Ek thee Amrita

When I watched Pinjar during my school days, little did I know that the movie would have such a bearing on the literary landscape. I didn’t know of the writer or even the fact that the movie was a famous literary adaptation. The actors- Urmila Matondkar, and Manoj Bajpayee gave a subtle, serene voice to the agony while being sombre. The movie won the National Film Award for Best Feature Film on National Integration. 

Why am I recollecting my childhood memory? It’s because August 31st marked the birth anniversary of Amrita Pritam. A renowned figure in Punjabi Literature, she received the Sahitya Akademi Award in 1956 for her work ‘Sunehade’. This makes her the only woman in Punjabi literature to receive such accolades. In my UGC-NET preparation, I read her under the heading of Partition Literature. Perhaps, the memory of violence that made her a refugee at the age of 28 made her mostly write on Partition. Pinjar too is a period drama set in the Partition. Besides Pinjar, she is sealed in the hearts of readers with her moving poem, ‘Ajj Aakhan Waris Shah Nu’. Written in an elegiac tone, it harks the eighteenth-century Punjabi poet to express sadness over Partition. 

‘Kagaz Te Canvas’ showered on her Bharatiya Jnanpith, one of India’s highest literary awards in 1982.  Later she received Padma Vibhushan in 2004, after receiving Padma Shri in 1969. Sahitya Akademi rewarded Sahitya Akademi Fellowship for lifetime achievement. In fact, M.S Sathyu who directed ‘Garam Hawa’(1973) based on the theme of Partition paid tribute to the Punjabi icon through, ‘Ek Thee Amrita’. Not only that, Amrita was the first recipient of the Punjab Rattan Award by Punjab Chief Minister Capt. Amarinder Singh. 

‘Amrit Lehren’, her first anthology, came at sixteen. Starting as a romantic poet, she moved towards writing on topical issues. Her collection, ‘Lok Peed’ brought to the forefront the Bengal Famine of 1943. The literary luminary’s famous autobiography is ‘ Rasidi Ticket’. What marks her as a writer of considerable influence is the flexibility with which she moves from amorous themes to writing on societal issues. Her literary corpus makes her ‘the first poetess of the Punjabi language’ who has left an indelible mark on the global literary tradition.