In November 2025, as books lined the stalls and conversations flowed across the lawns of Khalsa College Amritsar, the Amritsar Literature Festival and Book Fair offered more than readings and discussions. It quietly became the setting for a personal homecoming and a gesture that linked past and future.
That day, a former student returned to his college with something he had carried for decades.
A Student’s Journey Comes Full Circle
Varinder Bhalla, former Commissioner of Nassau County in New York, was in Amritsar for the festival when he formally established and distributed the Chaman Lal Bhalla Scholarship at Khalsa College. Twenty students received the scholarship during the event, and the interview documenting the moment was recorded the same day. The video has now been released.
For Bhalla, the setting mattered. His academic journey had taken him first to DAV College and then to Khalsa College before he moved on to Thapar Engineering College and eventually to the United States. Returning to Khalsa College after nearly fifty years was not planned as a grand moment. It felt natural.
“This is where my student life found direction,” he said. “So this is where giving back had to begin.”
A Father Who Led by Example
The scholarship is named after Bhalla’s father, Chaman Lal Bhalla, who believed deeply in education and quiet service. Bhalla recalled how students from the Amritsar School for the Blind would regularly come seeking help.
“Even when times were difficult, my father never turned them away,” he said. “He believed students needed encouragement more than anything else.”
That belief shaped the family’s values. In recognition of his work, a street in Chheharta was later named Chaman Lal Bhalla Lane. The scholarship now extends that legacy into the classrooms of Khalsa College.
The Thought That Turned into Action
The idea of a college-level scholarship took shape through conversations with Bhalla’s wife, Ratna Bhalla, who has served as a Deputy Commissioner in New York. Education, she said, had always been central to their lives and to the way they understood responsibility.
“Supporting students felt like the most meaningful thing we could do,” she said.
The scholarship is funded through the AWB Food Bank, a hunger relief organisation established in Bhalla’s mother’s name, linking education support with a broader commitment to community welfare.
Not a Grant, but a Responsibility
Bhalla was clear in his message to the students. He does not see the scholarship as charity.
“This is not a grant,” he told them. “Think of it as a loan you repay later in life.”
The repayment, he explained, is not financial. When the students are settled and confident in their careers, they are expected to help another student in need. The help must continue forward.
Quoting Swami Vivekananda, Bhalla reminded them that giving is not loss. The one who gives, Vivekananda said, is the one who truly gains.
Letters, Distance, and Memory
Bhalla left India on September 8, 1969, from Palam Airport. That departure became his last meeting with his father. While studying in America, he received a letter from him every single day, asking about his health and progress.
Those letters have since been lost, but the habit of remembering never faded.
“There is not a single day when I do not think of him,” Bhalla said during the interview.
For more than four decades, the family has tried to honour that memory through steady, often unseen work for people in need.
Work That Continues Quietly
The family’s charitable activities in Punjab are coordinated locally by Satish Kumar Ballu, who has known the Bhalla family through long personal connections.
The work includes distributing blankets and rations twice a year, providing eyeglasses every month to those who cannot afford them, and organising support activities on the death anniversaries of Bhalla’s parents.
It is practical work, rooted in everyday needs, and rarely publicised.
A Festival Moment That Will Last
The Amritsar Literature Festival and Book Fair provided the moment when the scholarship entered public view, but its meaning goes beyond the event. As the festival ended and the campus returned to routine, twenty students carried not just financial help but also a responsibility to pass it on.
For Varinder Bhalla, the return to Khalsa College closed a long personal circle. For the students, it opened a new one.
Sometimes, the most powerful stories at a literature festival are not read aloud. They are living.
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