Autumn is Greeting the Punjabi NRI’S

 Harjap Singh Aujla

USA

 Believe me, we had a very treacherous summer in Punjab in 2016. Those who do not believe in global warming, this summer really highlighted and proved it beyond doubt the extreme ill effects of deforestation and global warming. Summer in Punjab pre-poned itself and started in the last week of March, instead of the normal month of April.  The month of April saw temperatures soaring beyond dreadful 40 degrees Celsius. May was a lot worse, some places experienced temperatures soaring up to 48 degrees. And there was hardly any rain. Some greedy people started flooding their fields to transplant rice paddy, which is not native to the state, even prior to tenth of June. This step, in addition to furthering depleting the precariously low water table in most of Punjab, artificially increased the humidity in the air. Life became even more unbearable than usual. The annual monsoon season started in July and brought with it even more humidity. August was worse than July. The heat broke even more records. There was more rain in month of “Bhadron” than in proverbial ‘Sawan’. The Indian mango season was enjoyable. The Sindhoori, Dussehri, Langra and Chausa varieties were unbelievably delicious. The rice paddy ripened in the month of September in most of Punjab. Later on at the time of marketing there was a serious problem of excessive moisture in the crop, this became a nightmare for the farmers. Then came the, greed inspired, annual ritual of rice stubble burning, which artificially generated the allergy season.

 The saving grace is that from the tenth of October, the weather in Punjab has suddenly started improving. Nights are pleasant and days are bearable. The ground water on year round basis needs reverse osmosis for human and cattle consumption, but the season of our native citrus fruit “Kinnow” is coming in November, which does not need complicated reverse osmosis for human consumption in the form of juice or otherwise. Those who don’t need to drink potable water so often can consume “Kinnow” juice. Soon “Sarson Da Saag and Makki Di Roti” will be available in plenty all over Punjab. The magnificent Golden Temple is greeting all the devotees with its twenty four carat splendor. Even its surroundings have received a decent facelift. The Punjab’s winter can get as cold as the European winter, but we do not get snow to shovel. All NRI’s are invited to visit Punjab during the current autumn and coming winter season. The only precaution is to drive slowly and carefully on the Punjab roads both rural and urban. Most of the people in Punjab either don’t know the rules of traffic or they stubbornly refuse to obey the rules that are in existence. Best of the luck for your travel to Punjab, the land of your ancestors.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Harjap Singh Aujla

harjapaujla@gmail.com