Jallianwala Bagh martyrs remembered in Kolkata

Tribune News Service

Kolkata, November 21

A concert to pay homage to the martyrs of Jallianwala Bagh was held last evening at Kolkata’s iconic Victoria Memorial Hall.

Singer Harpreet Singh mesmerised the audience with his mournful rendering of the ‘Khooni Baishakhi’ song. Written by legendary poet and novelist Nanak Singh, a survivor of the 1919 massacre carried out by the British, the iconic poem has been set to tune by the singer himself, a native of Kurukshetra who lives in Mumbai. The English translation of the poem, done by Nanak Singh’s diplomat grandson Navdeep Singh Suri, was read aloud by Bengali singer Moushumi Bhowmik.

The concert titled ‘Music and Memories from Punjab and Bengal’, organised by the Victoria Memorial Hall authorities, was a curtain-raiser to an exhibition – Ways of Remembering Jallianwala Bagh & and Rabindranath Tagore’s Response to the massacre — to be held at the hall next month.

Sarmisthsa Dutta Gupta, curator of the exhibition, said while Tagore was traumatised by the massacre, the incident scarred the minds also of many others in Bengal and found expression in the works of poets and songwriters. Touching upon the similarities in the history of Punjab and Bengal, Sarmistha said, “We have suffered together, we have sung together.”