Dr Surjit Patar

Dr Surjit Patar (1945 to 2024) was among the best-loved Punjabi poets of his time, a poet of the ghazal and the nazm whose lines politicians quote and ordinary Punjabis know by heart. He is remembered here because his verse took in the dark chapter of 1984 and the years of violence that followed, and because in two moments of protest he handed back the honours the state had given him.

He was born on 14 January 1945 at Patar Kalan in Jalandhar district. He took a master's in Punjabi at Punjabi University, Patiala, and a PhD at Guru Nanak Dev University, Amritsar, and retired as professor of Punjabi at Punjab Agricultural University, Ludhiana. He began writing poetry in the mid-1960s.

Key moments

• 1993: Sahitya Akademi Award for Hanere Vich Sulagdi Varnmala. Other collections include Hawa Vich Likhe Harf, Birkh Arz Kare, Lafzaan Di Dargah, Patjhar Di Pazeb and Surzameen.
• 2009: Saraswati Samman for Lafzaan Di Dargah, according to Wikipedia.
• 2012: Padma Shri. He served as president of the Punjabi Sahit Akademi, and The Tribune says he chaired the Punjab Arts Council from 2017.
• 2015: returned his Sahitya Akademi award to protest intolerance in the country, The Tribune records.
• 7 December 2020: announced he would return the Padma Shri to the Centre, saying, with "a broken heart", that the Centre's insensitivity towards the farmers' peaceful struggle had pained him. He praised Punjab's farmers for leading the protest in a cultured way, with mothers and daughters beside them.
• 11 May 2024: died in his sleep at his Ludhiana home, aged 79, according to his family. The Chief Minister, a former Chief Minister, the SGPC president and former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh were among those who paid tribute.

His poetry and the Panth's hard years: The Tribune's tribute says he wrote about the dark chapter of 1984 and about the Naxalite movement, and that his poems often answered the events of the day yet stayed fresh. A tribute in Asia Samachar says his verse gave voice to the turbulent 1980s and 1990s. The People's Archive of Rural India (PARI) describes him as a poet who never accepted silence, and opens its tribute with a couplet of his about speaking out against the darkness rather than staying quiet. He also wrote on Guru Nanak's thought and took his PhD on folklore in Guru Nanak's writings, according to Wikipedia.

Remembered for: giving Punjabis words for loss and for refusal, and for returning two honours on principle.