Singh was educated at
Government College, Lahore and
St. Stephen's College in
Delhi before reading for the Bar at
King's College London. His father,
Sir Sobha Singh, was a prominent builder in
Lutyens' Delhi.
In August 1947, days before the partition of India and Pakistan, Singh, then a lawyer practicing in the High Court in Lahore, drove to his family's summer cottage at
Kasauli in the foothills of the
Himalayas. Continuing on to
Delhi along 200 miles of strangely vacant road, he came upon a
Jeep full of armed Sikhs who boasted that they had just massacred a village of Muslims. Such experiences were to be powerfully distilled in Singh's 1956 novel
Train to Pakistan. (The 2006 edition of Train to Pakistan, published by Roli Books in
New Delhi, also contains 66 photographs by
Margaret Bourke-White that capture the partition's violent aftermath.)
Singh has edited
Yojana, an Indian government journal;
The Illustrated Weekly of India, a newsweekly; and two major Indian newspapers,
The National Herald and the
Hindustan Times. During his tenure,
The Illustrated Weekly became India's pre-eminent newsweekly. After Singh's departure, it suffered a huge drop in readership.
From 1980 through 1986, Singh was a member of
Rajya Sabha, the upper house of the Indian parliament. Awarded the
Padma Bhushan in 1974 for service to his country, in 1984 he returned the award in protest against
the siege of the Golden Temple by the Indian Army. Undeterred, in 2007 the Indian government awarded Singh an even more prestigious honor, the
Padma Vibhushan.
A self-proclaimed agnostic, lover of fine scotch whiskey and admirer of female beauty, he nonetheless leads a very disciplined life, waking up at 4 am each day and continuing to write his columns by hand. His works range from political commentary and contemporary satire to outstanding translations of
Sikh religious texts and
Urdu poetry. Despite the name, his column "With Malice Towards One and All" regularly contains secular exhortations and messages of peace, brotherhood and tolerance. In addition, he is one of the last remaining writers to have personally known most of the stalwart writers and poets of
Urdu and
Punjabi languages, and profiles his recently deceased contemporaries in his column. One of the most striking aspects of his weekly writings is his outright honesty; he will openly admit to his weaknesses and mistakes, along with an acceptance of his declining health and physical abilities in more recent times.
As a public figure, Singh has been accused of favoring the ruling
Congress party, especially during the reign of
Indira Gandhi. He is better viewed as an
establishment liberal. Singh's faith in secular forces has been shaken by events such as
anti-Sikh riots that followed Indira Gandhi's assassination, in which major Congress politicians were alleged to be involved. But he has remained resolutely positive on the promise of Indian democracy.
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