Tarn Taran Diary: From being a medico to master of Dhrupad

There is Dr Sunny Sandhu who grew up in Tarn Taran and currently lives in France where he teaches music therapy through Dhrupad. He was the first person to go from Tarn Taran to the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), New Delhi, the best medical school of India. It was in 2016 while he was in AIIMS that he went to a concert of Ustad Asad Ali Khan playing the Rudra Veena that he started his journey with Dhrupad. He often visits Tarn Taran and during a recent visit said that the oldest reference to Tarn Taran is found in the Dhrupad composition, “Allah Tero Naam Tarn Taran”, sung by Talwandi brothers from Pakistan. He says that Dhrupad is an ancient form of music from the Indian subcontinent which reached its peak in the times of Maharaja Ranjit Singh.

With colonisation and later Partition, this form of music has suffered greatly. Now, it is difficult to find practitioners of Dhrupad. This art form is of spiritual nature and has a therapeutic impact on its listeners and practitioners. It’s an essential dialogue between man and nature, said Dr Sunny Sandhu. He said he was lucky to be accepted as a disciple by Ustad Asad Ali Khan. Dhrupad brought him back to nature and his roots. When he was starting with the study of Dhrupad, Ustadji asked him to spend time next to the rivers to learn properly. So he went and spent time near the river Beas in Tarn Taran. This was when he discovered that there are river dolphins in Beas. He was in the beda (big boat) with the boatmen in Karmuwala village (Beas riverside), looking at this amazing mammal, when he understood his life’s mission. He had to save the dolphin and the boatmen from disappearing. He started taking schoolchildren to see the river dolphins and understand the cultural heritage in 2011. He started building the Bhoomitra Beda Yatra programme based on Dhrupad and environmental education. Dr Sandhu wrote a song for the river dolphins called “Bulanaji”. He also rediscovered the old heritage of Tarn Taran . “We are on the old Grand Trunk route and we have beautiful sarais like Sarai Amanat Khan, Fatehabad etc. But not many people knew this,” says Dr Sunny. “We need to conserve and share these treasures with the future generation. He has been organising Bhoomitra Beda Yatra every year on February 2 which is the World Wetland Day,” he says. Last year, Rabbi Shergill participated in the event. This year, Niccolo Vacchi, French saxophonist and practitioner of Dhrupad participated marking the first international fest in river Beas, Tarn Taran. The Indian Trust for Art and Cultural Heritage also collaborated. He is busy trying to save Punjab’s cultural heritage under INTACH and wishes to open a chapter in Tarn Taran to facilitate the conservation of art, culture and environment in the area. He said Harike has the largest wetland in Asia where dolphins are to be found in the river. There is the Old Grand Trunk road but not many people knew about this and there is not much work on sustainable tourism.

Kisan Sabha urges DC not to enforce law on depositing arms

The process for conducting Lok Sabha elections has begun. To maintain law and order as part of preparations in the first stage, the administration has instructed citizens with licensed weapons to deposit their arms with the police or the arms dealers. In case someone violates the rule, he would be booked under relevant sections of the CrPC.

There is a farmers’ organisation, Jamhoori Kisan Sabha, which recently submitted a memorandum to the Tarn Taran Deputy Commissioner-cum-District Election Officer, urging the administration not to impose the condition in the district keeping in view the alleged poor law and order situation. Daljit Singh Dialpur and other leaders of the organisation told the Deputy Commissioner that there were as many 20,000 persons who have been issued licenses for self-protection when the number of illegal weapons was much more in the area. The farmers’ organisation told the DC that people daily face cases of theft, looting, snatching, extortion and farmers staying at farm houses away from the populated area in the villages would not feel secure in case they are forced to deposit their weapons. The Sabha said that in this way, anti-social elements with illegal weapons would get a free hand and do as they wish with the unarmed civilians. The farmers’ organisation has appealed to the administration not to force genuine people to deposit their weapons as they keep it for self-protection from armed anti-social elements. The district administration should take the suggestion of Jamhoori Kisan Sabha seriously. (Contributed by Gurbaxpuri)

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