Zindagi Ihri Bhali
Tikk’a Tey Ralli’a Jihri
Parr’a Jey Toon Na Weheen Pireen Ta Poi
Aaoon Wedhey Cho Na Chadiyaan
Life is like a precious and expensive Ralli [a traditional bed cover cloth], but if you are not going to sit on it, it is better to fold it up and keep it in a closet. Thus wrote Hassan Dars, Sindh’s poet of resistance in the contemporary era. Early Thursday morning, 45-year-old Dars’ life folded in a road accident – he lost control of his car and crashed into a divider on the National Highway while on his way home to Qasimabad, Hyderabad.
Dars lay in an injured state for more than two hours. A police mobile stationed near the site of the crash, but as eye witnesses claimed, refused to help Dars. Passers-by then informed a nearby police station, but they declined to help on the grounds that the accident had not taken place in their jurisdiction. Dars is survived by a widow, two sons, a daughter and thousands of fans. The Sindhi Adabi Sangat has announced two-day mourning in his honour.
News of Dars’ death spread across Sindh like wildfire, and his fans started exchanging his poetry on SMS. Many also updated their Facebook status, expressing their love for Dars, paying tribute to him, and lamenting the loss of yet another poet of high calibre at such a young age. “He was the Mir Taqi Mir of Sindhi poetry; his writings were bold and challenged societal taboos,” said Mazhar Laghari, a famous poet of the Sindhi language.
“Dars’ poetry was like a fresh breeze of hope for the dying and fading horizon of Sindhi poetry. He used simple words and accent of lower Sindh, just like Shah Abdul Latif, which made him famous throughout Sindh.” Dars used to write on the ironsmiths, snake charmers, potters and other socially neglected professional in his poetry and also described the beauty of rural Sindh and told his fans through his poetry that how youths were using to adore their love.
What is most fascinating about Dars is that not a single of his poetry collections was published thus far, but his popularity soared to a cult-status.