Some stories are never told

When i was in 8th standard i was aware of the Stories and Adventures of our National Heroes such as Shivaji the Maratha King, MahaRana Pratap the great Rajput warrior, Guru Gobind Singh the last Sikh Guru, and about the whole Mughal dynasty, as From Babur to Indira Gandhi, all of them were part of the syllabus and i realize now, that they were told in a very plain manner, as if the writers were not feeling proud about any of them, the feeling was never part of the narrative.

I was sitting in the back row of my class and quietly opened my comic book and start reading it for the third time since last night, suddenly someone shouted," what are you reading, come here, bring it, the teacher Mrs. Saxena(name changed) snatched it from my hands and read the title," Hari Singh Nalwa", who is he and when i am teaching you about the rise of Brahmo-Samaj, how dare you read a comic that too in my class, keep your hands above your head and stand there in the corner.

I felt insulted not for myself but for Hari Singh Nalwa, he was suddenly at the top of my list of Heroes, with tears in my eyes i start to visualise the scene where Afghani mothers from Kabul to Peshawar were telling their naughty children,"Chup kero, Haria Ai! {Keep quite and go to sleep, otherwise Hari Singh Nalwa will come}. Suddenly the bell rang and the Social Studies class was over, Mrs. Saxena came upto me and gave me the comic back and said,"This is "Amar Chitra Katha", cover it in plastic and never read these stories here in your history class, OK". I will never read the stories that were not told, i promise, but i couldn't keep my promise.

Hari Singh Nalwa (A.D.1791-1837) was the Commander in Chief of Maharaja Ranjit Singh. Known as Nalua Sardar, Hari Singh Nalwa never lost a battle and won Kasur, Sialkot, Kashmir, Multan and Peshawar from Afghans, in A.D.1837, He became the first General to march ahead of an Army from India upto the Khyber pass on the borders of Afghanistan since the time of Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb. He blocked this well known pass through which Conquerors invaded India since time immemorial and put an end to the invasions of India.

He is still remembered by the story-tellers in Peshawar. The samadhi (memorial) of this Great Sardar is inside Jamrud Fort which he built and there was a memorial to him also in Peshawar town but now no-one knows about its existence. British historians of 19th century compared Nalua Sardar's exploits with Nepoleon Bonaparte. The story of "The Murat of Khalsa" should be told or we already have Sikhs too many in our history text books.

Hari Singh was called Nalwa after he killed a tiger with a dagger. He joined the army of Maharaja Ranjit Singh as a lad, participated in the battle of Kasur and rose to become the Governor of Kashmir in 1820 and the Viceroy on the Western Front (1822-31). In 1834 Nalwa became the Governor of Peshawar.

In the two and a half centuries that Afghanistan has existed as a nation, three super powers — the US, Russia and Britain have attempted to subdue the Afghans with little or absolutely no success. The Sikhs won the only real victories against them. Hari Singh Nalwa's success has remained unmatched.