The Josh Adabi Foundation demanded on Monday that a civil award be granted and a federal capital avenue named after poet Josh Maleehabadi to acknowledge his contributions to Urdu literature. Talking to APP Farrukh Maleehabadi, Josh’s grandson said the foundation had repeatedly approached the authorities in this regard, but no action had been taken. He said the foundation’s request to the Sindh governor for granting a Civil Award to Maleehabadi was under process Farrukh has written a book titled ‘Josh-Meray Baba’, which presents a detailed picture of Josh’s life and personality.
The Josh Adabi Foundation will also organise a national literary conference in collaboration with the Josh Memorial Committee and the National Language Authority (NLA), to commemorate the poet’s 30th death anniversary on February 22.
Iftikhar Arif, Agha Nasir, Shabnam Sakeel, Mansoor Aqil, Dr Rawish Nadeem and Dr Yahya Ahmad will read papers on the life and work of Maleehabadi. Ministry of Culture and National Heritage Federal Secretary Fareed-Ullah Khan and Dr Muhammad Ali Siddiqui will be the guests of honour.
Josh Maleehabadi, a noted Urdu poet born in British India, was an Indian citizen until 1958, when he emigrated to Pakistan. He wrote ghazals and poems under the pseudonym ‘Josh’. He was born in Maleehabad, studied at St Peter’s College, Agra and passed his Senior Cambridge examination in 1914. The death of his father in 1916 prevented him from going to college but he studied Arabic and Persian. In 1925, Josh began to supervise translation work at the Osmania University, Hyderabad. He was exiled from the state when he wrote a poem against the Nizam of Hyderabad. Soon after, he founded the magazine, Kaleem in which he openly wrote articles in favour of independence from the British Raj. As his reputation spread, he came to be called Shaair-e-Inquilaab (Poet of the Revolution). Subsequently, he became more actively involved in the freedom struggle.
After the end of British Raj in India (1947), Josh became the editor of the publication Aaj-Kal. Josh is reputed to have had complete command over Urdu and was quite strict about respecting the grammar and rules of the language and it was because of this that he is called the King of Urdu language. The first collection of his poetry, published in 1921 included Shola-o-Shabnam, Junoon-o-Hikmat, Fikr-o-Nishaat, Sunbal-o-Salaasal, Harf-o-Hikaayat, Sarod-o-Kharosh and Irfaniyat-e-Josh. He also wrote his auto biography ‘Yaadon ki Baraat’ in 1966.
