The violent Partition of India in the summer of 1947 – during which more than two million people lost their lives – is painfully described in Amrita Pritam’s Ali Ajkhaan Waris Shah Nu, a moving poem inspired by a train journey from Dehradun to Delhi as communal riots raged. Pritam had just left Lahore for newly independent India, having crossed the north-west border like thousands of other refugees who hoped for new beginnings. One of them was Govardhan Batra, a migrant from Lyalpur (now Faisalabad in Pakistan) who arrived in Amritsar, Punjab.
As the 1940s drew to a close, Govardhan Batra and his family were settling into their new lives in Amritsar. Much to Govardhan Batra’s relief, his recently set-up “Eats” dhaba was a runaway hit with customers. Located directly opposite the city’s government-run Glency Medical College, it had students and faculty dropping in at all hours; Batra’s famed mutton curry was irresistible on cold winter nights and the man…