LAHORE: “Azhar Jafri had so much pain in his heart, how could that heart ever be ‘cured’,” said Husain Naqi at a reference for photojournalist Azhar Jafri, who recently passed away due to a cardiac arrest.

Mr Naqi alluded to the depth of emotion that Mr Jafri felt within after seeing everything he had seen in his vast life experience.

“Everyone talks about the person he was but I saw that he also had a lot of pain that lived within him, and that is how maybe he felt so intensely some of the scenes that he later depicted in his photographs,” said Mr Naqi.

The hall of the Lahore Press Club was filled with people that Mr Jafri had known, even those who had met him briefly.

“He was not just a photojournalist, he was also an activist,” said Asma Jahangir.

“When we used to protest we kept checking to see if Mr Jafri was there because we knew that if there was any violence, Mr Jafri would capture that and then the world would know about it. He was a role model for journalists. There are so many unreleased photos of his that are equally spellbinding as the ones already published. His photos sometimes had brilliant contrast of themes and he perceived things that very few photojournalists could see and for that one must have a political mindset otherwise you cannot see beyond the obvious,” she said.

Asma said even his poise as a photographer was incredible, and his elegance was obvious to anyone. “He would find any kind of base – a stool or a rock– where he stood or sat to get his pictures.” She said he was a person and a professional who had made the society richer.

Analyst Imtiaz Alam said Mr Azhar knew every nook and cranny of Lahore and the city’s life was known well to him through all its ordeals. “He was not just a photographer, he was a proper historian, narrating history through pictures. He was an intellectual, who was secular, democratic and political but never biased.”

He said Lahore’s democratic history would never be complete without him. He said it was pathetic that photographers were not treated as journalists, and were not appreciated properly. Much more should have been known to people about Mr Jafri while he was alive.

“Unfortunately we never respect our real heroes but seem to crowd around hooligans and corrupt people instead. Mr Jafri’s lowest point in life was when he was proclaimed ‘wajibul qatl’ by some of the extremist forces living in his neighbourhood. I saw how miserable he was in those days,” he said.

Journalist Khawar Hashmi said it was amazing to see how Mr Jafri would come to press conferences or events, and never have his camera on when he came. He walked around, even went to smoke and then at one moment of his own judgement he would take a couple of pictures and leave. The next day his pictures would have surpassed all other published photos.

A BBC journalist said Mr Jafri’s one picture would be more than paragraphs of what had been written about something. One of the photojournalists said he had been inspired by Mr Jafri.

“He had a very unique technique to check where the light was coming from, and told me once, only if you are conscious enough you will know about the direction of the light otherwise it will only be your camera doing the work, not you,” said Waseem Niaz. “This was back in the manual era, and he was one of the finest in developing and printing, a real trendsetter. One meeting alone with him inspired me enough.”

Omar Shareef also mentioned Mr Jafri’s all-revealing photo that showed a clash between two religious groups, but at the precise moment he took the picture, it showed the banner with Islamic text on it being trampled under their feet.

Rahat Dar, photojournalist and long-time friend of Mr Jafri, just uttered a few words before he was choked with emotion and gave the microphone away. Shafiq Awan also gave a tearful tribute.

Mr Jafri’s son said he had always seen his father as an ideal. “We have found many negatives of his work done over the past decades, and we want to show them to everyone. I do know that I will always endeavour to keep my father’s memories alive.”

The Punjab Union of Journalists who had organised the reference announced that an Azhar Jafri award based on photojournalists’ performances would be given at the end of an upcoming competition.

PUJ secretary Amir Suhail said the award was similar to that of the Minhaj Burna Award for journalists.

The press club lobby was also now named after Azhar Jafri.

Published in Dawn, November 27th, 2016