Hans – Prem Chand’s literary legacy

Sunday today. The weekend turned out to be a busy one as I took the afternoon flight to Mumbai yesterday and returned late in the evening. Mumbai is the city that I have seldom travelled to and I prefer it that way.

I had stayed in Mumbai at a Nariman Point guest house for about six months in 1996-97. Since then, my visit to this city has been few and far, mostly to attend weddings and on some occasions I extended my visit by one or two days just to catch up with my circle of friends.

Today evening I met Rajendra Yadav and discussed the possibility of collaboration between Prabha Khaitan Foundation and Hansakshar Trust.

Hans was the leading Hindi monthly literary magazine that was started in 1930 by none other than Munshi Prem Chand himself from Varanasi. When the magazine fell on bad days, Yadav ji took editorial charge and revived it. Mahatma Gandhi and K M Munshi were also associated with Hans. A whole school of prominent contemporary Hindi writers had begun their creative career with Hans.

Again, when the magazine was on the verge of closing down, my mother Late Prabha Khaitan decided to extend financial help to the magazine. Mr Yadav recounted old memories and asked for my views on celebrating 80 years of Hans. In the afternoon I had lunch at the residence of my Rajya Sabha MP friend in Mahadev Road.

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