Punjabi folklore researcher & poet Dr Darya dead

Neha Saini

Advertisement

Tribune News Service

Amritsar, September 4

Prominent Punjabi folklore research scholar and poet Dr Darya, who was also Head, School of Punjabi Studies, GNDU, passed away here this morning. Dr Darya suffered a heart attack and breathed his last. He is survived by wife Rewa Singh and two daughters.

An eminent scholar, Dr Darya was born on August 1, 1971. His father Shingara Ajari was a noted writer and researcher of Punjabi folklore. Ajari was credited with writing about the lost traditions of the tribes of Punjab that receded in numbers due to increased capitalisation. Taking over his father’s legacy, Dr Darya too stayed focused on his research into reviving and writing extensively about Punjab’s erstwhile tribes. His first book, titled ‘Culture of Sansi Tribe’, was awarded by the Punjab Language Department for tracing the journey of the Sansi tribe, which migrated to Punjab from Rajasthan.

He did PhD from Guru Nanak Dev University and taught at DAV College, Amritsar, and BUC, Batala College. He had authored 13 books and a large number of research papers on Punjabi literature and folklore.

“He had extensively studied about the tribes of Punjab and felt that these communities needed a revival platform. We belonged to the Tapariwaas tribe that finds its variant in the Baazigars of Punjab. Our ancestors migrated from Pakistan and settled in Mohammadpura village and both of us spent our childhood under the influence of literary revolutionaries like Gurbaksh Singh Preetlari. Our father too was a big inspiration for us. To lose him suddenly is a big shock for the family,” shared his elder brother Hira Singh, who is also a writer and educator at Government College in Tarn Taran.

Dr Darya took over as head of department (HoD) of School of Punjabi Studies in January 1 this year. Dr Darya’s wife Rewa is a government school teacher. He had named his daughters Leher, aged 14, and Era, aged 10, after rivers.

In his condolence message, Vice-Chancellor Prof Jaspal Singh Sandhu expressed his deep and heartfelt condolences to the bereaved family. He said the contribution of Dr Darya was commendable in the development of the university, especially in the field of Punjabi literature and folklore.