That last meeting with Amrita Pritam at her Hauz Khas residence and more

Ace photo journalist reminisces his meetings in Delhi with the famous poet, novelist, essayist and fiction writer

Picture Talk/By NK Sareen

Two Indian women named Amrita by their parents, both born into Punjabi Sikh families, both born in the second decade of the 20th Century within six years of each other, both immensely successful, achieving tremendous name, fame and laurels internationally in their chosen fields of work. While the senior Amrita came to be known as Amrita Shergil who excelled in painting, her six years junior, Amrita Pritam, reached great heights as a poet, novelist, essayist and fiction writer.

Both of them were rebels and lived their lives on their own terms; one died in Lahore while the other married in Lahore before migrating to India after partition. They were contemporaries for some time living in the same city.

Amrita Shergil, considered to be one of the greatest women artists of the 20th Century, died very young, at 28, in Lahore, leaving a large body of work a lot of which is displayed at the National Gallery of Modern Art Delhi. A road, Amrita Shergil Marg in New Delhi, is named after her.

Great legacy

Amrita Pritam’s body of work consists of more than 100 books – poetry, essays, novels, biographies, and collection of Punjabi folk songs including her autobiography titled Rasidi Ticket. Most of her work has been translated into many Indian and foreign languages.

Amrita was recipient of the Sahitya Academy Award, Bharatiya Jananpeeth Award, and was also awarded Padma Shri and Padma Vibhushan by the Government of India. She also received the Punjab Ratan Award from the Punjab Government.

Amrita Pritam was also recipient of the Sahitya Academy fellowship, honorary D. Litt degrees from the universities of Delhi, Vishwa Bharti and Jabalpur. Two movies titled Pinjar and Daku were made on her works. Noted film director M S Sathyu paid her a theatrical tribute titled Ek thi Amrita. She was also a nominated member of Rajya Sabha from 1986 to 1992.

I had met Amrita Pritam in her Hauz Khas residence to do a photo-feature cum write-up on her life to be published in an English magazine, a part of an English language newspaper, on its Sunday edition. After I had taken some pictures of hers at her residence, we all went to a large park near R K Puram to shoot more pictures to go with the feature. Her living companion Imroze, a lanky pleasant man, was accompanying us.

Meeting for photo shoot

As a practice I had taken pictures both in color and Black and White but the magazine carried only color pictures in its feature.

Amrita was greatly pleased to see her 5-page feature published in the magazine. which included about one-and-a-half page spread in large size taken in the park.

I had also carried a small Black and White print of one of her B/W pictures I had liked a lot but which was not published in the magazine. She liked that picture so much that she immediately asked me to get a larger size print for her drawing room wall. That B/W picture feature was later published on the cover of Patriot newspaper in a big size and was used by the DNA newspaper from Mumbai and other publications.

My last meeting with Amrita Pritam was just a few days before she passed away. I had gone to her house to present her the large size print of her cherished Black and White picture. Her companion took the picture from me and asked me to follow him. I saw Amrita lying on her bed, very frail and unable to speak. Imroze told me she had not eaten for days and had almost lost her voice. That was the last I saw her.

Amrita Pritam was born on 31st August 1919 and breathed her last on 31st October 2005.

Also by the same author: 42 years ago, on that fateful day, the tragic death of Sanjay Gandhi – THE NEWS PORTER

In this column, ‘Picture Talk’, veteran photo journalist NK Sareen, a former Photo Editor at Expanse International and a writer, shines light on some of the pictures of personalities he has clicked over the years, with a touch of nostalgia. The views expressed here are the author’s own and The News Porter bears no responsibility for the same.