Krishen Khanna, one of India’s most revered modernist painters and a member of the legendary Progressive Artists’ Group, turned 100 today. A living bridge between pre-independence India and the present, Khanna’s life and work trace a remarkable arc through the subcontinent’s most defining moments from the trauma of Partition to the quiet dignity of the Bandwallahs that populate his later canvases.

Born in Lyallpur (now in Pakistan) in 1925, Krishen Khanna witnessed the upheaval of the Partition firsthand, a rupture that would leave a lasting imprint on his artistic sensibilities. “That memory never leaves you,” he once said in an interview, recalling the trainloads of refugees and the stark human suffering that followed the division of India.

Though largely self-taught, Krishen Khanna developed his artistic voice alongside India’s most renowned painters like M.F. Husain, F.N. Souza, and S.H. Raza during the country's early years of independence. While many of his contemporaries leaned toward abstraction, Krishen Khanna remained committed to figuration, using the human form as a vessel for empathy, narrative, and social commentary.

His early works, such as News of Gandhiji’s Death, reveal a young nation in mourning, while his later pieces shift to more intimate, localized portraits of working-class India; bus conductors, fishermen, and most iconically, the Bandwallahs, musicians who feature prominently in his work from the 1980s onward.

Painted in vibrant reds and golds, Krishen Khanna’s Bandwallahs became a visual metaphor for celebration and invisibility; festive figures who bring joy to others’ lives but remain on the margins themselves. “They represent the soul of a people,” Khanna once explained. “Always performing, always outside the spotlight.”

Over the decades, Krishen Khanna's brush captured both epic and everyday narratives with equal gravitas. Biblical stories like The Last Supper and Doubting Thomas found fresh meaning in his hands, stripped of divinity and steeped in human struggle. In later works, he turned to the Mahabharata, reimagining scenes like The Humiliation of Draupadi in stark monochromes, often to chilling effect.

Despite international recognition including shows in São Paulo, Tokyo, and Venice; Khanna remained rooted in India, painting in his Gurgaon studio well into his 90s. He received numerous accolades, including the Padma Shri (1990), Padma Bhushan (2011), and the Lalit Kala Ratna (2004), honoring his lifetime of artistic contributions.

As India reflects on a century of change, Krishen Khanna’s art offers a mirror not just to history, but to the humanity within it. His is a legacy of witnessing, remembering, and rendering the invisible visible.

And at 100, Krishen Khanna remains not only a chronicler of time, but a timeless voice himself.