he novel under review is a fine addition to Punjabi literature on the Partition of 1947. Chiraghan Wali Raat is unlike anything else I have read on the subject so far.

Although the emotional centre of the novel revolves around the murder of a Muslim woman and her unborn child by a strong, thuggish Sikh youth – both belonging to the same village – the novel’s canvas extends beyond this tragedy. It captures the village and its people, as they struggle to cope with the grief, guilt and lingering echoes of the past.

While reading the novel, this reviewer was reminded of Hindi fiction writer Mohan Rakesh’s classic Malbay Ka Malik, which follows an elderly Muslim man who, despite surviving the Partition bloodbath – where over a million people were killed and more than ten million uprooted due to colonial policies – returns to his old neighbourhood in Amritsar. Driven by deep love for his former neighbours, he is unaware that one of the local young men had instigated the burning of his house.

As the old man steps off his transport and makes his way back to where his house once stood, exchanging greetings with familiar shopkeepers and neighbours, he finds the culprit lounging atop the debris of what was once his home. The man greets the youth as warmly as an uncle would greet a nephew. The young man reciprocates – but, overcome with shame, he cannot meet the elder’s eye as he mutters, “How are you, uncle?”

The novel also brings to mind Ghassan Kanafani’s classic Returning to Haifa. Similarly, in Annemarie Jacir’s Salt of This Sea, Soraya (played by Suheir Hammad) enters Israel without a permit and confronts a young, hospitable Jewish woman who now occupies her grandfather’s home.

Racism and ethnic cleansing remain among the major moral issues of our time. Serious, thoughtful writers like Harkirat Kaur Chahal continue to dissect the realities with a sharp and unflinching gaze.

The aftermath of the murder committed by Jeemal Singh – the killing of the last remaining Muslim woman, Najma, who was carrying the unborn child of her husband – is explored in a complex way. Her husband has left on a business trip just as the butchering of neighbours began on both sides of the newly erected borders.

A local Sikh family shelters and hides Najma at the risk of their own lives. Yet, they feel deep anguish over having agreed to Najma’s suggestion that she could attempt to escape to Pakistan unharmed. The matter is worsened by the knowledge that her murderer, Jeemal Singh, is one of their own – a fellow villager.

It captures the village and its people, as they struggle to cope with the grief, guilt and lingering echoes of the past.

In his defence, Jeemal Singh offers a simple justification: in the chaos of Partition, where Hindus and Sikhs were being slaughtered by Muslims and made homeless, one cannot single him out for blame. Chahal points out that, at the end of the day, life goes on, even as sorrowful memories and guilt cast a long shadow. When some villagers sense Najma’s soul wandering, Chahal avoids overdramatising the moment. Instead, the novel remains centred on three or four households, preserving a sense of life moving forward. This choice prevents the narrative from becoming too diffuse.

The focus remains on the household that sheltered Najma; a Sikh family uprooted from western Punjab, now living in Najma’s former home; and Jeemal Singh’s household. The novel seems to reinforce the idea that if man-made laws fail to deliver justice, the laws of nature will. Tragedy begins to strike Jeemal Singh’s family across generations – first his son, then his grandson. The connection between a person’s crime and divine punishment is an oversimplified and somewhat illogical resolution, making it the novel’s weakest link. Yet, it is touching that through Jeemal Singh, Chahal offers a form of collective repentance and an apology in the name of humanity.

The novel’s most powerful moment arrives in the mid-1970s when Najma’s husband, Abdullah, returns to the village after Indians and Pakistanis were officially allowed to visit each other. In a delicate touch, the village elders ensure that Abdullah remains unaware of Jeemal Singh’s role in Najma’s tragic end – sparing both men further pain.

Chahal’s prose presents both strengths and weaknesses. Her language and dialect, [boli or lehja] – is so musical and rich that one never tires of reading the long dialogues of her characters. Yet, those very same extended dialogues, one after another, begin to resemble the style of South Asian commercial cinema and teleplays, sometimes at the expense of deeper introspection.

To her credit, Chahal not only avoids the trap of sentimentality – despite the wisdom-laden speeches of elders – but also succeeds in portraying a wide range of perspectives on Partition, particularly from the viewpoint of Hindus and Sikhs from poor, peasant backgrounds. She conjures a poignant picture of those who survived, only to spend their long nights oscillating between sorrow and hope, often wondering about the fate of their missing women.

This novel certainly deserves a wider readership in Pakistan.

Chiraghan Wali Raat

Author: Harkirat Kaur Chahal

Pages: 215

Price: Rs 1,000

Publisher: Fiction House

The writer is a librarian and lecturer in San Francisco. His last book was A Footbridge to Hell Called Love. His novella Unsolaced Faces We Meet In Our Dreams is due soon.