|
|
Gusse Ho Gaya Nand Kishore
S P Singh
 In
his subtle but touching study of a migrant labourer and his
world, Punjab's uncrowned poet laureate Surjit Patar penned his
poem Aaya Nand Kishore hinting at a problem which even
nose-to-the-ground scribes woke up to much later. The poem
describes how a weakling Nand Kishore boarded the Sialdah
Express train, his Ramkali perched on the berth, shrinking
within herself, and then how their daughter Madhuri is born
amidst Punjabi atmosphere and ends up learning ‘Gurmukhi’ script
even as sons of Punjabi jats go to convent schools to learn the
English alphabet.
After many hikes in wheat-paddy MSPs, and
sarson-fields giving way to shopping malls, Patar's poem also
lost the pace. Madhuri is now a grown up, speaks Punjabi,
watches India Calling on coloured TV, and has cassettes of Daler
Mehndi at home to tap her heels to. She seems little different
from many Punjabis and off and on, one or the other Madhuri is
getting married to a Jat's grandson. At times, troubles brew
when Madhuri's little brothers at some places in Punjab grow
into handsome Punjabi-speaking men skilled in the art of
masonry, rise to become 'thekedars' , or one day elope
with a jat's granddaughter.
After the migrants versus locals clash in
Ludhiana last week, things will never be the same again. By the
time the fracas ended, over 50 were left hurt and the
precariously-preserved harmony lay shattered. Now, calling out
derisively to a migrant by shouting ‘Oye Bhaiyia!’ may
trigger off stone pelting.
“The situation is under control,” a police
officer jumped to the conclusion after two hours, thus covering a
distance which sociologists would have taken years to reach.
Sialdah Express still chugs as slowly, but
culture runs on Shatabdi Express pace. Demography is changing
culture, and many a troubles are brewing on Punjab's migrant
labour front.
Then some re-mixes are also happening. Many
among the migrant labour from Bihar are turning to the Sikh
religion and converting in a bid to reduce discrimination
against them in the agricultural and labour sectors in Punjab.
In Talhan village near Jalandhar, which saw
boycott of dalits three years earlier, Punjabi-speaking Vijay
Singh has married a Mithila-tongued Ram Dulari.
And surprise! surprise! Vijay originally
belongs to the Purnea village of Bihar himself, he came as a
migrant labour to Punjab 27 years ago and became a baptised Sikh
while his wife joined him just three years back.
A friend of Vijay, also a migrant, now
sports a turban and is growing a beard. He found it a cheaper
way to enhance his social status. Passer-by sometimes hail to
him as Giani ji if they have to ask what time it was.
In his own village, he is still fighting.
He is still known as bhaiya, this time a "Sikh Bhaiyia".
By a conservative estimate, Punjab has a
million plus strong migrant labour population, largely from
Bihar and Uttar Pradesh, employed in agriculture and industry.
They are attracted by the higher wages they get in this state.
Discrimination is yielding way to reluctant acceptance though
they remain at the lowest end of the periphery.
But then if they are asked by the police to
become card-carrying members of the identified community, named
all the time in newspapers and FIRs for every crime under the
sun, sometimes the anger boils over.
Sialdah Express of course still runs. Some
like Simranjit Singh Mann and Jaswant Singh Kanwal sometimes try
to switch on the red signal, pull a chain or block the tracks,
but Madhuri's call in Punjabi beckons. Sialdah is always full.
Achhar Singh’s sons still go to convent schools to learn ABC.
Madhuri’s little kids study in Punjabi-medium teacher-less
government schools. And Nand Kishore’s innumerable brothers are
booked on Sialdah.
August 27, 2006
Print this article
|
|
|
