PESHAWAR: The 11th death anniversary of renowned poet Ahmed Faraz was observed across the country and also in some cities abroad on Sunday. Special programs were organized to pay tributes to the great poet.
Ahmad Faraz was considered as one of the greatest modern Urdu poets of his time. He was born on January 12, 1931 in Kohat, as Syed Ahmed Shah. Faraz was his pseudonym ‘takhallus’. He moved to Peshawar with his family, where he studied in famous Edwards College and received Masters in Urdu and Persian from Peshawar University.
The progressive poets, Faiz Ahmad Faiz and Ali Sardar Jafri, were his friends during college days, who impressed him and became his role models.
Faraz was arrested for writing poems that criticized military rulers in Pakistan during the reign of General Zia-ul-Haq.
Following that arrest, he went into a self-imposed exile. He stayed for 6 years in Britain, Canada and Europe before returning to Pakistan, where he was initially appointed as Chairman of the Pakistan Academy of Letters and later chairperson of the Islamabad-based National Book Foundation for several years.
Faraz died of kidney failure in a private hospital in Islamabad on August 25, 2008. His funeral was held on the evening of August 26. He was awarded numerous national and international awards, Sitara-e-Imtiaz, Hilal-e-Pakistan and also Hilal-e-Imtiaz in recognition of his literary achievements in 2004. He returned Hilal-e-Imtiaz in 2006 after becoming disenchanted with Musharraf’s government and its policies.
