Punjabi Antenna
Tryst with the past
Randeep Wadehra

Watno Door focusses on people in Punjab whose kin have gone abroad

PTC Punjabi’s Watno Door reminds one of ETC Punjabi’s Pardesan Vich Punjabi as far as the show attempts to become a conduit between NRIs and their kin in Punjab. However, unlike Pardesan Vich Punjabi — which highlighted the Punjabi diaspora’s lifestyle abroad — Watno Door focusses on people in Punjab whose kin have gone abroad — parents, siblings and spouses indulging in bitter-sweet-sour nostalgia, and recalling his (it is invariably "he") quirks and foibles.

The show’s anchor Satinder Satti attracts one’s attention right from its beginning, when she appears reciting relevant verse with aplomb, while the camera lingers on her colourfully dressed, ornamented and made-up visage from different angles.

The more one watches Doordarshan Jalandhar, the more one wonders at its hidden retro charms.

Last fortnight, its regular show Khazana telecast a perspective on Punjabi Cinema. There was a lot of valuable information on Punjabi cinema’s glory during the pre-Partition era when it dominated the scene in such cultural centres as Lahore, Calcutta and Bombay. Post-Partition, its fall became perceptible although some excellent movies like Madhee da diwa, Satluj de kandey and Chann pardesi etc were made. It was a treat to watch stills/clips from some of the old productions.

Dovetailed to this documentary were tributes to Punjabi actor Varinder, who was killed by extremists while shooting for a movie. However, the clip was obviously old as among those who paid tributes were young looking Dara Singh, Preeti Sapru, Rama Vij and the late Sunil Dutt.

DDJ’s another show that caught one’s eye was Shauk Awalle (unusual hobbies). Last fortnight it focussed on a young man — I think his name was Manpreet Singh — from Amritsar, who has built a medieval-looking house in Verka village. It contained utensils, hand-pumps, kerosene lamps, spinning wheels, looms and various utensils that used to be part and parcel of our daily life several decades (even a century) ago. Of particular interest was a bed said to have been gifted to Maharaja Ranjit Singh on the occasion of his marriage to Rani Jindan. A lot of time, effort and money must have gone into building the house and collecting the artefacts from different parts of the world, including Pakistan and England. However, DDJ’s third show under review needs a lot of improvement in its presentation. Zaika — as the name suggests — deals with food, generally Punjabi cuisine. The anchor was not very comfortable in front of the camera and was less than lucid while explaining the ingredients and method of cooking a meat recipe. Hope she will spruce up her act next time.

Samwad on PTC News discusses literature. Last fortnight it discoursed upon the indifference of Punjabi litterateurs towards the tragic events of 1984. One of the panellists, Reema Anand, attributed this to the trauma that the community has still to come out of, while others seemed to be more interested in scoring brownie points with their respective constituencies. There is certainly a need for honest investigative and introspective literature that would interrogate Punjabiat’s failure in countering the political shenanigans borne out of inter-party and intra-party rivalries that led to the tragedy — chief culprits being the region’s two major political parties, the Shiromani Akali Dal and Indian National Congress.

The much maligned foreign hand came into the picture later on when things started going out of control. It is time for us to decide that never again shall we become gun-fodder for the manipulative politicians’ turf wars. Talking of politicians, Masle took up the recent fracas in the Punjab Vidhan Sabha over the issue of violence in Ludhiana.