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Singapore NRI alleges land grab by brothers in Punjab
NRI's daughter said "Blood is not thicker than water"

 

India is no longer what it used to be. Or should I say, Punjab and its people was just never like what my father described it to be. Love, family-bonding, sacrifice for other’s happiness, hospitality, kindness and caring were the adjectives my father would use to explain how was, back in India. Ever since we came to our senses, me and my siblings have been visiting India every year. And I must add, that we did feel and experience all the love and care we could have felt in the world from our relatives and friends, back ‘home’.

I was born and bred in Singapore, yet i have always felt a strong correlation between me and Punjab. I liked every thing about Punjab. Dad would tell us stories every night, about how great Punjab is and more importantly how great his family is.

Because we lived in Singapore and earned more in currency, my father probably felt a need to continuously support his family back home. Thank God he was into the labour supply business and he managed to bring my uncles(his two younger brothers) to Singapore on a work permit basis. My uncles worked here and savoured every good moment in Singapore.

They went back and settled down. A few years later, my dad's younger brother begged my dad for help to send him to New Zealand. He felt he could rise as a singer there. My father slogged even if it meant we (my brother and sister) had lesser tuitions, so could he pay for his brothers PR application for New Zealand.

My uncle was cheated of S$20,000 and he went back shamelessly to India without even thinking of working and slowly repaying my father. Despite all these ungratefulness, my dad’s love for his younger brothers never faltered. Infact, he kept providing more for them. My poor mother’s cries to my dad to be cautious never made an impact. My dad built a huge house, which they are now living luxuriously in.

Things began changing out of the blue and my uncles ganged up against my father. Greed probably seeped into their minds and I wont be surprised if our neighbours made an influential contribution. My dad’s second brother started gossiping behind my father’s back and TODAY, these two unfaithful souls have usurped all the land, even my fathers share. Needless to say, being a landlord or farmer by birth and having deep attachment and a sense of belonging to his ancestral land, my father is devastated.

His condition worsens day by day. Every night now, he mumbles to himself in his drunken stupor, “What am I going to pass down to my son?” Not that my brother is too keen on that piece of land, but he feels strongly for my dad but regrets that he is unable to help much.

The past few days have been tough. My dad he gets up early and starts making calls to relatives to in India, for help. Suddenly everyone is unkind and unhelpful and his pleas fall on deaf years. He calls his sisters daily, hoping they would make a quick trip down to our village to speak to the ‘Sarpanch’. “Sorry, we can’t get involved.”- is the reply he gets.

The contemporary side of me tries to explain to my father to let go and forgive. After all, it’s just some piece of land. There is no logic to drink to your ill-health over land disputes.

But there is something deeper here. It’s about betrayal and it’s about fighting for your rights. Fighting for rights is something that has been preached even in our religion.

So, we have vomited out our true love and care for our family in Punjab and have decided that we are going to fight for our land, no matter what it takes. Blood is not thicker than water, so we have heard and now we have felt.

India, I guess is always putting a façade. In reality, all that happens there is killing over land disputes, rapes, disgusting dowry tactics, female infanticide, etc. India has no law and no system and definitely no conscience. Even if someone wants help, they need to pay first or bribe first. It’s sad because India is a land when the purest and holiest have come and left only for conditions to be in dire states today.

submit:
Singapore, Feb.26, 2008
H.K.Bhullar

 

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