Frontlist | Novel brings to readers stories of pre-partition Lahore

A new novel set in the backdrop of pre-partition Lahore, from the turn of the century to the time of Independence, offers powerful accounts of desire, love, society and politics. Written on the Wind published by Rupa, is written by writer-astrologer Anuradha Kumar-Jain. The book, essentially a story of two women, takes a probing look at the struggles and aspiration of a nation and its people. “Both my parents were refugees from Pakistan, and my growing years were filled with stories about the land and the lives they had left behind. Those were narratives of loss, but also of love and humour and family gossip and I found in myself a desire to chronicle some of the anecdotes and events before they were lost forever. So this book was born,” Jain, a debut novelist, told PTI. While story of Harjeet, who belongs to a landlord Sikh family and married into a Hindu family, revolves around her affair with a Muslim man against the backdrop of the growing Hindu-Muslim divide; second protagonist Amiya, born out of wedlock to a British army officer and a Brahmin girl and married at 19, is a story of her troubled marriage and how she struggled to become a writer.