It is so beautiful to see that Google pays tribute to Punjabi writer and poet Amrita Singh by featuring a google doodle on her 100th birthday . The very promising, Bold and outward Amrita was the few female writers that India had initially . In 1956, Amrita Pritam became the first woman to win the Sahitya Akademi Award for her long poem, 'Sunehade' (Messages). In 1981, she won the Bharatiya Jnanpith for the novel 'Kagaz Te Canvas' (The Paper and the Canvas). In 1969, she was conferred with the Padma Shri and in 2004 the Padma Vibhushan. She was also awarded the highest honour conferred by the Sahitya Akademi - 'Immortals of Literature' in 2005.


Her first anthology of poems, Amrit Lehran (Immortal Waves) was published in 1936, at age sixteen, the year she married Pritam Singh, an editor to whom she was engaged in early childhood, and changed her name from Amrit Kaur to Amrita Pritam

Ms Pritam, who was born in Gujranwala, British India, is best remembered for her poem “Ajj Aakhaan Waris Shah Nu,” which lamented the traumatic partition of India and Pakistan in 1947. When India was partitioned into the independent states of India and Pakistan in 1947, she migrated from Lahore, to India, though she remained equally popular in Pakistan throughout her life, as compared to her contemporaries like Mohan Singh and Shiv Kumar Batalvi.

 She published 28 novels over her life, including Pinjar, a dramatic tale set during the time of partition which was adapted into a film in 2002.
 

here is one of her best verses 

शहर 

मेरा शहर एक लम्बी बहस की तरह है
सड़कें - बेतुकी दलीलों-सी…
और गलियाँ इस तरह
जैसे एक बात को कोई इधर घसीटता
कोई उधर

हर मकान एक मुट्ठी-सा भिंचा हुआ
दीवारें-किचकिचाती सी
और नालियाँ, ज्यों मुँह से झाग बहता है

यह बहस जाने सूरज से शुरू हुई थी
जो उसे देख कर यह और गरमाती
और हर द्वार के मुँह से
फिर साईकिलों और स्कूटरों के पहिये
गालियों की तरह निकलते
और घंटियाँ-हार्न एक दूसरे पर झपटते

जो भी बच्चा इस शहर में जनमता
पूछता कि किस बात पर यह बहस हो रही?
फिर उसका प्रश्न ही एक बहस बनता
बहस से निकलता, बहस में मिलता…

शंख घंटों के साँस सूखते
रात आती, फिर टपकती और चली जाती

पर नींद में भी बहस ख़तम न होती
मेरा शहर एक लम्बी बहस की तरह है….

- अमृता प्रीतम