Yashpal
Meri Teri Uski Baat
(Lok Bharati Prakashan, Allahabad; 1974)
(Sahitya Academy Awardee-Hindi-1976)
"Sri Yashpal, distinguished Hindi novelist and short story writer, was born in 1903 at Ferozpur, Punjab. A graduate from the National College, Lahore, Sri Yashpal grew into an active revolutionary and came to be known as one of the closest associates of such patriots as Bhagat Singh and Chandrashekhar Azad. He went underground after the Sanders Assassination and the unearthing of the Lahore Bomb Factory. Yashpal was responsible for the bomb explosion under Lord Irwin's train in December 1929. He had many armed encounters with the police and was arrested in 1932 and sentenced to imprisonment for life but was released in 1938. An author of international repute and recipient of many literary honours, Sri Yashpal, who passed away on 26 December 1976, sixteen days after the declaration of the Award, leaves behind him more than 50 books, twelve of them novels and sixteen collections of short stories. .
Meri Teri Uski Baat is considered an outstanding contribution to Hindi literature for is depiction of the various crosscurrents shaping modern Indian society, its racy and virile prose, masterly stylistic variations and deep human commitment." (Citation)
This novel, based on the history of Indian's struggle for Independence, covers almost all the events of the first half of the 20th century, particularly the activities of the Indian National Congress and other revolutionary activities in general It depicts and bring to the forefront the inner struggle which continued within the Congress up to the last moment of our slavery. The author underlines the inner and outer contradictions, without favour or prejudice, which played a leading role in the political and social life of our country. He has conveyed his critical notes, not through statements but through the creative analysis of events, making them an integral part of the plot of the novel. The novel contains historical characters as well as imaginary ones and the inter-relation of these two types of characters is well-maintained with artistic fervour and flavour. .
The author has maintained artistically both the inner and outer plots of the novel. The outer plot narrates beautifully the self-contained and self-explanatory accounts of our political scenario whereas the inner plot depicts the life of individuals, males and females, existing in our society at that time under the shadow of that political scenario. Yashpal thus has been able to draw an artistic as well as realistic sketch of the personalities growing and shaping into full-fledged heroes and anti-heroes of that crucial period. In addition to this, he has also depicted those mediocre type of individuals who were neither heroes nor anti-heroes, representing the mentalities and activities of a sizable majority of our people at that time. There were actives as well as inactives, enlightened as well as non-enlightened, intellectuals as well as non-intellectuals and also those who we're this or that. The story of middle class Usha, a university student with her revolutionary romanticism reflecting the feelings and aspirations of the young generation of pre-Independence era is an additional attraction of the novel which is comparable to the feelings and aspirations of the young generation of today.
Meri Teri Uski Baat is no doubt one of the best novels in Hindi written in epical style on our struggle for freedom. As is typical of him, Yashpal infuses revolutionary romanticism with progressive realism in such a way that the whole blending becomes an artistic panorama of Indian middle class life in general and. Punjabi life in particular.
Raj Kumar Saini
(Source: Sahitya Academy Awards – Books and Writers – 1955-1978
Published by Sahitya Academy. ISBN 81 7201 014 1)
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