Today’s Google doodle is celebrating the 100th birth anniversary of Amrita Pritam, one of India’s first prominent women Punjabi poets. She is one of the most notable and strong individuals who predominantly rules in Punjabi literature and lifted it to another level. Amrita is the one who equally loved both sides of the India-Pakistan border and always talked about peace and love between the two nations. She is one amongst those who had suffered most from the partition and her writings are the true reflection of that lament.
Let’s know about this amazing brave personality who believe in love and peace, speaks about feminism and women issues, and tried to spread love through poem and literature.
She was born as Amrit Kaur in Gujranwala, Punjab (present-day Pakistan). Her father, Kartar Singh Hitkar, was a poet and scholar.
Amrita Pritam is mostly remembered for her poem titled “Ajj Aakhaan Waris Shah Nu,” (Today I Invoke Waris Shah), addressed to Punjabi Sufi poet Waris Shah in which she laments the tragedy of the partition of Pakistan from India.
Today, I call Waris Shah, “Speak from your grave,
And turn to the next page in your book of love,
Once, a daughter of Punjab cried and you wrote an entire saga,
Today, a million daughters cry out to you, Waris Shah,
Rise! O’ narrator of the grieving! Look at your Punjab,
Today, fields are lined with corpses, and blood fills the Chenab.
Her writings passionately reflect her lament over the partition.
“My bed is ready for you
But take off your body
Like you did with your shirt and shoes
Keep it away on the stool
It doesn’t matter
Every land has its own customs.”
Even 100 years after her birth, through a life that saw the trauma of Partition and the birth and rise of a new nation.
Her famous novel “Pinjar” which was written in 1950 portray about the social turmoil and the traumatic torture inflicted on women by their abductors in the wake of the Partition. It was adapted into a Hindi film of the same title, which won the National award for Best Feature Film on National Integration in 2004.
She became the first woman to win the Sahitya Akademi Award in 1956 for her long poem, 'Sunehade' (Messages). In 1981, she won the Bharatiya Jnanpith for the novel 'Kagaz Te Canvas' (The Paper and the Canvas). She was awarded the Padma Shri in 1969 and in 2004 the Padma Vibhushan. She was also bestowed the highest honour conferred by the Sahitya Akademi - 'Immortals of Literature' in 2005.
Krishi Jagran pays tributes to the fearless spirit of love, queen of literature and a feminist who upfrontly raised women issues towards the world.
