A Window To Perceptive Journalism

Malwa's Garg who charmed
the world as Gargi

S P Singh

Decades ago they rechristened it as Kasturba Gandhi Marg, but for millions of Balwant Gargi fans, it will always be 27, Curzon Road that they will remember. Hordes of men (and more women) of letters and artistes will have a nostalgic full stop in memory connected with Gargi, be it the New Delhi address or his later Mumbai abode.  

"What is this Gargi?" renowned Punjabi playwright Gursharan Singh once asked him. "I am a Garg bania from Bathinda but if I gave out my real identity, who will buy my books?" Gargi said. Gursharan never found out whether he was saying so in earnest or in jest, but he certainly said it charmingly.  

'Charming' is the word most used when they described Gargi, ‘aristocrat’ coming a close second.  

Born in 1916 in Punjab's Malwa heartland, immortalised in Kakka Reta (Coarse Sand, and not Golden Sand as the legendary poet Mohan Singh once translated it), Gargi, who learnt how to write in Punjabi long after he was an established man of letters, strode the world of literature like a colossus.  

And with an uncanny ability, often stepped on fellow artistes' toes, an art he perfected and chuckled about in private conversations.   A playwright par excellence – Loha Kut, Dhooni Di Agg, Sultan Razia,Kanak Di Balli are just some examples – Gargi took the literary world by storm with Kuari Teesi, the one-act play about the desires of a young lass to break through the shackles around her.  

Conventional milestones passed by with unfailing regularity. Sahitya Akademi award for Rang Manch, directorship of Indian Theatre Department of Panjab University, sundry other awards, trips to the US and excursions across Europe, a Padma Shri secure in his cupboard -- Gargi had been through all that, leading a 'seen that, done that' life.   

He willed, and in writing, that people were not to mourn his death, that his ashes were to be immersed in a Bathinda canal along whose banks he played like an urchin. Like in death, so in life, Gargi didn't need a user's manual to live life – he made his own rules.   

Once, when Amrita Pritam forced him once to address her with a tussi instead of much informal tu when in public, Gargi conceded. But an hour later, he took her to a nearby coffee joint and used tu some seventy times during the conversation to make up for that one tussi.  

The Grand Old Man of Punjabi Literature (Are their two?) once took exception to the fact that Gargi named his play Kalakaar, a name which Sekhon had given to his own play. When Gargi got to know about Sekhon's anger, he pulled out his play even though his work had preceded Sekhon's by some five years.    

"I am an enemy of mediocrity. I can sip tea at the best of restaurant, or at a lowly dhaba, but at a run-of-the-mill hotel? Never," Gargi said.  

Among other things, Gargi will forever be remembered for spawning a whole new genre of pen-sketch profiles of literary figures. Nimm de Patte, Kaudian Wala Sapp, Surme Wali Akh, Huseen Chehre – one after one he profiled the leading figures, including Amrita Pritam, Sekhon, Kartar Singh Duggal, Santokh Singh Dhir, Shiv Batalvi and many others.    

Gargi got his feedback real fast after the profiles were published. Some slapped court cases on him, Amrita stopped speaking to him, Duggal was angry, Prof Mohan Singh virtually turned him out of his house, Sekhon sent a legal notice.  

The Naked Triangle created a storm whose waves people still remember. "Somewhere deep down, Gargi relished controversy," recalled Dr Raghbir Singh who edits the respected Punjabi literary journal Sirjana.  

"Those who claim he brought him badnami forget that he made them amar too," said Panjab University's Deepak Manmohan Singh, Gargi's close friend.    

He lived in style. "He was a man of passion. No wonder so many beautiful women passed through his life. He had a passion for a good life – good food, good clothes. Shahana zindagi us da style si (Aristocratic life was his style)," said Bhapa Pritam Singh of Navyug Publishers who had life-long ties with Gargi.  

"I don't care how much my servant cheats me, or the dhobi, but I can't let my publishers pinch a penny from my royalty," Gargi once wrote. Bhapa ji naturally had some tough times too.    

If Mohan Singh was the king of Pothohari, then Gargi was the emperor of Malwai boli, a dialect he exploited to the hilt without making it jarring for the people outside Malwa.  

"I learnt Punjabi after I went abroad. I saw Sanskrit theatre on Russian stage, Bharat-Muni's nat-shastar I read in London, and learnt how to appreciate Punjabi sartorial styles after watching fashion shows in Paris," Gargi once wrote in a self-portrayal exercise.  

Perhaps this is how world citizens are made. Adieu Gargi!■

April 21 2003

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