On the occasion of the centenary birth anniversary of Kaifi Azmi (January 14), SUMIT PAUL ponders the uber sensitivity of his kalaam in both poetry and lyrics
In 2014, I taught Urdu poetry and linguistics for a couple of months at Government College, Sialkot, Pakistan. It is the birthplace of Dr Muhammad Iqbal, one of the greatest poets of Urdu on the sub-continent. A professor friend of mine just finished his PhD on Kaifi Azmi’s poetry. The subject of his thesis was: Zindagi ki jaanib Kaifi ka hassas nazariya (Kaifi’s sensitive approach towards life). The very title appealed to me. Kaifi was extremely sensitive and his approach to life was not that of an indolent lotus-eater. He wasn’t an armchair poet, writing and living in an ivory tower and insulated from the ground realities. Kaifi was a poet who braided his poetic sensibilities with the sensitivity and action-orientation of a crusader: ‘Shamsheer ban gayee hai meri qalam/Lekin lahoo isse dushman ka bhi dekha nahin jaata’ (My quill has turned into a sword/ Yet, it can’t shed the blood even of an enemy). This rarest of rare couplets (you won’t find it on the internet or Rekhta) ensued from Kaifi’s pen when he was just a 17-year-old!
Look at the paradoxical juxtaposition of severity and sensitivity in a 17-year-old boy’s masterly creation. His pen becomes a sword yet he is not in favour of using it like a marauder or a murderer. “Khoon chaahe jiska ho khoon hai/ Baat gulaab ki karo uska bhi toh rang surkh hai” (Blood is after all blood, whoever it belongs to/ Talk of the red rose, that’s also red). To elaborate it, a very young Kaifi realised so early in life that if at all we all were so enamoured of the colour red (symbolising ‘blood’)/ We had better talk of the red rose. That’s also red. Praiseworthy, to say the least.
In 1999, I had the privilege of meeting Kaifi Azmi at Azamgarh (UP) along with my professor and mentor Dr Zaifa Ashraf. He was there to look after some welfare work and was quite unwell. He shuffled off the mortal coil after three years, in 2002. Yet, he agreed to be interviewed. My professor asked him in which role he felt more comfortable: As a poet committed to life and literature or a naghmanigaar (lyricist) writing beautiful songs for films? “Kisi ne aaj tak mujhse ye sawaal nahin kiya. Aap pahli shakhs hain jisne ye sawaal kiya hai” (No one ever asked me this question. You are the first person asking this).
“Mere hassas dil ko kabhi kisi ki bandish gavara nahin hui. Maine khud ko nikhalis adab se vaabasta rakha aur film ke liye likhkar bhi door raha” (My sensitive soul couldn’t tolerate anyone’s diktats. I associated myself with pure literature and remained away from films in spite of writing lyrics). Kaifi sa’ab replied haltingly.
Imagine, the man who wrote: “Woh jinko pyaar hai chaandi se ishq sone se/Wahi kahenge kabhi humne khudkushi kar lee” (Those who are fond of affluence, will one day say that they have committed suicide) for Anokhi Raat (Mile na phool toh kaanton se dosti kar lee, 1967), didn’t feel that his heart was in film-songs.
“Dil mera kahin aur basta hai/ Aksar khaali panna dahqaan ka sookha khet dikhta hai” (My heart resides somewhere else/ Often the blank paper of my diary appears like a poor peasant’s infertile/arid field).
Kaifi could never think of his existence or fate as separate from that of a poor peasant crying to see his barren field. This striking imagery and palpably throbbing idiom/s can only flow from someone of Kaifi’s calibre and sensitivity.
It was Kaifi who could write so poignantly that, “Insaan ki hasraton ki koi intiha nahin/ Do gaz zameen bhi chahiye do gaz kafan ke saath” (There’s no end to man’s cravings/ He longs for a 2-yard shroud along with a 2-yard land to be buried).
We both had already heard this beautiful couplet. I requested Kaifi sa’ab to write it for me in his own handwriting. He said, “Meri ungliyaan larazti hain. Phir bhi aapka israar chashm-bar-sar” (Though my hands and fingers tremble, I’ll not say no to you). He then wrote the Urdu couplet in my diary in his shaky handwriting. The diary is still with me and I read the couplet every day like a ritual.
Kaifi could never forget his childhood days at Mijwaan in Azamgarh district in Eastern UP. That’s why he’d often say poetically: “Mera bachpan bhi saath le aaya/ Gaaon se jab bhi aa gaya koi” (He brought my childhood along/ When someone came from my village). This genuine association with one’s roots makes Kaifi a poet whose heart throbbed with the zephyr of his village and moved with the petrichor of the soil.
It was Kaifi’s sensitive poetic mind that he could think out of the blue and write: “Main khada tha ke peeth par meri/ Istihaar ek laga gaya koi” (I was standing, someone came and pasted an advertisement on my back).
In the use of poetic conceits and far-fetched ideas, Kaifi was far ahead of his coeval poet-lyricists like Shakeel Badayuni, Majrooh Sultanpuri, Sahir Ludhianavi and Qateel Shifai (Pakistan). Ahmad Nazir of Karachi University aptly said, “Kaifi ki shayari se ilm-o-tajurbaat ki sondhi mahak aati hai” (Kaifi’s poetry emanates the earthly scent of nous and experience). It also savours of erudition and creative angst.
Though Kaifi never approved of his own poetry in films, who can forget the uber sensitive and graying number (British Urdu scholar Ralph Russell called it an ashen number of ultimate pathos): Dekhi zamane ki yaari/Bichhde sabhi baari-baari (Kaaghaz Ke Phool, 1959) or that deathless “Jaane kya dhoondhti rahti hain ye aankhein mujh mein” (Shola aur Shabnam, 1961). One wonders how he straddled the two seemingly opposite spheres of cinematic poetry and literary poetry. But the colossus that he was, Kaifi left indelible imprints on both the domains with his unforgettably sensitive poetry that didn’t compromise even once. He never stooped. The immortal couplet of Makhdoom Mohiuddin applies to Kaifi, “Main jhuka to faqat sajde ke liye/ Vagarna jhukna mera sheva nahin” (I genuflect only to pray/ Otherwise, stooping goes against my grain). Let’s salute the ‘poet of the masses’ (shayar-e-awaam) on his 100th birthday.
