Nasir Dhillon, a Pakistani YouTuber, is on the mission of reuniting families and friends who got separated in 1947 during the creation of Pakistan and India.
Nasir runs a YouTube channel named ‘Punjabi Lehar.’ He created the channel with the help of a friend in 2016. Since then, the channel has served as a bridge that has connected hundreds of families and friends from across the border.
The British rule in India came to an end in 1947, resulting in the creation of two independent states – Pakistan and India. The migration during the partition saw 12 million people becoming refugees and between 0.5 and 1 million people losing their lives.
Both neighbors have a tenuous relationship, which makes it extremely difficult for Pakistani and Indian citizens to travel across the Radcliffe Line.
Inspiration Behind Punjabi Lehar
Nasir was inspired to make a YouTube channel with the aim of reconnecting separated families and friends because of the experience of his own family.
Nasir’s father and grandfather had migrated to Pakistan from Amritsar, a city in the Indian Punjab. Nasir says that they always wanted to visit their village in Amritsar before dying. Unfortunately, they died without visiting their hometown. This motivated Nasir to make a YouTube channel to help connect families separated between Pakistan and India.
Brothers Reunited Over 70 Years Later
Punjabi Lehar made headlines earlier this year in January when the channel paved the way for the reunion of two brothers – Sadiq Khan and Sikka Khan – after more than seven decades.
During the partition, Sadiq Khan along with his father relocated to Pakistan while Sikka Khan and his mother stayed back in India.
Punjabi Lehar uploaded a video of Sadiq Khan in which he was appealing to the netizens to help him in locating his lost brother in India.
A man from Sikka Khan’s village saw Punjabi Lehar’s video and told him that his brother is in Pakistan and a YouTube channel has shared his appeal for the reunion of his family.
Sadiq Khan and Sikka Khan were finally reunited at the Gurdwara Darbar Sahib in Narowal through the Kartarpur Corridor, a visa-free border crossing and religious corridor that connects Gurdwara Darbar Sahib to Gurdwara Dera Baba Nanak in India’s Gurdaspur.
How The Channel Was Made
Before making the channel, Nasir used to visit Nankana Sahib, the birthplace of Sikhism’s founder Baba Guru Nanak. There, Nasir befriended Bhupinder Singh Lovely, a Pakistani Sikh, and both decided to launch Punjabi Lehar on YouTube.
Punjabi Lehar has gained more than 602,000 subscribers and its videos have been viewed over 98 million times. Nasir and Bhupinder have now hundreds of contacts in both countries, who help them trace the families and friends who got separated during the partition.
