Celebrity: A litterateur with no malice

He's 87 and, quite unarguably, considered the grand old man of Indian journalism. With over 60 books to his credit and two weekly columns being reproduced by over 50 journals in India and abroad, Khushwant Singh is one of India's most famous bylines. A tete-e-tete with the feisty, forthright man of letters


The first time I met Khushwant Singh was more than a decade back. The writer, editor and historian greeted me with a warm hug. Singh's house at New Delhi's Sujan Singh Park bore no nameplate on the door then. Only a signboard with a terse message: 'Please do not ring the bell if you are not expected.' Over the years, nothing has changed. Neither the signboard nor the man's receptiveness.

Known to lead a straightforward and disciplined life, Khushwant never sees anyone without prior appointment. To him, time is sacred. And he respects people who value time - his and theirs.

I had been late by 10 minutes on my first meeting and Khushwant was quick to reprimand. "Try and be punctual," he gibed. Lesson learnt, I have made it a point to reach the premises early on my innumerable visits to the grand old man but ring the doorbell only at the appointed hour.

Numerous stories do the rounds about Khushwant not meeting people without an appointment. One such is of India's milk baron Nanak Singh. Himself a cordial person, Nanak Singh had once dropped in to see Khushwant but the latter refused to meet him without an appointment. Not one to take no for an answer, the milk baron went to Khushwant's neighbour's house and phoned the author from there to find out if he could visit him. Khushwant agreed. But Nanak Singh shot back, 'You have spoiled my mood today. I shall see you some other day!' And left the place. The two did have cordial meetings later, though.

Another anecdote: Swaraj Paul, a good friend of Khushwant's, pays him a visit whenever he is in town. "Once, he arrived before 7 pm, but waited in his Mercedes Benz, and rang the bell only when the clock struck seven because he didn't want to disturb me. I consider that very gentlemanly," Khushwant states.

But let this not make you jump to conclusions about Khushwant Singh's nature. The grand old man of Indian journalism, Khushwant is a jovial, yet an emotional person - a facet few people have truly cared to notice. His attitude towards people who drop by at his place without an appointment may be to ignore them, but he definitely takes care to reply to the two to three dozen letters he receives every day.

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Khushwant Singh's apartment in New Delhi in Sujan Singh Park faces a squarish lawn, which has large ficus trees, a young choryzzia and an old mulberry. An avid birdwatcher, he is passionate about nature. "Every year, on February 18, I see a sign of green on the mulberry and choryzzia flowers by the end of October," he says.

The building that houses his tenement was built during World War II mainly to accommodate civil and military officers. Khushwant's father, Sujan Singh, got the land and the contract to construct it. After the end of the war, it was handed over to the family. So Khushwant, following India's independence, came from Lahore to stay here in 1947. Thus began his long domicile with wife Kanwal in a spacious, red-brick residential area built on the pattern of London's Sussex Gardens.

A man of many talents, his house is rich with two wealths of civilisation - history and books. And the room, which has seated celebrities from across the world, reflects modesty. The two-bedroomed house boasts furniture that has celebrated its silver jubilee, but is as polished as is the man of the house. Khushwant's living room, where he spends most of his time reading and writing, has a sofa set, chairs and tables that were bought more than 50 years ago. "These were crafted by a Chinese furniture maker," he discloses.

Many items, including the table lamps, are gifts his wife received as dowry. The shelves in the room display reference books, autobiographies and tomes on nature and history. Prominently placed is a picture of Yamini Krishnamurthy, gifted to the writer by the dancer.

The only part of the décor that keeps changing is the 'mooda' (a kind of foot rest). "And there is no other reason to do so except that it gets worn out," he confesses.

Apart from a refrigerator, the dining room houses a dining table and a set of chairs, the work of furniture makers who are said to have furnished the Rashtrapati Bhavan (the Indian president's official residence), which are also in the 'antiques' category. "I can claim to possess similar chairs as the Rashtrapati Bhavan," Singh jokes.

A voracious reader and a proficient writer, Khushwant's day begins at 4.30 in the morning. "My alarm clock makes sure that I don't sleep more," he tells you. He scans the headlines of a daily newspaper and solves crosswords. It's a start to a day that is spent mostly steeped in the activities of reading or writing. One of the reasons why his marriage was a contrasting experience of togetherness and aloofness with his wife Kanwal. The companionship between the two lasted 60 years. Kanwal passed away on December 28, 2001. Singh becomes nostalgic. "She held the reins of the family in every way. But towards the end, she had shrivelled up and it was painful to see her condition. She was never sweet-tongued, but in her later years, she would be rude to me. And would get very annoyed if I suggested she see a psychiatrist."

Deterioration from Alzheimer's had begun to set in five years ago. At times, after dropping Khushwant off at the Gymkhana Club, on her way back home Kanwal would find herself on the road to Palam Airport - several kilometres off the mark. "I insisted she stop driving as she used to lose her way. But she would strongly protest. In fact, in the last few months, she had begun to mistake her daughter for her granddaughter - whom she was extremely fond of," he remarks.

Khushwant considers the first few years of his marriage as the best ones. "(But) like most marriages, ours too was a rollercoaster ride. We had lots of misunderstandings and quarrels," he reminisces.

Khushwant has a vast circle of friends and his wife had her own yardstick of measuring their importance to his life. She had a major say regarding who would get to meet her husband. Extremely outspoken, Kanwal did not mince words if she disapproved of someone. Many times, their marriage came to the point of breaking up. But as it happens with many marriages, the two became a habit with each other.

Says Khushwant, feeling a trifle upset, "It was most unfair (the trait in her) as she generally disapproved of people whom I wasn't even very close to. And we would have fights, usually every evening." The couple rarely interacted throughout the day, as Singh would keep himself busy reading or writing. "I had the great advantage of being in a profession which required my being left alone for several hours in the day. And she left me alone."

But he admits that her fondness for him was genuine as she guarded his health fiercely. No one was allowed into the house after 8 pm. She would rather bluntly tell people to leave so that Singh could, without fail, sleep at 9 pm.

Singh recalls an incident involving a former German ambassador who dropped in around 9 pm. "That wa