh, born on Feb. 9, 1923, son of Sardar Bahadur Mohan Singh of Rawalpindi, a former Member of Privy Council, were both appointed in the Foreign Service in 1949. The two would indeed blossom as role models to emulate in representing the best and the noblest in the diplomatic service of India. I was privileged by destiny to know them both, a generation later: wish I had been posted to serve under them! Shri KR Narayanan, as President of India, signed on May 3, 2002, my letter of  credentials as High Commissioner to New Zealand while Sardar Gurbachan Singh presided over my first public lecture in retirement delivered at Bhai Vir Singh Sahit Sadan, New Delhi, on Nov 11,2006.

The above paragraphs are a prologue to pay my soulful tribute to Ambassador Gurbachan Singh who passed away on Oct. 7 at the age of 89, leading an eventful and meticulously disciplined life. He had been a unique witness - and pious participant too - in the history of India as one of the ablest diplomats and the historic Punjab as the noblest son of the soil and a dedicated follower of the faith born in the land of five rivers. By all available accounts, he indeed personified the grace, dignity, generosity, brilliance of mind and above all for the qualities of a team leader who was reputed to be instinctively empathetic towards the junior colleagues dubbed as 'the staff' in the wooden bureaucratic jargon. Born in the palatial house in Rawalpindi famously named after him as 'Bachan Niwas' – to use the idiom I learnt at school, 'with a silver spoon in his mouth', he was a silver-tongued gentleman with a golden heart and a mind of 'platinum'. Blessed with a glowingly handsome visage and always immaculately dressed, mostly wearing 'Churidar with the finest Nehruvian jacket, sporting often a neatly tied turban at its artistic best, he indeed commanded, as if, a majestic attention wherever he was present. He was every centimeter an epitome of courtesy and gentlemanliness. The colleagues in Foreign Service and his large circle of friends recall how he was the most generous and meticulously charming host in his diplomatic career in the various continents and also for more than a quarter century of active retirement in his tastefully maintained home, No 12, Curzon Road (renamed Kasturba Gandhi Marg). The untimely and sudden death in Dec. 2007 of their multi-talented son, Tejeshwar Singh - a familiar profusely bearded philosophical face, a distinctly baritone voice and an impeccable accent of English - on the Doordarshan in the pre-color era, perhaps, changed it all for Gurbachan Singh and Mrs Shama Singh.

Ambassador Gurbachan Singh would seem to be born, brought up and educated to be a quintessential diplomat in the service of India. Soon after his Post Graduation in Economics from Punjab University, he had been posted in the India Supply Mission, Washington in Sept. 1945 and continued to be there till April 1950 in the wake of his appointment in Indian Foreign Service. He was posted to Bangkok, London, Lagos, and Paris and was Ambassador/High Commissioner to Morocco, Kenya, Sri Lanka, Maldives and Switzerland with accreditation to Vatican. He held important assignments in the Ministry/Cabinet Secretariat including the post of Political Officer in Sikkim when the territory got integrated with India.

In retirement, Ambassador Gurbachan Singh had followed in the footsteps of his father Sardar Bahadur Mohan Singh in taking a keen interest in the cultural and educational projects of the Sikh organisations. He was one of the founding trustees of Bhai Vir Singh Sahit Sadan, New Delhi. He made donation of several precious collections of the family including the copy a rare handwritten Granth Sahib for the special section of the Library. He was also closely involved in the deliberations of 'Punjab Group' when crisis engulfed the state in the 1980's. He was a very keen scholar 'carrying since childhood an abiding interest in the Sikh faith and philosophy' and authored in 1998, dedicated - 'To the evergreen memory of my parents…' - a highly acclaimed and illustrated book, The Sikhs; Faith, Philosophy & Folk which has run into three more editions. He states in the Preface to the book, “Since the Gurus all received divine inspiration for their writings, it is one of the revealed religions…it is not a fusion or synthesis of the two (Hinduism and Islam), it is a separate faith and has evolved into a separate religion.” As regards the translations of Gurbani in the book, he states, “they are my personal effort…I have attempted to convey the essential meaning and spirit of the original.”

Ambassador Gurbachan Singh was a pillar of strength to the Association of Indian Diplomats (Ambassadors) founded in 1980 and was its President in 1989. He took a special interest in the Journal of the Association, Indian Foreign Affairs Journal launched in 2006. He contributed a comprehensive account- under the Oral History project of the Journal – detailing each turn and twist at the Rabat Islamic Conference in September 1969 when he was India's Ambassador in Morocco. The account could be termed as a learning text for the budding diplomats of India. It is indeed amazing but tragically true that this scion of the most eminent aristocracy was far away in Washington since 1945 when his beloved 'Bachan Niwas' became a Foreign-Enemy-territory in the wake of Partition of India. It was as in March 2008 that he could again set his foot in the land of his forefathers - it was as a member of the Delegation of the Association of the retired Ambassadors! He must be gazing at sky while moving step by step in the 'Bachan Niwas' -the tastefully designed dream house had been in turn Pakistan Army Chief/ President Zia Ul Haq's residence and to be later the seat of an Islamic university! The Pakistani hosts were extra gracious to take him to Aitcheson College; Punjab University, Lahore and other places of his most precious memories. The Pakistanis, according to him, said, “The borders between India and Pakistan should only be delicate demarcations not frightening frontiers…we must be free to meet unhindered...” Ambassador Gurbachan Singh replied in his hall mark gentle intonation, “Friends, first, you may please make up your mind, clearly and firmly what you want…!”

Ambassador Gurbachan Singh, to mention that his family was Chadha would be a blasphemy according to tenets of the Sikh faith, was a true and pious Sikh. Making his remarks as Chairperson at function of my lecture, “The Dynamics of Sikh diaspora since Independence”, he was gracious and thoughtful to pick on my mention of uncalled notes of discordance including the caste divides among the Sikh Community of Britain by the narrow minded vested interests. He mentioned two specific points to the immense hilarity of the distinguished audience of the Punjabis of the capital. Quoting poet Ishar Singh 'Ishar Bhaiya', he recited his Lines:

Kise Baddhi saarhi, tan Sikhi nuun khatra;
Kise baddhi darhi, tan Sikhi nuun khatra;
Eh Sikhi naa hoee, ho gayee mom-batti:
Pighal gayee, laggi jara vee je 'vaa tatti'!

Some perceive threat to religion in wearing of Sari;
Others suspect danger to religion, if the beard is tied
Is it the faith or a fragile, little candle?
In danger every moment, a fresh breeze blows!

He also narrated the anecdote his father had told him in the early 1930's about an army man. The simple soldier was asked about his experiences of his visit to London. He replied with great gusto, “kamaal hi hai ji…safai karan wale bhi angrezi bolde ne otthe tan…” it is indeed strange, Sir, even the street cleaners talk in English there!”

A remarkably active and polished individual, Sardar Gurbachan wrote in June 2009 to the Association, “I have not been able to attend meetings of the Association for over a year…because I have been quite unwell leading to several stays in the hospital …May I request you accept my resignation from the Editorial Board of the Foreign Affairs Journal.” The final communication was in July this year,” Shama and Gurbachan Singh are moving house by the end of July, 2012…They will in due course inform you when they relocate to a more permanent abode.” And then the obituary pages of the two leading dailies of Delhi informed on OCT. 9 that he "left peacefully with Satguru's th grace on 7 Oct. 2012…"

With the passing away Sardar Gurbachan Singh, the Punjabis in the capital have lost another stalwart of the community. Having chosen Delhi to be my own home in the sun-set years, I have felt an indefinable void and diminishing of the Punjabiat in the demise in the recent years of great sons of the 'Mitti Panj Dariya di…sacred soil of the Five Rivers' including Gen. JS Aurora, S. Patwant Singh, Kartar Singh Duggal, Dr Amrik Singh and of course 'the daughter of Punjab' Amrita Pritam…the West Punjab had indeed embraced values representing the best of the spirit of Punjab. The latest accusations about the Punjabi youth drowned in the flood of 'Nashas - drugs' would make Prof Puran Singh turn in his grave. Thank you Sardar Gurbachan Singh…your life would remain a source of inspiration for your so many friends and admirers across globe and the Punjabis nearer at home! May your soul rest in eternal peace!!

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Copy of magazine article is available here (PDF)
 and here (MS Word format)

Tales of ‘Neta Ji’ and Netas Today - Re-envisioning India in 2011

Ambassador Bal Anand,
Panama 1997

The word ‘neta’, originally from Sanskrit, meaning ‘a guide, a leader’, has earned, via Bengali, the distinction of an entry into the Concise Oxford English Dictionary (First Published in 1911, Tenth–revised–edition in 2001, the one in my use now is Fourth impression 2006 ). ‘Neta Ji’, the suffix ‘Ji’ being a term of endearment, implies ‘a revered leader’, this prefix-title conferred by people of India on Subhash Chandra Bose, the iconic youthful leader of Indian National Congress - 28 years younger than Mahatma Gandhi - who dared to defy ‘Bapu Ji’ with a unique dignity, restraint and grace! The Google search on Neta Ji flashes in single click 1,210,000 entries in 0.19 seconds. In this epoch of rapid globalization of languages, Ghotala – scam - would surely make an honorable entry soon into the dictionaries of the five UN languages- the ‘scam’, of unknown since 1960’s, meaning fraud /dishonest scheme, is already a freely used and fully grasped ‘shabad’ in the 22 recognized languages in the Eighth Schedule of the Constitution of Bharat.

On the 15^th of August, the day of the anniversary of Independence and the most painful amputation of people in the history of humanity India in 1947 when, in the stirring words of Jawaharlal Nehru, the nation awoke to ‘a tryst with destiny’, the heart beats of Indians, Pakistanis - and Bangla Deshis too - do feel, in today’s lingo, ‘Kuchh, kuchh hota hai … sensation of something, something’. In my consciousness, the first stirrings of the day were felt in 1951 as a student of 4th grade in the Mahatma Gandhi Memorial National High School in a grain market town, 20 km from Ludhiana. There was a big Prabhat Pheri - morning procession - by younger activists of local political spectrum of Congressmen in Khadi, the Socialists in several sartorial hues - and the Jan Sanghis in Khaki shorts - holding medium size Tirangas - Tricolors - raising slogan, ‘Bharat Mata ki Jai - victory to Mother India’ - and, in between, also, ‘Pakistan, Murdabaad - Death to Pakistan!’ I particularly recall the colored illustration splashed on the cover of Saptahik Hindustan depicting Pakistan as a Devil with horns and Maulvi beard, holding a flag with Moon & Star, running away from the gun wielding Indian Jawan! I feel bewildered to imagine even today: What has really changed for the separated twins since their brutal birth? Are the people commodities to be divided and displaced according to the dirty games among the power hungry maniacs posing as their saviors - Netas or Rahbr-e Qaum?

This town of my tiny rented home since the summer of 1951 till I was pulled out by destiny in the summer of 1971 to join a career of ‘representing India’ had been founded in 1905, on the cross borders of Anrezi Ilaqa and the only small Muslim state in East Punjab, by Nawab Ahmed Ali. The Nawabs boasted Sherwani Afghan descent and the marital link to Delhi ruler Bahlol Lodhi. The town of Ahmedgarh had been necessitated by the newly laid out railway line between Ludhiana-Jakhal-Bathinda. It is said that the design of town planning of Lyallpur of West Punjab had been borrowed to provide for wider rectangular road and a central Plaza which was named Gandhi Chowk on the day of Independence. The location of the town on the borders had been ideally utilized by the freedom fighters of ‘Riyasati Praja Mandal’ and Indian National Congress of Anrezi Ilaqa to dodge the police in their hot pursuit, making the new town a centre of heightened political activity’.

The trend and tradition of political consciousness had continued to persist for about two decades after Independence. The local leaders would stake their prestige to fetch all famous leaders visiting Ludhiana - 20 Km away - to address people in Gandhi chowk. I was privileged as school / college student to listen to JP, Ram Manohar Lohia, Acharya Narendra Dev, SM Joshi, Neta Ji’s nephew Sisir Bose, communist stalwarts like AK Gopalan, Sat Pal Dang, Pandit Kishori Lal not to forget great Jan Sangh orators including Pandit Premnath Dogra, Prakash Vir Shastri, Veer Yagya Dutt, not to forget many singers of patriotic songs attuned to hit film songs. Meanwhile, the character of politics and quality of leaders seemed to have undergoing a metamorphosis witnessed strange changes after national elections in 1967. The spirit of sacrifice and idealism of the era of freedom struggle, as if, had vanished in two decades! I must, however, pay my respects to the saffron khadi clad Swami Harivishnu Dass ji who gladly financed till his last all the expenditures for the function of the Independence Day of hiring the required materials for stage, loud speaker, carpets, cleanliness of the area of Gandhi Chowk etc - and would make an impressive speech praising Jawaharlal Nehru’s leadership and India’s rising prestige in the world. Comrade Tek Chand Diwana, the 88 year old freedom fighter who was also a great football player & famous for playing role of Lakshman in Ram Lila is my last surviving Neta-hero.

My thoughts on the Independence Day of India go to the poet-patriot (Padam Shri) Ali Jawad Zaidi (1916-2005). During my posting to Tehran (1975-1977); I had the good fortune to enjoy his enlightening company. When, on the eve of his departure due to retirement, I persisted in asking him about his personal encounters with the top leaders during the struggle for freedom, he reluctantly narrated the two such experiences. Firstly, the Neta Ji, the freshly elected President – Rastrapati - of the Indian National Congress in 1937 for the annual session in Haripur, “we, the group of the Students Federation of India mildly complained to Subhash Babu that we had worked so hard for his election but since his becoming of Congress, we are finding it very hard to get opportunity to meet him for deeper discussions ... Subhash agreed with us adding that he had indeed been terribly occupied and asked us about our place of stay … we hesitatingly revealed address of the obscure Dharamshala we had put in … Subhash said,” please expect me visit you after midnight … and lo, behold! Neta Ji did visit us around 1 AM and spent two hours with us talking about all the current national and international issues ...”

As regards the meeting with Gandhi Ji, Zaidi Sahib narrated how Sarojini Naidu had arranged the meeting and how their group of students got late due to his bad habit of oversleeping … Ms. Naidu was furious - cursed them and refusing to talk to them. One of the students concocted a false but clever story about a procession and police blockade of the way. The meeting was rearranged through kindness of Mahdev Desai. While his three companions touched Gandhi Ji’s feet, Zaidi did not because he believed it to be an act of orthodoxy and indignity. According to Zaidi Sahib, Gandhi Ji continued to ply the small Charkha and enquired about our activities, advising us to engage in some social service among the poor…’ I felt myself in a strangely mystic atmosphere … and effortlessly, unconsciously my hands were touching his feet when we took leave of Gandhi Ji’ revealed Shri Zaidi, in an emotionally choking voice.

Most interestingly and emotionally so fulfilling for me, I have been privileged to hoist the National Flag - the beloved Tricolor - 19 times in the foreign lands on Independence / Republic Days of India and also read out the messages by our Presidents. The 15^th of August has been a day of deep reflections for me for the destiny of Bharat. Memories come crowding of the celebrations - beginning with school to Embassies of India in various continents. A really scholarly and inspiring school teacher, Ashni Kumar, made all the difference for me in the only life I can talk about. The poem in early fifties, 'phir baeson ke baad desh ne nutan jeevan paya - after so many years, the country has been bestowed a new life'; tributes in verse to patriots like Bhagat Singh, Jawaharlal, Neta Ji; inspiring film songs by Pradeep, Sahir, Kaifi - notwithstanding the challenges and privations, there appeared hope and sense of confidence in the air and in the leadership: now, perhaps, in spite of many an achievements, the masses do feel deprived on a daily basis and the air seems increasingly polluted by a sense of betrayal. We must remember what President S. Radhakrishnan had said, "the goal before our politicians must be service at any cost –and not power at any price".

Ashok, Akbar, and Nehru - the legacy is indeed long and challenging: a re-envisioning of India awaits!

Ambassador Bal Anand and family,
celebrating 50th Independence Day, Panama

W.H. Auden’s poem “Partition,” published in 1966. These moving verses highlight the absurdity of the way the border was created sixty two years ago:

Unbiased at least he was when he arrived on his mission,
Having never set eyes on the land he was called to partition
Between two peoples fanatically at odds,
With their different diets and incompatible gods.
“Time,” they had briefed him in London, “is short. It’s too late
For mutual reconciliation or rational debate:
The only solution now lies in separation.
The Viceroy thinks, as you will see from his letter,
That the less you are seen in his company the better,
So we’ve arranged to provide you with other accommodation.
We can give you four judges, two Moslem and two Hindu,
To consult with, but the final decision must rest with you.”

Shut up in a lonely mansion, with police night and day
Patrolling the gardens to keep the assassins away,
He got down to work, to the task of settling the fate
Of millions. The maps at his disposal were out of date
And the Census Returns almost certainly incorrect,
But there was no time to check them, no time to inspect
Contested areas. The weather was frightfully hot,
And a bout of dysentery kept him constantly on the trot,
But in seven weeks it was done, the frontiers decided,
A continent for better or worse divided.

The next day he sailed for England, where he could quickly forget
The case, as a good lawyer must. Return he would not,
Afraid, as he told his Club, that he might get shot.