There is a short period between spring and summer when temperatures begin to rise across India’s Gangetic plains. Mercury hovers around 35-38 degrees Celsius, but coming out of winter, the sun suddenly feels too hot. It’s this dry heat that ripens the wheat in Punjab, one of the country’s biggest producers of the grain — which the world trades most in.
Just outside Amritsar, a sea of green-gold flanks the Grand Trunk Road, a historic trade route connecting Bengal to Afghanistan, built by Sher Shah Suri in the 16th century. It made Amritsar and Lahore, twin cities pre-Partition, prominent centres of trade. The drive from Amritsar, down 28 km, leads to Attari village, adjacent to Wagah, a village broken into an Indian and a Pakistani side.
At Attari-Wagah border, every day, men from the Border Security Force and the Pakistan Rangers display their might in a perfectly rehearsed synchronised drill, with the Beating Retreat ceremony, where the two countries’ flags are lowered in the evening. Patriotism peaks, with hundreds of people, mostly from out of town, cheering the soldiers on.
