Winding Back The Clock : Cover page & Prologue

 

 

 WINDING BACK THE CLOCK

(Our Family Chronicle)

(Time Beats That Resonate)

 

 

 

Author: Prakash Narain Singh

Editor : Ajai Singh

S/O Shri Randhir Singh & GS/O Shri Ramanugrah Narayan Singh

Table of Contents

Prologue_ 1

1.      winding back_ 4

2.      Shri Basti Singh (1765 -1842)_ 5

3.      Shri Ram Dayal Singh (1794-1860)_ 8

4.      Shri Visheshwar Singh (1833-1900)_ 10

5.      Shri Ramdhani Singh (1855-1925)_ 12

6.      Ramanugrah Narain Singh (1879-1954)_ 16

7.      Smt Ishwari Devi (1894 -1974)_ 23

8.      Shri Randhir Singh (1917 –2002)_ 25

9.      Smt. Savitri Devi (1924-2009)_ 29

10.        time beats that resonate_ 34

 

Prologue

For a long time, I have been persuaded by my youngsters in the family to document a detailed ancestry of the family for the benefit of the generations to follow. In fact, during sit-ins, on various occasions with the younger generation, my narratives infused a sense of pride in them, and at times they were awestricken when I showed them some rare old documents that were handwritten, parched with vagaries of time, handwritten booklets penned by ancestors, newspaper clippings, excerpts from published books authored by eminent persons, eulogizing their great grandfather and their great grandfather also. The sense of pride that it evoked and the pleasure that they derived, inspired me to present them with a documented history of our ancestry. And, hence this small attempt of mine based on collective memory of my generation and that available in various documents I could lay my hand on.

It may not be out of place to mention that the logarithmic advancement of technology would before long attain 5^th dimension characteristics. Time machine   has now bid adieu to speculation and fantasy and is now gradually spreading the outreach of scientific enquiry. In good time, the past and the present may coalesce. At that point of time, what I have recorded herein by way of ‘’Shruti’’ from my forebears, passed on to me, and the records that I have, would get more authentic review, reconsolidation and reconstruction. The future generations would   have a validated benchmark to measure themselves vis-a-vis their ancestors.

I began with a 60-years old hand written paper. Sometime in the 60s, my father had asked me to copy the lineage from a highly withered paper containing family tree of almost six generations with which my father and forefathers used to perform ‘’Pitri-tarpan’’. (After demise of my father, we, all six brothers perform Pitri-tarpan in our own way and understanding). I scanned and updated the paper for future reference. I began with this handwritten Family-Tree to build up a dynastic history.

It is quite difficult to recover and reconstruct what happened 300 years back. There are weather beaten documents highly fragile but readable. There are 100 years old photographs, again in highly decomposed condition but giving a glimpse of the past. There are also some booklets handwritten by my grandfather and great grandfather through whom they used to teach their students and juniors in the school. The autobiography of Dr. Rajendra Prasad Modern Review Journals published in between 1900-1920 AD and the document related to Mahatma Gandhi Champaran episode had details that revealed the person my grandfather was.

The family tree which could be traced by me with the help of records available to me goes back to year 1765 with the advent of Basti Singh and his two brothers Daria Singh and Harihar Singh in 1765-70. We are descendants of the eldest of them, Basti Singh. We are Kaushik Rajput Our native place is Narsinghpur village, 4 km west of Gorakhpur railway station.

                                                                          

         

 This narrative describes or rather reaffirms as to how our ancestors migrated from Narsinghpur and relocated and remained successively at Parsa, Allahabad, and Patna and how they lived their life.

to be continued.......