https://fashionindustrybroadcast.com/2020/09/07/reminiscing-the-born-rebel-and-fierce-author-amrita-pritam/

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When it comes to character traits of a lady, it is often associated with beauty, then follows purity (or being a virgin) and intellect? Its optional. Subjected to such societal evils and hailing from India myself, I’ve faced many derogatory instances as a woman. And that is why I take pride in the Indian Novelist, Amrita Pritam whose radical stance against the patriarchal system in the 60s gives me Goosebumps!

For years, women have faced the backlash of societal stereotypes. Especially during the past when the society glorified the notion of an ‘ideal woman’, the one who remains within the realms of social standards and is submissive to toxic masculinity. The Feminist movement declared a new wave of accomplishment for women.

In the present generation, after years of sabotaging the face of women, we see tales of women breaking the boundaries of the ‘ideal women’. And yet in the 21st century, it is saddening to see women continued to be deprived off their basic right to choose and embrace.

Born on 31st August 1919 as Amrit Kaur in Mandi Bahauddin, Punjab (present-day Pakistan), that officially marks 101 years of Amrita Pritam and her literary works that still circulates the hall of fame.

Brimming with Naivety, she lost her mother when she was just 11 and was plagued with loneliness that pushed her to find comfort in writing. Her first anthology of poems, Amrit Lehren (Immortal waves) was published in 1936. Such was her unwavering passion towards writing poetry. Around the same time, she got married to Pritam Singh, this was in her early childhood when families cared less about the bride’s consent and thought of the girls as a ‘Burden’. Her marriage lead to the name she carries today, Amrita Pritam.

Her work involved several poems, short stories and novels. And she is renowned for her melancholic poem, Ajj Aakhaan Waris Shah Nu (Today I Invoke Waris Shah), a poem that adheres to the 18th century Sufi poet, Waris Shah. Her poem excessively spoke about the devastating time in Punjab during the India-Pakistan partition. This period was a massacre in history and Amrita witnessed this partition. Her words depicted the horror that engulfed the women of this time. She called out to Waris Shah to become the chronicler of the brutality inflicted upon women.