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L I T E R A T U
R E
Punjab
Tragedy Revisited by Punjabi Diaspora
Dr. Jaspal Singh
 Prof.
Harbhajan Singh from Kala Sangian in Kapurthala district in Punjab is a
well-known NRI Punjabi writer who left for the States some six years ago in
search of greener pastures. In India he remained associated with the Naxalite
movement of the seventies and for some time he was a whole time revolutionary
totally committed to Marxism Leninism and the thought of Mao Tze Dong. Before
moving to America he had published two collections of short stories, one
collection of poetry, three novels and three collection of prose.
 Now his fourth
novel Balde Sivian Da Sek (Vishavbharti Parkashan, Barnala) has appeared.
This novel has dual purpose first to deal with the Khalistan terrorism in India
particularly in Punjab and second to understand and conceptualise the nature of
American system and it’s supporting organs. The novel begins with a cocktail
party in an apartment at San Jose where four friends – Kuldeep, Bachitar,
Mohan and Varinder Sharma live. The party is being hosted to celebrate the
success of cultural programme writer from Sacramento. Bachitar is an asylum
seeker and Kuldeep is pleading his case in the relevant department. All the
others are permanent immigrants. Bachitar has a girl friend “Poppy” in India
whom he intends to marry before bringing her to America. He often remains lost
in her thoughts. Towards the end of the novel when Bachitar is able to secure a
work permit in America, he receives the news of Poppy’ murder along with the
other members of her family at the hands of the Sikh extremists. The news
completely shatters him, pushing him into deep depression. Mohan, the
protagonist of the novel has similar problem in India. His maternal Uncle is a
farmer in the Trai region pf Uttar Pradesh. Both his sons get involved in the
terrorist activities and in course of time one of them is killed by the Police
while the other is captured by the security forces during operation Black
Thunder executed in the Golden Temple complex at Amritsar. He is savagely
tortured by the Police. Consequently Mohan’s Uncle goes mad and his aunt
commits suicide when she could no longer bear the brunt of the tragic events. In
San Jose though Mohan is able to win over his beloved Rummi, her parents do not
acquiesce in her decision to live with Mohan without marrying and have a child
in cohabitation. When Mohan learns about the pathetic condition of his Uncle in
India and the suffering that his own parents have to undergo, he decides to
visit India. At the other end in America his girl friend Rummi is due to deliver
her child any day and she becomes very sad to learn about the absence of her
child’s father at the time of his birth.
Now within this
broad storyline, Harbhajan weaves sharp comments on the American system in which
strange bedfellows move hand in hand. Out of the four protagonists of Khalistan
in San Jose one is a genuine Khalistani, the second is an army deserter of 1984,
the third is a smuggler from Amritsar who has remained a police tout for a long
time and the fourth is a farmer policeman who has killed many Khalistani
terrorists in Punjab. Now all of them are promoting the Khalistani cause in
America. One of the characters in the novel dubs America as a ‘sweet prison’
where one has to annihilate himself in order to become a being from a non-being
and by the time one achieves this status one is completely done for. Another
telling comment about the American system comes from Kuldeep who along with
Varinder says that when the Cabaret dancer passed by him she let off terrible
stink. Kuldeep says, “Everything here is stinking. From junk food to the
President. From relation to system. From work to bed. There is nothing but
stink. And this stink gives an illusion of fragrance. Now this stink is selling
at a very high premium. The agents are charging a million and a half rupees to
get you across the electrified wires.”
The generation
gap in the Indian society in America is much larger than it is in India. When a
character Basant Kaur scolds her daughter for living with Mohan before marriage
the girl is provoked. She bluntly tells her mother that if she sleeps with her
boy friend it is her personal matter. If she is pregnant before marriage, the
mother should not bother. She adds that sex or pregnancy has nothing to do with
marriage. At this the mother gets fits and after a few days she becomes a wreck
both physically and mentally.
Kuldeep who
towards the end of the novel becomes a successful lawyer and marries a Muslim
divorced girl is stunned when he remembers his first wife who would often tell
him to cook and eat at home since she is to go for dinner with her boss or her
boy friend. He advises one and all that the boys born in America or Canada
should never marry in India nor the girls born in India should ever marry those
born in America or Canada. Such marriages are veritable disasters. How the
business companies shut their shops in America and fire their workers in
thousands is really unbelievable.
The whites in
America have their own problem when their children mix up with the coloured
ones. A white teenager falls love with an Indian boy and they have their maiden
sex as well. The girl’s family learns about it. They immediately plan to shift
to some other place where they don’t see ‘dirty suck mean coloured immigrant
bastards’ around.
Bachitar
overcomes his depressions. Good books drags him out of the abyss. He starts
living with GurIqbal, a progressive playwright and theatre man. Punjab tragedy
always lurks at the background. They try to build a movement through theatre to
understand the Punjab tragedy in a rational way. The post Operation Blue Star
era and its madness is presented through plays and other cultural programmes
which the extremist elements detest. Nevertheless they are able to drive their
viewpoint home to the common people who then respond ardently. As a result
alternative visions and dreams start taking birth in their minds and they become
capable of crossing the dark tunnel of communal hatred and spite.
Harbhajan has
selected one of the most important themes for this novel. But he deserts it in a
huff. The sense of incompleteness piques the reader. The author cannot
escape like this. He must bring his tale to a logical end where the structural
forces devise a functional equilibrium. To achieve this he must write the second
part of this novel.
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