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The city that nurtured the talent of Amrita Pritam, took the lead in holding a large literary meet in the memory of the writer mid-November while no such function has yet been organised on this side of the border, writes Nirupama Dutt
IT was announced in the function held at Alamhara Hall by World Punjabi Congress (WPC), in collaboration with several Lahori literary groups, that an Amrita Pritam Chair for Studies in Punjabi Poetry would be set up at Panjab University, Lahore. The WPC has instituted an annual poetry award in Amrita’s name. Although Amrita had received several national and international honours and awards this is more special as it comes from her city. One can borrow lines from Sahir Ludhianvi who had said of his college at Ludhiana: Yahin seekha thha fun-e-naghmagari; Yahin uttara thha sher ka ilham. The times that Amrita grew up in were such that very few girls entered universities or colleges for that matter. And now there is to be a chair in the name of Amrita who probably would have longed to be a part of the university intelligentsia in her times. In the 1960s, when Amrita Pritam was first given the D.Litt degree along with celebrated vocalist M.S. Subhalakshmi by the Delhi University, it was a special moment. These women had little by way of formal education and the taught themselves with toil in the school of their lives and their arts. Later, several universities, including Panjab University, Chandigarh, conferred the D.Litt degree on her. This was a rare honour for a Punjabi writer but then Amrita was the rarest of the rare. Such honours also affirm the power of creativity and hold a mirror up to the irony of the ‘schooled’ and the ‘unschooled’
Back to Lahore, Satinder Singh Noor and Deepak Manmohan Singh, who were Indian delegates to the Lahore meet for Amrita, say that what was most moving was that Punjabi poets of Lahore paid their tributes to Amrita in poetry specially written for the occasion. Cities have a strange way of remaining with their writers no matter where they go. Although Amrita was born in Gujranwala, it was Lahore that gave her recognition as poet. Amrita was a star in her teens and an announcer and sitarist for All India Radio, Lahore. It was in this city that she met Urdu poet Sahir Ludhianvi. First, she fell in love with his poetry and then with him for he was her first love. Talking of her days in Lahore, which she often did, Amrita would recall an interesting albeit heartrending episode on leaving Lahore at the time of the Partition. Sahir had gifted to Amrita a framed calligraphic copy of his famous poem Taj Mahal: Meri mehboob kahin aur mila kar mujhse... And it was hanging on the wall of her living room. Amrita, on the other hand, had gifted a Parker pen to Sahir. In the chaos that accompanied Partition, Amrita fled with her family from Lahore without carrying anything. On the other hand, Sahir was trying to leave Delhi for Lahore, he did migrate for a short while, and someone stole the pen from his pocket. Smiling, she would say: "Thus the gifts of love were lost." But the love that was never lost was that between Amrita and her city Lahore. In spite of the politics of division, the poet was never exiled. Punjabis there read Amrita just as Punjabis read her here. And now he is back in her city cherished for the contribution she made to the world of letters. |
