History’s most prominent woman Punjabi writers, essayist and poet “Amrita Pritam” (1919-2005) was born in British India’s Gujranwala 100 years ago. She remembered for the poignant poem titled, “Ajj Aakhaan Waris Shah Nu” (English: “Today I Invoke Waris Shah” or “Ode to Waris Shah”, Punjabi: اَج آکھاں وارث شاہ نُوں, ਅੱਜ ਆਖਾਂ ਵਾਰਸ ਸ਼ਾਹ ਨੂੰ). Apart from Punjabi, She also wrote in Hindi and Urdu as well.
Amrita is the first prominent recipient of Punjab Rattan Award conferred upon her by Punjab Chief Minister Capt. Amarinder Singh. In 1986, she was nominated in the Upper House of Parliament. She also won the ‘Jnanpith Award’ in 1981 and one of the country’s highest civilian awards, the Padma Vibhushan in 2004, a year before she breathed her last on October 31, 2005..
On August 31, in the Google Doodle, She is seen sitting in front of a bunch of ‘black roses’ as she writes in a diary. Here is the black roses are symbolic of her autobiography titled ‘Kala Gulab’ (Black Rose).
In 2004, She was honoured with India’s highest literary award, given by the Sahitya Akademi, the Sahitya Akademi Fellowship is given to the “immortals of literature” for lifetime achievement. Significantly, Her work in ‘Pinjar’ (1950) is the best literature for many authors, which is written in the ‘backdrop of the Partition of India’. In this novel, she created the much memorable character ‘Puro’.
In Bollywood, Pritam’s novel titled “Pinjar” was adapted into 2003 period drama film directed by Chandraprakash Dwivedi. Pinjar featured Urmila Matondkar, Manoj Bajpayee and Sanjay Suri, and the film also won the National Film Award for Best Feature Film on National Integration. Thus, The novel was made into an award-winning film in 2003. In 2007, an audio album titled, ‘Amrita recited by Gulzar’ was released by noted lyricist Gulzar.
A number of her works have been translated into various languages such as English, French, Danish, Japanese, Mandarin, and other languages from Punjabi and Urdu, including her autobiographical works Black Rose in 1968, Rasidi Ticket in 1976, and Shadows of Words in 2004.
In the poem the poet invokes Waris Shah, a popular Punjabi author, who wrote a popular version of Punjabi love tragedy “Heer Ranjha”. She asks to record and witness the miserable condition of Punjab and its people after partition (1947) and open a new page of his book of love.
In the story of ‘Heer Ranjha’, Waris Shah narrated the misery of a woman (Heer), but a million of daughters of Punjab, She feels, were crying to Shah. Despite this, She worked until 1961 in the Punjabi service of All India Radio, Delhi. After her divorce in 1960, her several works became more feminist..
Despite all of this, Punjabi language and literature has its own rhythm of vigour like its folk dances and way of life. She belongs to the Indo-Aryan family. Punjabi literature was a natural successor to Vedic and Perso-Arabic literatures and Apbhramsa literature that contained dramas, and narrative poems..
