Rakhshanda Jalil calls Urdu writer Joginder Paul “the gentlest storyteller of the Partition.” It is a critical judgment, not a ranking: in her reading of his fiction, the upheaval is rendered through the tenderness of people who survive migration yet remain emotionally bound to the homes they lost. His story Khabrau—also spelled Khwabro and translated as Sleepwalkers—makes that lingering displacement vivid.
Who was Joginder Paul?
Joginder Paul was a modern Urdu fiction writer born in Sialkot on September 5, 1925. He migrated to India during Partition and died on April 23, 2016. The Library of Congress records that Punjabi was his mother tongue, that he received early schooling in Urdu, and that he chose Urdu as his language of creative writing. His daughter, writer Sukrita Paul Kumar, also notes that he held an MA in English literature but chose Urdu for literary expression. The Library of Congress places him in the Progressive Urdu Writers’ Movement and records his belief that Urdu is “not a language but a culture.” Library of Congress biography; Sukrita Paul Kumar’s tribute.
Jalil situates Paul in a tradition shaped by Saadat Hasan Manto, Rajinder Singh Bedi, Ismat Chughtai, and Krishan Chandar, while emphasizing that his career began as the great progressive era was declining. That is her literary framing, not a claim that Paul simply followed those writers. His fiction ranges beyond Partition, and his formal experiments included very short stories known as afsanchey.
Why is he called the gentlest storyteller of Partition?
Jalil’s phrase describes the emotional register she finds in Paul’s Partition writing: empathy for uprooted people rather than a sustained emphasis on anger or moral outrage. Partition remains central to his literary legacy, but his characters’ experience is often shown in its afterlife—the memory of home, the difficulty of belonging, and the persistence of attachment after migration.
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That distinction matters. The label “gentlest” does not mean that the events or losses are slight. It describes how the fiction approaches those who endured displacement. Instead of treating migration as a completed journey, Paul attends to what people carry with them and to the homes that remain present in memory.
Khabrau and the lives that continue in memory
In Jalil’s account, Khabrau (also rendered Khwabro), translated into English as Sleepwalkers in the Katha Perspectives series, follows people uprooted from Lucknow and transplanted to Karachi. They live in a new city, but remain haunted by their old homes, streets, neighborhoods, and the mangoes of Malihabad. Jalil describes them as survivors who continue like “waking ghosts”: physically elsewhere, yet bound to the places they left.
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The story is a useful entry into Paul’s treatment of Partition because it concentrates on displacement’s intimate, continuing effects. Its remembered places are not just background; they express the distance between where the characters live and where they feel they belong. Rakhshanda Jalil’s essay on Paul.
Partition recurs, but it is not his only subject
Paul’s daughter writes that Partition affected his consciousness deeply throughout his life. She names the stories “Dera Baba Nanak,” “Daryaon Pyas,” “Fakhtain,” and “Mele Mulakatein,” as well as the novel Khwabro, as works that return to different aspects of Partition. She says these stories were collected in the English translation Rivers of Thirst, published by Speaking Tiger. Sukrita Paul Kumar’s tribute.
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Yet Partition does not account for all of Paul’s fiction. Jalil also discusses “Akhri Paath” (“The Last Lesson”), set amid Punjab militancy, and short pieces concerned with other dimensions of human and social experience. Rekhta’s author profile characterizes his writing as engaging with inner life, psychological and social realities, poverty, class conflict, migration, Partition trauma, and declining human values. That broad summary is useful orientation, rather than a definitive critical consensus. Rekhta author profile.
Very short stories and a wider body of work
Jalil highlights Paul’s afsanchey, compact short-short stories she describes as piercing. Among the titles she cites are “Parkinson’s Disease,” “Death,” “One by One,” “Kargil,” and “Living Happily Ever After.” Their brevity is a distinct part of his practice, alongside stories, novellas, and novels.
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The Library of Congress bibliography gives a sense of that range. Its listed short-story collections include Dharti ka lal (1961), Main kyun socum (1962), Mati ka idrak (1970), Khudu Baba ka maqbara (1994), Parinde (2000), and Bastiyan (2000). It lists the novellas Amad va raft and Bayanat (both 1975), and the novels Nadid (1983) and Khavab-i-rau (1991). Transliteration and bibliographic spellings vary, so use the spelling printed in the edition being discussed. Library of Congress bibliography.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.Which Joginder Paul books are available in English?
For an English-language reader, these titles offer different forms and angles rather than one universally agreed starting point:
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| Book | Form and connection | What the sources establish |
|---|---|---|
| A Drop of Blood | Novel; an entry point for readers who want a book-length work. | Penguin Random House India identifies it as the Penguin Classics English edition of Ek Boond Lahoo Ki, Paul’s first novel and one of his significant works. Jalil describes the novel’s publication in 1962; other sources give a different year, so bibliographic dates should be attributed. Penguin India edition page; Jalil’s essay. |
| Sleepwalkers | Translation of Khabrau/Khwabro; especially relevant to Partition memory. | Jalil discusses it as a central example of Paul’s compassionate writing about Lucknow residents uprooted to Karachi. Jalil’s essay. |
| Rivers of Thirst | English translation collecting Partition-related stories. | Paul’s daughter identifies Speaking Tiger as its publisher and names the stories gathered in it; her account does not establish current edition availability. Sukrita Paul Kumar’s tribute. |
English availability can change by edition and retailer. Penguin’s page identifies a specific English edition of A Drop of Blood; the other titles are included here because the cited accounts identify their translations, not to promise current stock.
Paul’s own account of writing from experience
Writing about his 1989 short-story collection Khula (Open), Paul said, “I have suffered every single one of my stories.” The passage continues: “I have experienced them in such a way that my characters often appear to be nothing but reflections of my own being.” Jalil quotes these words in her essay; in that context, they offer a glimpse of how closely Paul connected the inner lives of his characters with his own experience. Jalil’s essay.
How to understand his legacy
Paul’s significance lies in the range of forms he used and in the attention he gave to inner life. His Partition fiction makes remembered homes and unsettled belonging central; his other stories address social realities and violence beyond 1947. Jalil’s “gentlest storyteller” is best read as a description of the compassion she sees in that work, particularly Khabrau, rather than as an objective ranking of writers or a description of every book he wrote.
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