How Rabbi Shergill music challenges Authorities?

Adarsh phasan jahan naaron mein

Aur chor bharey darbaron mein

Vahan maut akhlaq ki hai ik khabar baasi,

 

Jinhe naaz hai hind par vo kahan hain?

Jinhe naaz hai vo kahan hain?

 

(Where the ideal is entangled in slogans

And thieves on the royal court

Where death becomes a stale news

 

Where were they who are proud of India?

Where are those who are proud?)

-Rabbi Shergill, from “Bilqis”, trans. Dibyajyoti Sarma

 

Rabbi Shergill, the famous Punjabi singer and poet primarily known for his Bulla Ki Jaana Main Kaun and Tere Bin, is one of the most significant Punjabi artists who does not shy away from asking the right questions in his songs. His music forms one of the most versatile, original, and courageous works of art that both Punjab and India have witnessed. Though famous for his romantic songs, his music is not restricted to the romantic genre as it explores deep philosophical questions, social discrimination, cultural taboos, and political concerns. This article explores how Rabbi Shergill’s music challenges the conventional perception of the role of art to “please” and to “entertain” as it analyses how his lesser-known songs such as Bilqis, Jugni, and Tun Milen break away with a strict separation between art and society. It also examines how Shergill’s music breaks away from and resists the commercial music industry as it does not merely believe art to be a means to break charts but more importantly, to break societal norms.

 

With his Tere Bin being obsessively used in Instagram reels and trending on several social media and music streaming platforms (and justifiably so), it cannot be denied that Rabbi Shergill is a popular artist. However, no less of a truth is the observation that only some of his songs have made it to the charts while several of his treasures remain unexplored. One of these songs that recently resurfaced was Bilqis from his 2008 album Avengi Ja Nahin when the rapists of Bilkis Bano and the murderers of her 9 family members were released from prison and even garlanded, on 15th August 2022. Inspired by Sahir Ludhianvi’s poem Jinhe Naaz Hain Hind Par which was made into a song for Guru Dutt’s 1957 film Pyaasa, Shergill uses the question as a refrain throughout his song as he recounts the grave and gravely neglected, instances of injustice and corruption citing the rape of Bilqis Bano, the murder of Satyendra Dubey, Shanmugam Manjunath and Navleen Kumar. In the video song, Rabbi Shergill enters a Mumbai chawl and starts singing his song as he is both, a witness to and a victim of the four instances of injustice and oppression, like all Indians represented by the residents of the chawl. However, it is only Rabbi who suffers in the video song and not the fellow-residents which could be read as the passive complicity of people in the face of injustice and the lack of public outrage. Not only does Rabbi use the refrain “Jinhe Naaz Hain Hind Par Woh Kahan The?”  throughout the song but he also uses the rhythm of the national anthem and combines it with rock music, to further add to the irony of the song as it questions blind and proud nationalism, by seeking accountability for oppression. 

 

Bilqis, unlike any other contemporary Punjabi or Indian song for that matter, deals with a particularly different and rather disturbing subject yet it is highly empathetic in its language and very sharp in its critique. The song does not merely question social values by highlighting how bureaucrats and activists were murdered for exposing corruption and questioning authorities and how a Muslim woman was raped and her family members murdered in the Gujarat riots of 2002. It questions the very nature and purpose of art as it reflects on the cost of silence and invokes via the very writing of the song, the humanity that the artist must not distance themselves from, as art must, whenever necessary, refuse to look away. This idea is beautifully captured by Bob Dylan, an inspiration of Shergill, in his song Blowin’ in the Wind as he asks: 

how many times can a man turn his head

And pretend that he just doesn’t see?

Courtesy: Amit Sana, director of the video song Bilqis by Rabbi Shergill 

Caption: A still from Rabbi Shergill’s video song Bilqis directed by Amit Sana

 

Like Dylan, Shergill is not just an artist but an artist-activist for whom, as he himself claims in an interview with Suanshu Khurana, “escape cannot be the only mode in which art lives”. When culture in itself cannot be rooted out of social and political issues, how can music, in particular, and art, in general, be separated from the society in which they’re produced and consumed? Shergill’s Jugni stands as one of his finest pieces that illustrate his brilliance as a poet as he effortlessly combines the social consciousness of Punjab with its aesthetics. “A montage of news audio clippings, his own vocals and original folk” as Prof. Sakoon N Singh calls it, Jugni is an adaptation of the Jugni trope that is believed to have entered Punjabi music in the 19th century. Jugni is an important woman character in Punjabi folklore who acts as a “dispassionate witness”, as Prof. Sakoon N Singh puts it, as she observes the circumstances around her and provides a commentary of the same. According to Prof. Sakoon N Singh, it is important that the religious identity of Jugni is fluid as it opens up the possibility of creation of various narratives. Shergill’s adaptation of the 19th century trope is one of the most unique adaptations of the song as, sung in the old Majhi dialect that was used in pre-Partition central Punjab, it uses language and Jugni as a witness to record the decline of Punjabiyat not only in Punjab but also in Kashmir, Mumbai and Delhi. 

 

Though Shergill depicts a decline of Punjabiyat in Jugni, the very structure and aesthetics of the song are an affirmation of Punjabiyat as he not only uses a dialect that belonged to a united pre-Partition Punjab but also uses a 19th century trope that, as Prof Sakoon N Singh argues, emerged as an anti-colonial anthem of resistance by the poets Bishna and Manda. Unlike other adaptations of the Jugni trope that focus only on the aesthetics, tone and style of the song, Shergill goes beyond aesthetics as he laments the condition of the unemployed Punjabi youth and also observes its impact on society. Further, the song also highlights the violence in Kashmir, the loss of identity in Delhi, restlessness and materialism in Mumbai and presents an overall image of the nation where, he reminds us:

 

jugni vekhan chali desh

jide jamne si kade ved

jitho padhya si angrej

ki banya usda

ki banya usda haal

kede kite use kamaal

 

(Jugni goes to see the nation 

Where were born once the Vedas,

Which had removed the Britishers.

What has now become of it?

What became of its condition?

How many miracles did it achieve!)

 

In Jugni, Shergill uses the trope of Jugni, the woman traveller, and conflates it with his own self as the two become witnesses of the decline of the nation and call for a reform in the nation. Though a social commentary, the song does not lose its aesthetic qualities and it remains till date, one of Shergill’s most performed songs in his concerts. Unlike Bilqis and Jugni, Shergill’s Tun Milen uses the trope of a romance to lay bare its own privileges and reveal the “social” or the “political” concealed behind the “personal”. In the official video of the song, Shergill himself acts and sings the seemingly romantic, love ballad and in about the later half of the song, he introduces as Sakoon N Singh notes, “several poor labourers looking vacantly into the frame” and this completely alters the meaning of the song as it introduces the rather uncomfortable question of social reform in a love song. Sakoon N Singh compares his song to Faiz Ahmed Faiz’s poetry ,and rightly so, as Faiz conflated the personal and the political, the beloved and the revolution, in his prison poems to subvert the conventional love symbols of Urdu poetry. As the subtitle of the single Tun Milen: The Ghost of LSD depicts, Shergill takes the tune of his song from a poem titled “Tur Gia Koi Dil Ch Lae Ke Saadgi”  by a revolutionary Punjabi poet, Lal Singh Dil (LSD) whose works have inspired him. Not only does the song introduce the uncomfortable element of social reform in a love ballad as it also investigates the very idea of romance itself by seeming to asn the question: “Who gets to love?” In an interview with Prof. Sakoon N Singh, Shergill states how he is inspired by the poems of Lal Singh Dil and their social consciousness that he adapts in his song as he depicts the “implausibility of romance in a hard life”. The song is a perfect example of the combination of aesthetics and politics as it neither compromises nor gives primacy to either of the two in the song and leaves all judgement to the listener which makes the song highly subversive.

 

While some argue that art must be separated from society, be pursued only for its own sake and exist only as an end in itself, is it really possible in today’s age? Or, to reframe the question, should mere aesthetics and beauty be the purpose of art? Amidst any extremity, social crisis, or a genocide as Palestine experiences today, what is the role of art? Carolyn Forché answers, “to bear witness”. Noor Hindi answers this question with her poem “Fuck Your Lecture On Craft, My People Are Dying”. Marwan Makhoul, a Palestinian poet, writes:

 

In order for me to write poetry that isn’t political

I must listen to the birds

and in order to hear the birds

the warplanes must be silent.

 

As Munshi Premchand had mentioned in his presidential address at the 1st All India Progressive Writers’ Conference in 1936: “we must change the definition of beauty. Until now it was controlled only by the rich and the privileged.” This idea can also be extended to the question of the role of art as art cannot be mere aesthetics and it should not be mere political propaganda either. However, in a world like ours, we, as conscious art enthusiasts, must ask ourselves: Is entertainment all there is to art? If so, at what cost? At the cost of human lives, it seems.

 

Works Cited

• Shergill, Rabbi. Rabbi. Agni Media, 2005. CD. 
• —. Avengi Ja Nahi. Yash Raj Films, 2008. CD.
• —. III. Universal Music, 2012. CD.
• Singh, Sakoon N. ““Like a library of incredible wisdom housed in a stinking building.”: An Interview with Rabbi Shergill”. South Asian Ensemble, vol. 7, no. 3, 4, Summer and Fall 2015.
• Khurana, Suanshu. “Artistes are the moral compass of their times’: Rabbi Shergill”. Indian Express, 7 Apr. 2023, https://indianexpress.com/article/lifestyle/art-and-culture/rabbi-shergill-artistes-moral-compass-8543553/lite/
• Singh, Sakoon N. “Enigma of her Arrival: From Rebellion to Commentary in the Jugni Narrative”. Café Dissensus, https://cafedissensus.com/2017/04/15/enigma-of-her-arrival-from-rebellion-to-commentary-in-the-jugni-narrative/
• Forché, Carolyn. “Introduction”. Against Forgetting, W.W. Norton, 1993.