Punjab De Shahsawar By Navdeep Singh Gill Sanjha Virsa ISBN: 978-93-6359-138-7 Sports books are rare in our part of the world, and a sports book in Punjabi is unheard of. Addicted to sports literature since childhood, I have hardly come across any locally published editions. It was a pleasant surprise then to discover one Punjabi sports book, and that too published in Pakistan. The author of Punjab De Shahsawar, Navdeep Singh Gill, is based in Indian Punjab though. The book was originally published in India in the Gurmukhi script. It has now been brought out in Pakistan by Asif Raza of Sanjha Virsa Publishers in the Pakistani Punjabi script known as Shahmukhi which, more or less, is the same Arabic script used in Urdu. The book is a collection of short biographies of 30 outstanding Punjabi sportspersons, 15 each from East Punjab and West Punjab. The choice is excellent. The Pakistanis include Olympic gold medallist Arshad Nadeem and two other athletes — Abdul Khaliq (“the fastest man of Asia”) and Ghulam Raziq (a hurdler who won two Asian Games golds and who was also the last Pakistani to get a track and field gold in the Commonwealth Games of 1962 before Arshad Nadeem, who earned his gold medal in 2022). There are also cricketers — Wasim Akram, Waqar Younis, Fazal Mahmood, Shoaib Akhtar, Inzamam-ul-Haq and Babar Azam — and hockey, too, is well-represented by Pakistan’s World Cup-winning captains Shahbaz Ahmad and Akhtar Rasool, “Flying Horse” Samiullah and Dr Ghulam Rasool. Then there is the legendary wrestler Gama Pehlwan. There is also a sportswoman, Ushna Suhail, who remained Pakistan’s top tennis player for many years. A Punjabi book brings together interesting biographies and anecdotes about 30 outstanding sportspersons from both Pakistani and Indian Punjab The selection of Indian Punjabi achievers is equally impressive. There is India’s first individual Olympic gold medallist shooter Abhinav Bindra, cricketer Yuvraj Singh and hockey player Balbir Singh Sr. Ajitpal Singh, India’s only hockey World Cup-winning captain, also finds place in the book. India’s current hockey captain Harmanpreet Singh, a three-time FIH Player of the Year, is there too, along with the country’s penalty-corner king Prithipal Singh, who was the top scorer when India won the gold at the 1964 Olympics. Rupa Kumari Saini, captain of the Indian women’s hockey team at the 1980 Olympics, when women’s hockey became a part of the Olympics for the first time, and who also captained India at the 1978 World Cup, is there as well. Athlete Milkha Singh, whose biopic Bhaag Milkha Bhaag became a huge box office success, also finds mention. Other sportspersons in the book include female shooter Avneet Kaur Sandhu, a Commonwealth Games gold medallist; the internationally acclaimed professional wrestler Dara Singh, who later gained fame as a Bollywood actor; and Kartar Singh — the only South Asian wrestler to win gold at two Asian Games. Footballer Jarnail Singh is regarded as India’s greatest defender. He is the only Indian to be named captain of the Asian All-Star team (1966), and is also included in the book. The succinct biographies are very informative with interesting incidents narrated throughout. For example, Inzamam’s running out of partners while batting, and his going after a spectator with the bat in Canada after being rudely heckled, are narrated. As is the commonly known fact that iconic American actress Ava Gardner — who was in Lahore for the shooting of Bhowani Junction in 1954 — was captivated by Fazal Mahmood’s handsome looks. Also about Fazal, it is written how he survived the Partition riots when a mob attacked the train he was travelling in along with other cricketers after attending a camp for preparing the Indian team for an Australian Test tour. Fazal’s fellow Hindu cricketers turned away the mob. Likewise, there are harrowing 1947 escape stories of footballer Jarnail Singh and Milkha Singh. There are also stories in the book about the on-field rivalry but close friendship off the track between Arshad Nadeem and Neeraj Chopra — even their mothers keep in touch with each other. When Pakistani sprinter Subedar Abdul Khaliq became a prisoner of war in the 1971 war, Milkha Singh especially came to visit him in the prison camp; both had tears in their eyes. Interestingly some sportspersons who flew Pakistan’s flag were born in Indian Punjab or their parents had migrated from that part of the Punjab at the time of Partition and vice versa. Each profile sketch comes with a catchy headline such as ‘Hockey Da Urran Ghorra’ [Hockey’s Flying Horse] for Samiullah, ‘Reverse Swing Te Yorker Da Jadoogar’ for Waqar Younis, ‘Pakistan Athletics Da Shahsawar’ for Arshad Nadeem, ‘Sunehri Nishanchi’ [Golden Marksman] for shooter Bindra and ‘World Champions Da Kaptaan’ for Ajitpal Singh. Navdeep Singh Gill is an eminent sports journalist and writer residing in Chandigarh. He is currently employed as the Information and Public Relations Officer with the Indian Government of Punjab. He also worked for the Punjabi Tribune, a leading Punjabi language daily. He has covered mega sports events including the Olympics, Asian Games and the Commonwealth Games. Punjab De Shahsawar is his 13th book on sports. The book was launched in Lahore at the University of Management and Technology (UMT). The event was attended, among others, by hockey’s Olympic gold medallist Tauqeer Dar, hockey World Cup winner Tahir Zaman and the late sprinter Abdul Khaliq’s son, Mohammad Ijaz. Prominent personalities from India included the chairman of the Punjabi Lok Virasat Academy Ludhiana, Prof Gurbhajan Singh Gill, former civil servant and international cyclist Amrit Kaur Gill and author Gurpreet Singh Toor. There was also a guest from Canada, patron of the Vishaw Punjabi Sabha in Toronto Inderjit Singh Bal at the launch. When the Director UMT, Abid Sherwani, the event’s main organiser, invited the guests to express their views, many of them stressed that sports can play a great role in promoting goodwill among the people of the two countries. Punjabis across both sides of the divide should take pride and inspiration in the achievements of these Punjabi sportspersons, whether they are Indian or Pakistani or even from the widespread international Punjabi diaspora. The reviewer is a freelance sports journalist based in Lahore and can be reached at ijaz62@hotmail.com Published in Dawn, Books & Authors, April 6th, 2025