Some people change love into a spiritual feeling where love reaches a point of the level after which no one wishes for anything else. An example of this kind of love story is of Sahir Ludhianvi and Amrita Pritam.

A strong Punjabi writer, Amrita Pritam broke all relations of her period and lived her life on her own terms. Even after so many struggles, she stood strong and held her head high.

After losing her mother in her childhood she started writing. She was married to Pritam Singh at the age of 16. This marriage never worked out. Their hearts never met. 

Sahir Ludhianvi was a poet and song lyricist. He openly wrote about women’s suffering and questioned the way society treated women. He got famous through Bollywood songs written by him and got highly respected in literature.

His childhood was not a good one because his parents’ marriage was not on good terms and he never bonded with his father. He mostly felt lonely and miserable. This was when he started writing poetry. Sahir became famous in his college life and was known as a shayar (poet). 

Amrita and Sahir both had a silent love story. The kind of love that cannot be described but felt even after both of them have passed away.

Their love story started in Preet Nagar in 1944 when they met for the first time during a Mushairah. They both admired each other’s creativity. They felt a strong connection between themselves. To them, words felt like love. So they expressed their love through letters and it seemed like they were addicted to each other’s love.  Amrita called him “Mera shayar”, “Mera mehboob”, “Mera khuda”. But at that time, Amrita was married to Pritam Singh and had two children with him but was not happy. After meeting Sahir, a new wave of happiness came into her life. 

Sahir and Amrita started to meet but most of the time they remained silent. Sahir used to quietly smoke and go. After he had gone, Amrita would light and smoke those cigarettes alone and she felt like the smoke from their used cigarettes would mingle in the air. Amrita loved him so much that she even got separated from her husband and lived alone with her children. But after some time, things turned down between them. Sahir had a commitment phobia because of his past and Amrita knew about it. In her last letter, she wrote to him, “Maine toot ke pyaar kiya tumse, kya tumne bhi utna kiya mujhse?”. She knew that this relationship was not gonna last long and she never made this as an excuse to love him less. 

Sometime after partition, Amrita shifted to Delhi and was at her peak phase. She wrote excessively about the sufferings of people and as well as love. Everyone related to her poems and novels. Whereas, Sahir was touching heights as a Bollywood song lyricist.

If one thing which was not moving ahead was Sahir and Amrita’s relationship. They got separated and moved on with their lives. Sahir fell for Sudha Malhotra, playback singer and Amrita started a new journey with Imroz, an artist. 

Sahir and Amrita’s love story could not reach a beautiful conclusion but the love they had was a unique one. They continued to express their love through poetry and songs. Thus ended a tragic but beautiful love story and Sahir wrote:-

Taaruf rog hojaye toh usko bhoolna behtar,

Taaluq bojh banjaye toh usko toda achcha,

Woh afsana jise takmeel tak laana na ho mumkin,

Use ek khubsurat mod dekar chhodhna achcha