WHEN in Gujarat the Muslims were being massacred indiscriminately, a poet’s soul from among the dead resurrected after his grave was desecrated and transformed into a symbol of resistance awakening the conscience of all those who respect the noble values a poet stands for. The poet was Wali Deccani, who is known as the father of Urdu poetry. Some scholars and critics like to call him the Chaucer of Urdu. The news of the desecration of his grave by the rioters came as a shock to the civilised world, more particularly to the literary circles both in India and in Pakistan.
In India, the intellectual circles reacted sharply against it and registered their protest in different ways. Sahitya Academy, the prestigious body representing all the languages of India, took upon itself to tell Indian writers and intellectuals as to what kind of message was enshrined in the verses this poet wrote and how relevant it is in the present South Asian context. Soon the Academy, under the chairmanship of Dr Gopi Chand Narang, arranged a two-day seminar, where the poet and his works were exhaustively discussed by the participating writers. Now we have a volume published by the Academy, which includes the proceedings of the seminar along with the articles read there. It has been compiled by Dr Narang and presented under the title Wali Deccani; Tasawwuf, Insaniyat, aur Muhabbat ka Shair.
It may seem a bit ironic that for this fresh study of Wali we are indebted to the planners of this outrage. It was their outrageous act which compelled sensitive souls to turn to the poet in a serious way and to see if his poetry carries in it something so provocative to the communalists that they stooped to destroy his grave. When seen from this angle, Wali’s verse appeared to have some meanings very relevant to our violence-ridden times. Wali seems to have been rediscovered in a new context.
Wali belonged to the later period of the seventeenth century. His date of birth is not available to us. Aurangabad is said to be his birth place, though his family originally belonged to Gujarat. He went back to that land and resided in Ahmadabad. He died and was buried in that city. His year of death, according to one version, is 1707. And it was on March 2, 2002 that his grave was desecrated.
As has been pointed out by his critics, he was very much under the influence of the sufis. That in turn influenced his poetry. So his verse may be seen deeply steeped in mystic tradition.
Our sufis in general are known for their enlightened way of thinking. Love for all with hatred towards none had been their creed. They hardly spoke of religious differences. Instead, they very much liked to find some hidden linkage between faiths, which seemed apparently opposed to each other. Wali had drunk deep in the tradition of Tasawwuf and had in the process absorbed this way of thought and behaviour, which eventually informed his poetry. In addition to this there is one more quality, which, according to Dr Narang, imparts a distinctive colour to his poetry. That is his love for what is local. He in his presidential address laid emphasis on this aspect of his poetry. The references to Arjum, Bhim, Ram and Kirshn speak of his specifically Hindi trend in his verse. As he pointed out, Wali in his early period was under the influence of Persian. It was under the influence of sufis that he developed a love for Hindi elements to the extent that his poetry appears to be the product of a Hindi sensibility.
Dr Narang has tried to show to his Indian audience that this Urdu poet was in comparison to others more deeply rooted in the soil and so deserves to be valued more. His experience of love too as expressed in his love poetry gets sustenance from local culture. For his similies and metaphors, he is more indebted to what is local than to the poetic tradition of Persian as, for instance, in couplets like this:
Koocha-i-Yar Ain Kashi Hai
Jogi-i-Dil Whan Ka Basi Hai
and in the next couplet playing upon the word Hindu, which in Persian means black, he likens the black mole on the beloved’s forehead to a Hindu from Harduar.
Some other writers too have cared to highlight this aspect of Wali’s poetry. Shabnam Ishai wonders that this poet, in spite of his enlightened approach to religious differences and in spite of his deep love for what is local, was targeted in particular. But perhaps it was precisely for this reason that he was targeted by the communalists. The kind of enlightened thinking Wali represents should naturally be taken as a threat to what they preach. But ironically, their outrageous act has resulted in something contrary to what they had intended. Shabnam Ishai is very right in saying that this painful act has brought out a new life for Wali. Only the scholars engaged in the study of classics cared to study him. But with the desecration of his grave, he had a rebirth and is attracting the attention even of those, at least in India, who have hardly any taste for Urdu poetry. His verse has now attained a new significance in relations to the present times. The liberals in India have found in Wali a new symbol of enlightenment as opposed to the intolerance and narrow mindedness of the communalists, who pose a threat to their creed of secularism. n
WHEN in Gujarat the Muslims were being massacred indiscriminately, a poet’s soul from among the dead resurrected after his grave was desecrated and transformed into a symbol of resistance awakening the conscience of all those who respect the noble values a poet stands for. The poet was Wali Deccani, who is known as the father of Urdu poetry. Some scholars and critics like to call him the Chaucer of Urdu. The news of the desecration of his grave by the rioters came as a shock to the civilised world, more particularly to the literary circles both in India and in Pakistan.
