Edited By : Aakriti Handa " Jattan de puttan nu rok sake na Trump, Billo; dukki tikki di ta gal shadde...
[Even (US President Donald) Trump cannot stop sons of Jatts (from illegally entering the US), leave alone a commoner] ." Six months before the United States started sending deportees back to India, Punjabi Singer Cheema Y released a song called ' Trump ' which, in essence, underlined that no one can stop Punjabis from entering the US. The song has more than 55 million views.
Punjab's vibrant popular culture has been laced with the themes of emigration and a general fascination of the West — be it films, fashion or music. There was a time when Punjabis used to migrate to Myanmar (then Burma) and Chandi Ram had sung a song in which a young woman was seen pleading her husband not to leave Punjab for Burma. Back then, the woman's appeal to her husband was to not leave her alone; but in contemporary times, emigration is celebrated.
Popular Punjabi artistes, through their music videos, seem to sell the idea of the 'American Dream' better than Americans ever have. This is not to say that they don't mention taking dangerous journeys through jungles and scaling mountain peaks to illegally cross the Mexico-US border — commonly described as 'dunki' among Punjab and Haryana immigrants — they often do. But it is romanticised as a means to an end, where the end will not only solve all their money and job-related problems but also earn them the respect of their parents, friends an.