Nawaz Nai continued: “Once Pilu saw draft animals with blinkers at a Persian wheel and said; ‘Wah maula, wah rung maulay de / Khooh budhay majhin jhotay / naal passon do munn usaaray, jehray channey nu cha khlotay (The Lord be praised and the spectacles he creates be praised/ Buffaloes and bulls drive the Persian wheel/ two walls stand constructed opposite each other/ and they hold up the log over them’ Then he looked at the water in the pool by the side of the well and said; ‘Pani pia inj dhavay, jun akhin chun udd gia neer / nisareen pani inj phiray jun pairin paai vaheer/ kiari bootay inj pai ghinnay jun Ranjhay mildi Heer (‘The tray carries the water as if it has collected all the liquid from the eyes/ The water gushes out as if the feet mill around / the field receives the plants like Heer meets Ranjha.’

When we asked his opinion on Pilu’s tale of Sahiban Mirza, he replied that he didn’t compose such a tale. Despite our insistence he refused to accede to the point. When we left, Nabeel said that Nawaz Nai wouldn’t accept Pilu as author of the tale because the centre piece of the story was man-woman relationship. Pilu was a saintly figure for him, not given to narrating love stories. Strangely, the old man was oblivious of the fact that all the verses he recited were in the meter (Chhand) employed by Pilu for his Qissa of Mirza Sahiban which subsequently became so popular that it’s frequently used even today by a large number of poets and poetasters.

Nawaz Nai inspired by our keen interest, however, continued to recite Pilu’s verses and narrate tidbits about him gleaned from oral tradition. He said: “Pilu came back home after his wanderings and saw a big Pipal tree being lopped and chopped. He asked the tree; ‘Kaday gae oh pael paghuray, kaday gayyian oh sayyian / kujh sauhray kujh paikay, kujh khaak andar rall gian /mein uttay kalvattar challi, hor shaein bhull gian (Where have gone those swings? where have gone the girls? Some of them went to their in-laws and some remained with their parents. Some were buried under the earth / the saw cut me down and I forgot all other things.’

Once Pilu was going somewhere when he stepped on a potsherd. He addressed it and asked; ‘beh beh gia chabutra, kar kar sae niaan/ Pilu puchhda thikariyye, kitt vall gia jahaan / sae sae matt sharaab da, sae sae mast jawan /thikari mein tabaah thai, vich khada suleman (Councils and assemblies pass away / how does the world run on? Pilu asks the potsherd / many a pitcher full of liquor and many a young soul intoxicated / lonesome I was crushed to death / I am the same pot which the King Solomon ate from).’

Most of the verses recited by Nawaz Nai aren’t part of the tale composed by Pilu. This local historian well-versed in the art of oral transmission had his education till matric from a school in Munday village built by Sikhs in the area.

One wonders how Pilu came to know of the tragedy that happened to the young lovers hundreds of miles away in the absence of means of modern communication. The information, one supposes, was transmitted orally. Bards would tell the tale and travellers and wayfarers would carry it to their cities, towns and villages.

Regarding Pilu two scholars deserve special mention and our praise; Hafiz Barkhurdar and R.C. Temple. Hafiz Barkhurdar twice mentions Pilu in his remarkable tale Qissa Sahiban. Firstly, when Mirza after receiving message from Sahiban decides to come to her town Khiwa against all odds, Hafiz talking of vicissitudes of time mentions Pilu: ‘Since ages the skull has been lying midst the graves /seeing the writing on its forehead Pilu picked it up / hair rotten, teeth fallen out and mouth without tongue / Hafiz, If Pilu wasn’t around who would have deciphered the secret of the vision’. Secondly, he talks of Pilu as already mentioned when Sahiban hangs from a tree and the mythical crow carries her message to Pilu with the request: ‘narrate my tale so that it reverberates across the world’.

So we have solid historical evidence from the 17th century onward that Pilu of Dhun was the poet who first composed this thrilling tale. Later in the 19th century we have R. C. Temple, an orientalist and folklorist, who collected Pilu’s version of the tale of ‘Mirza Sahiban as sung by some Jats from Jalandhar district.’

I commented in one of my earlier columns; ‘isn’t it intriguing that locale of the tale is Sandal Bar (districts of Jhang and Layalpur), the poet who composed it is from the Dhun region and it is being collected from Jalandhar? Doesn’t it reveal something about the cultural and linguistic integration of the Punjab?’

Temple writes: ‘The version given here is characteristically incomplete and full of references of local nature.’ It was incomplete because it was introduced to the people in Jalandhar region by bards in the manner of oral tradition. It is ‘full of local references’ implies that such references point to later interpolations. The tale begins thus: Sahiban was born on a Tuesday in the house Khiwa / and singers sang songs of rejoicing at gate of the Chief of Khiwa / the kindred congratulated him with auspicious prayers / and made presents / as she became beautiful and buxom, her maidens emulated Sahiban (Trans-Temple).’ It’s interesting to note and analyse that though East Punjab didn’t make much contribution to our class literature but it did preserve some highly valuable classical texts such as Qissa Mirza Sahiban and lay of Dullah Bhatti, the great rebel and peasant leader, who revolted against the excessive taxation imposed by the Mughal administration in the 16th century during the reign of Akbar, the Great.

Pilu was lucky; he had great minds like Hafiz Barkhurdar and R.C. Temple who transmitted details about his life and preserved his available text. Poet Ahmed Yar Muralvi (18th century) says: ‘no one can compete with Pilu.’ Mian Muhammad also pays him tribute: ‘one has to traverse long distances on earth to find someone like Pilu.’ Posterity loved him and bards celebrated him which kept him alive in our collective memory. One wonders whether it was the tale of love that immortalised Pilu or his poetic genius that immortalised the tale. — soofi01@hotmail.com

(Concluded)

Published in Dawn, March 27th, 2023