In 1988, singer Amar Singh Chamkila and his wife, Amarjot, were shot dead by masked men in the village of Mehsampur in Punjab.
While the killers’ identities remain a mystery, filmmaker Kabir Singh Chowdhry recently revealed that one of the three assassins is still alive.
In an interview with Cine Punjabi, Manku said that Chamkila was paid Rs 8000 for his final performance.
In an interview with Hindustan Times, he said, “Spending time on the ground in Punjab pursuing Chamkila’s story, I inevitably crossed paths with one of Chamkila’s killers who is still alive.
He asked, ‘Babbi, tenu ki hoya (Babbi, what happened to you)’?”Imtiaz Ali’s new Netflix biopic has put the spotlight back on the life and death of Amar Singh Chamkila.
In 1988, singer Amar Singh Chamkila and his wife, Amarjot, were shot dead by masked men in the village of Mehsampur in Punjab. The shooting happened at an ‘akhaada‘ that they were supposed to perform at. While the killers’ identities remain a mystery, filmmaker Kabir Singh Chowdhry recently revealed that one of the three assassins is still alive. Chamkila’s former secretary, Manku, has now shared details about the tragic day. He revealed that a police officer assured him that the killers suffered and were subsequently killed.
In an interview with Cine Punjabi, Manku said that Chamkila was paid Rs 8000 for his final performance. Since Chamkila and Amarjot wanted to have a meal before the show, Manku left them to their meal, and went to the nearby stage to check if everything was in order. After greeting the crowd and checking the microphone, Manku called Chamkila and Amarjot over, saying, “Everything’s ready, come on.”
He said in Punjabi, “The shooters were among the crowd. They could have shot him on the way. They could have shot him after he’d stepped onto the stage. Who knows, even I might have been shot if they’d fired at the stage. But they waited. Chamkila arrived in his car in grand fashion, it was a scene straight out of a movie. I said, ‘Put your hands together, Chamkila is here’.’ No sooner than I’d said this, I heard loud bangs.”
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Manku then looked around and saw someone fall near the car. Realising what had happened, he jumped off the stage but got stuck in the fallen chairs. Stuck there, Manku thought to himself, “You aren’t getting out of this alive.” He added, “One person next to me described what she saw, I was too scared to look out. She said, ‘There are three men, they’re doing the bhangra. They’ve kept a letter on Chamkila’s chest’. I saw that letter later, I read it. It was drenched in blood. They left on scooters. I picked up the bodies myself.”
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Chowdhry, the director of the film Mehsampur, had revealed that he’d spoken to one of Chamkila’s murderers. In an interview with Hindustan Times, he said, “Spending time on the ground in Punjab pursuing Chamkila’s story, I inevitably crossed paths with one of Chamkila’s killers who is still alive. While I did get some insight into the motivations behind the act, I wouldn’t put too much weight on it.
In an earlier interview with Noble TV Canada, Chamkila’s dholak player Lal Chand, who was also present on the fateful day and even got shot at in the crossfire, recalled, “I bolted from the spot, but as I was trying to find cover, I saw Amarjot get hit. She was just about to step out of the car. I could hear them swearing at Chamkila while they were shooting. They shot him in the back, but before being hit, Chamkila looked at Amarjot and noticed the blood coming out of her belly. He asked, ‘Babbi, tenu ki hoya (Babbi, what happened to you)’?”
Imtiaz Ali’s new Netflix biopic has put the spotlight back on the life and death of Amar Singh Chamkila. The film stars Diljit Dosanjh and Parineeti Chopra in the lead roles.
