Balwant Gargi was born on December 4, 1916, in the village of Sehna, Barnala Panjab, to Sh. Shiv Chand Garg, an irrigation department head clerk. Balwant was the family's second son. Gargi completed his M.A. (English) and M.A. (Political Science) degrees from FC College in Lahore after finishing his primary and secondary education. He also studied theatre with Norah Richards at her Kangra Valley school. He wrote various plays such as Loha Kutt, Kesro, Kanak Di Balli, Sohni Mahiwal, Sultan Razia, Soukan, Mirza Sahiba, and Dhooni di Agg, as well as short stories such as Mircha Wala Sadh, Pattan di Berhi, and Kuari Disi. His plays have been translated into 12 languages and performed worldwide, including in Moscow, London, New Delhi, and the United States.
Balwant Gargi was a pioneer of Punjabi playwriting, and the production and transmission of his plays such as Sanjha Chulha on Doordarshan garnered national acclaim. Gargi's short stories began to be published in English alongside his theatrical corpus. Folk Theatre of India, a book published in New York City, and The Naked Triangle (Nangi Dhup) and The Purple Moonlight (Kashni Vehra), two semiautobiographical books in English and Punjabi, catapulted him to the forefront of global attention.
Gargi received the Sahitya Akademi award, India's highest literary honour, in 1962 for his book Rang Manch. Following this, he received the Padma Shri in 1972 and the Sangeet Natak Akademi Award for Punjabi Playwriting in 1998.
Visions of Panjab had a chance to meet when he visited Toronto Iqbal Mahal and Nuzhat Sadiqui interviewed him we present here for the audience.