DW BUREAU / Chandigarh Punjab Governor Banwarilal Purohit on Monday said writers and thinkers are the intellectual capital of a nation who enrich it with their creative ideas and literature. Purohit, who is also Administrator of Chandigarh, said 'word' and 'language' are the most important inventions of human history and literature the living carrier of the thought-tradition of a society. "The writers and thinkers are the intellectual capital of the nation who enrich it with their creative ideas and literature," he said while releasing a book, 'The Ninth Flower: Best of Amrita Pritam', transcreated from Hindi by author-biographer Jyoti Sabharwal and brought out by Stellar Publishers. The governor applauded Sabharwal for taking up a very challenging task of "transcreating" Amrita Pritam's various genres of writing into English and making it accessible to a larger group of readers. "Literature is the living carrier of the thought-tradition of a society. The more cultured a society, the more refined would be its language. The more awakened the society, the more extensive its literature would be," Purohit said. The governor said Amrita Pritam was a "poetess, novelist and essayist, who wrote extensively in Punjabi and Hindi, introduced the conservative Indian society to the whims and fancies of a woman through her pen". "Her verse Aj aakhan Waris Shah nu (Today I invoke Waris Shah) addressed to Punjabi Sufi Poet Waris Shah, in which she laments the tragedy of the partition of Pakistan from India, continues to resound even after seven decades," Purohit noted. She came out with her first book of poetry Amrit Lehran (Waves of Nectar), written in the spiritual tradition, at age 13. "However, it was at 16 - with Thandiyan Kirnan (Cool Rays) ? that she received critical acclaim and became the first modern poet of Punjab, eventually being considered a pillar of Punjabi poetry. After that we all know that there was no looking back!," the governor said. Transcreator Jyoti Sabharwal, as we can comprehend, had a very challenging task of translating her various genres of writing into English, he said. (editor@dailyworld.in)