Punjabi songs rule the roost, even in unexpected quarters
“Dil naal laare ni tu laun waliye, dil tera jadon tutuga ta pata lagooga”, the lyrics from a famous Punjabi song greeted me as I stepped into the taxi that was to ferry me from my hotel to the airport in Goa.
No, it was not nostalgia that hit me hard nor the realisation that music transcends all boundaries, but the fact that Punjabi songs and Punjabi music have become almost a revered cult across the globe.
Though the year belongs to “Naatu Naatu” and for most Indians, the year at the Oscars marked another “Jai Ho” moment with the song hitting the jackpot. Punjabi songs with their foot-tapping music and thumping beats, however, continue to top the list at weddings, discotheques, pubs, clubs, office parties and birthday bashes.
Despite the knowledge, it always comes as a welcome surprise when you hear lyrics of Punjabi songs in the most unexpected quarters. Last year, I was in Hyderabad for my daughter’s admission. Luckily, we met another set of parents from Chandigarh and while on a shopping spree to set up the hostel rooms, my husband and I, alongwith the couple, entered a shop to buy mattresses for our daughters’ beds. We were busy making payments and arranging for the delivery of the mattresses with the Telugu-speaking salesmen who could comprehend our need through a smattering of pidgin English. Right in the middle of all this we heard,
THOUGH THE YEAR BELONGS TO ‘NAATU NAATU’ FOR ITS OSCAR EXPLOITS, PUNJABI SONGS WITH THEIR FOOT-TAPPING MUSIC AND THUMPING BEATS, CONTINUE TO TOP THE LIST AT WEDDINGS, DISCOTHEQUES, PUBS AND ELSEWHERE
loud and clear, the lyrics of a Punjabi song. One of the salesmen, it turned out, had set the song as the ringtone of his mobile. We were thoroughly amused when the salesman told us that though he did not understand the lyrics, he could mimic the same and was a huge fan of the singer.
Therefore, it was a sense of deja vu when I stepped into the waiting taxi in Goa. I asked Francis, the driver, if he understood the lyrics. Francis, to my surprise, not only understood the lyrics, but could also comprehend the language as he ferried a number of tourists from the state. Not just Punjabi, he could also follow Gujarati, Hindi and Russian.
Russians, Francis informed, formed a huge chunk of his clientele during the Covid era. First, the pandemic restrictions and later the Russia-Ukraine conflict have acted as major deterrents for the Russian tourists visiting Indian coasts and have resulted in loss of business and social interactions for the likes of Francis.
As I sat musing in the taxi for the rest of my way, I wondered how a simple man who drove people from one end of Goa to another to earn his livelihood, was perhaps better acquainted with the world around him, the idiosyncrasies of people belonging to different races, regions and nationalities and with the languages spoken by them.
My own education and theoretical knowledge of things seemed insignificant in comparison to Francis’ real world and hands-on learning.
When I heard the lyrics of the same song for the third time within twenty minutes of my journey, I was convinced that despite my Hindi-English spattering, Francis had judged that I was a Punjabi at heart.