Harmanjeet Singhਹਰਮਨਜੀਤ ਸਿੰਘ

Harmanjeet Singh (born 27 June 1991) is a Punjabi poet and lyricist from Khiala Kalan village in Mansa district. His first book, Rani Tatt (2015), a collection of poetry and prose about Punjab and its nature, sold more than twenty-eight thousand copies and won him the Sahitya Akademi Yuva Puraskar in 2017. He is also one of the most heard lyricists in Punjabi cinema, the writer of Laung Laachi and of the devotional songs Aar Nanak Paar Nanak and Nanak Aadh Jugaadh Jiyo.

Early life

Harmanjeet Singh was born on 27 June 1991 in Khiala Kalan, a village in Mansa district of Punjab. He began writing poetry at a young age, filling notebooks long before he thought of publishing anything. He completed his secondary education at Baba Jogi Peer Public Senior Secondary School and graduated from a nearby college. The village, its fields, its seasons and its old words stayed with him, and they became the material of his first book.

What is Rani Tatt?

Rani Tatt, released on 19 August 2015, is Harmanjeet's first book, a collection of poetry and prose that looks at Punjab through nature. Its full title is Rani Tatt (Sohile Dhoor Mitti Ke). The book is in two parts, poems first and longer verse after, written in an old Punjabi vocabulary about the rivers, the seasons, the fields and the old life of the villages. Most Punjabi books sell about five hundred copies. Rani Tatt crossed that figure in ten days, went through seven editions in two years, and has sold more than twenty-eight thousand copies in India and overseas. In 2017 it won Harmanjeet the Sahitya Akademi Yuva Puraskar. He had already received the Punjabi Sahitya Academy Award for prose and the Shri Kanvar Singh Chauhan Yadgiri Nazam Puraskar. Harmanjeet has explained the title as meaning the supreme element, saying in Punjabi that it is supreme in the way the rani haar, the queen's necklace, is said to be the most beautiful. The Sahitya Akademi booklet released with the award praised the collection for going deep into the rich and ancient heritage of Punjab and connecting it with the modern ethos in a meaningful manner, calling the poems lucidly written and full of lyrical intensity.

Lyricist in films

Harmanjeet's poems made him a lyricist. He wrote Laung Laachi, the title song of the film of the same name, sung by Mannat Noor, a song that became one of the most played Punjabi songs of its year. He wrote the devotional songs Aar Nanak Paar Nanak and Nanak Aadh Jugaadh Jiyo for Diljit Dosanjh. His words have been performed by Sunidhi Chauhan, Neha Bhasin, Amrinder Gill and Manpreet Singh. He has also composed music for films, writing and composing Paunda Boliyaan for Puaada in 2021 and Chann Sitare for Oye Makhna in 2022. He has said that he was enchanted by music in childhood and could remember every detail about the songs, including the singer, the composer and the music director, and that he used to think he should do something like this himself.

Beyond the best known songs, his lyrics have been sung by a wide circle of voices. Gurshabd sang Chann Ve and Mitti Da Puttla, Prabh Gill sang Rooh De Rukh, and Amrinder Gill sang Paani Raavi Da with Neha Bhasin, Gutt Ch Lahore with Sunidhi Chauhan, and Darshan Mehnghay. Ammy Virk and Mannat Noor sang Sheesha, Chiddi Baulari, Kaala Suit and Gulaabi Paani, and Manpreet Singh sang Kise Da Pyaar Paavan Nu and Kitabaa Vaala Rakhna. His film work has continued into the 2020s. In 2024 he shared the lyrics of Vellian Nu Thok Ke, from the film Gandhi 3 Yarran Da Yaar, with Veet Baljit, and the song was sung by Veet Baljit and Gurlez Akhtar. Many of his songs are now sung in Punjabi films, and he has said he wishes to continue writing songs for films.

Devotional songs and the Rani Tatt channel

Alongside film songs, Harmanjeet has built a separate body of devotional work with the singer Manpreet Singh. Together they release a series of dharmik tracks under the name Sooraj Eko Rut Anek, a track a month dedicated to the Sikh Gurus, including Baleyo Chirag, Potli Anand Ki, Sukhman Sukhman and Chanan Di Chaunki. The songs are released through his Rani Tatt channel, which has become the home of his newer writing outside films. In 2024 the channel released Chanan Vidhya Da, a song about education in rural Punjab, with lyrics by Harmanjeet and vocals and music by Manpreet Singh, made with the Kalgidhar Trust and Akal Academy Baru Sahib. It is a good example of what his later songs do: they take a subject close to village life, in this case schooling, and treat it with the same care as a poem.

Teaching and village life

Harmanjeet still works as a primary school teacher in a government school at Ranjitgarh village in Mansa district, the job he held when Rani Tatt was published. He has kept the day job through the book's success and through his film work, and it is part of why readers trust him: he writes from inside the life he describes, not from a distance. His father was a veteran, his mother is a homemaker, and his elder sister lives at home. Painting and films are other interests close to his heart, and his father too is interested in writing, which is where Harmanjeet says his own interest in writing and art began.

Has Harmanjeet Singh written a second book?

Not yet. A decade after Rani Tatt, it remains his only published book, and no second collection has been announced. His newer writing has instead gone into songs: film lyrics, the monthly devotional tracks with Manpreet Singh, and songs for the Rani Tatt channel such as Chanan Vidhya Da. Readers waiting for a second book can follow that work in the meantime, but no second book has appeared so far.

Why does Harmanjeet Singh matter?

He matters because he showed that Punjabi poetry still has readers, and that a first book by a village schoolteacher can travel further than the market expects. Rani Tatt kept alive an old vocabulary and used it to talk about the present, and its success gave its author a second career in film music, where his words now reach listeners who may never buy a book of poems. The same lines that began in a Mansa village now play in cinemas, on devotional channels and in classrooms, and they all carry the same thing: a Punjab that is still worth writing about, in words that still sound like home. For young writers in Punjab's villages, his story is a practical one: he wrote from where he lived, in the language he grew up with, and he kept his day job as a teacher while he did it.