Better late than never....by Rajvinder Kaur Hayer Dhillon
Chandigarh: Avtar Singh “Prem” was born July 20th, 1921, in a small town of Malwa Region Muktsar. He was a Poet authored a poem “Rani Jindan” in 1960; Entrepreneur built the Ajit Theater; he was the Secretary of Market Committee Muktsar. Sir Chhotu Ram, Jat Farmer himself and Revenue Minister belong to Unionist Party in British India who changed the face of Rural Punjab.
The Shahukar Registration Act was passed in Sept. 1938 to curb the exploitation of the Farmers by the Money lenders and Market Committees were set up. If he was alive today he will be supporting small Farmers and sitting with them.
His parents were farmers. In those days Agriculture was preferred over Education, but he was determined to get Education, he defied all the odds graduated from RSD College Ferozpur became Secretary of Market Committee to help the farmers , he built the sheds for them to rest install water fountains help to bring small streams so they can irrigate their farms and keep an eye on money landers and Brokers.
He published his first book “Marsiea” in July 1986 which was inaugurated by S. Gurnam Singh Tir (Chacha Chandigarhia).
It was his dream to put that book on Maharaja Duleep Singh’s grave so after publishing the book he did that and then came to the USA to visit us. As luck would have it he had a stroke and returned to his beloved Sri Muktsar Sahib.
He never fully recovered so in Sept. 1991 my Son Ameet ,and I visited him, because of Stroke he had a speech impediment he was trying to tell me something as I understood he has a manuscript of hundreds of pages of poems he wants me to publish it I promised that his death bed wish will be fulfilled.
It was not easy for me living in USA taking care of family no internet did not know how to type no Punjabi Fonts but thanks to Mountain House Librarian Kathleen Blufleben who put the Punjabi fonts on one computer, I filled my promise which I made to him 32 years back published two books Prem-Kasturi and Insanyiat Dey Pahreydar , in March 2023 I updated his 1986 Book “Marsiea”.
By the grace of God after 75 years Jan. 27th, 2024, proved slow and steady wins the race, better late than never.
Sonia Dhami who is the Trustee of Sikh Foundation International, Independent Curator, works at Punjab Arts and Tolerance, S. Avtar Singh “Prem”s Epic of “Rani Jindan” is on the wall of UCLA’s Fowler Museum with QR code to read the whole poem which is twenty pages.
February 21, 2024
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Rajvinder Kaur Hayer Dhillon, Retired teacher based in California, US
raj@dhillonclan.com
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