Yashpal
| Yashpal | |
|---|---|
| Born |
3 December 1903 Kangra Hills, British India |
| Died | 26 December 1976 (aged 73) |
| Occupation | Revolutionary and Author |
| Language | Hindi |
| Notable works |
|
| Notable awards |
Padma Bhushan 1970 Sahitya Akademi Award 1976 |
Yashpal (3 December 1903 – 26 December 1976) was a Hindi-language author who is sometimes considered to be the most gifted since Premchand. A political commentator and a socialist who had a particular concern for the welfare of the poor and disadvantaged, he wrote in a range of genres, including essays, novels and short stories, as well as a play, two travel books and an autobiography. He won the Hindi-language Sahitya Akademi Award for his novel, Meri Teri Uski Baat in 1976 and was also a recipient of the Padma Bhushan.
Yashpal's writings form an extension to his earlier life as a revolutionary in the cause of the Indian independence movement.
Yashpal was born in 1903 at a village situated in the Kangra Hills. His mother was poor and had sole responsibility for raising her two sons. He grew up in an era when claims to independence from the British Raj were increasingly heard and with a mother who was a keen supporter of Arya Samaj. He attended an Arya Samaj gurukul in Hardwar on a "freeship" basis, due to the family's poverty. Such gurukuls were considered by the British to be seditious schools because they fostered pride in Hindu culture and Indian achievements, encouraging the notion that Aryan Indians would overthrow what they regarded as their temporary subjugation to the British. Yashpal later said that during his schooldays he had daydreamed of a time when Indians would reverse the situation to the point of governing their colonial masters in Britain itself. He was bullied by his fellow pupils at the gurukul on account of his poverty, and he left the school when he suffered a prolonged attack of dysentery.
Reunited with his mother in Lahore, Yashpal attended middle school there before progressing to high school in Ferozepur Cantonment, whence the family had subsequently moved. He found the urban environment and schooling to be more to his taste and he finished first in class in his matriculation exam.
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