ISLAMABAD, Aug 12: Munshi Ibrahim, the modern, revolutionary Sindhi poet, who in spite of the great influence of Shah Latif on his poetic sensibility, chartered his own course to write against oppression and injustice, was remembered at a literary reference organized jointly by Shah Abdul Latif Social and Cultural Organization and the Pakistan Academy of Letters on Tuesday evening.

The poet died at the age of 69 in July 2003 at his home village of Jinhan Soomro in Badin district.

Calling him a great human being, apart from being an equally great poet, Parliamentary Secretary Syed Javed Ali Shah said that he was a great man because he did not make compromises through which people try to achieve “greatness”. He fought at every level of oppressive power; with the wadera, with the police, with all those classes that made the life of the poor miserable. The result was obvious: he spent a good deal of his time behind bars.

Senator Mrs Tanvir Khalid from Karachi thought that in some ways he reminded him of Nazir Akbarabadi in being a poet of the people who spoke of the language of the poor masses to bring out their problem in the open. She said the fact that he did not study beyond class five does not subtract from his greatness because a great creative poet (she gave the example of Ghalib) does not need the appurtenances of formal “education”.

Iftikhar Arif, the chairman of the Academy of Letters, thought that Munshi Ibrahim was the trustee of the revolutionary tradition of Sufi Shah Inayat, and at the same time a reliable spokesman of Shah Abdul Latif Bhitai in our times. He would be remembered for being a poet of people’s resistance, and like Habib Jalib was an equally prominent rider both in koocha-i-daro rasan (the street of the hangman) and the shahr-i-harf hunar ( city of the word and craft).

Commenting on the complaint of a speaker that his books are not available in the market, he said the credit for this goes to the fruits of “ market economy” where even cheap literature in almost all Western languages is available in our bookshops because there is a buyer for it but great works in our languages, and in Persian and Arabic may not be available because the readers were not available for such things.

A resolution was passed asking the government and PAL to print the remaining works of the poet.

Dr Hyder Sindhi, of the Department of Pakistan Studies at Quaid-i-Azam University said the poet belonged to a place, which had a civilization at a time when people elsewhere were living in jungles.

Short story writer in Sindhi, Kailash, said the poetry of Munshi was embedded in the socio-political history of Sindh. His poems serve as a catalyst in the situation.

Abdul Majid Veesar, patron-in-chief of the association, mentioned about the six (some speakers said five) collections of his poetry that have been published. His poems speak of his love for the dharti, he said,

Qasim Haider, who (he said) belonged to the same tehsil of Tando Mohammad Khan where the poet was born said his poetry was a revolutionary voice against the landed class. He also gave the background of the area from where he came from. Discussing various aspects of the poet’s diction, Mujtaba Menon, in his well-written, paper said that Munshi had beautifully knitted the idiom, the proverbs, similes and metaphors in his lines almost like Coleridge, but has not supernaturalised the nature like him. Like Wordsworth, there is a natural colour in his poetry, but unlike him he has not personified it.

Zahid Jatoi, the general secretary of the association, conducted the proceedings while Azad Solangi read from some of his poems. Fateha was also offered for his soul. Some lines from the poet:

Chha jot taim aeen chha jo tanno,

Poye bi ghar mien ann na danno.

(What timings and what their bindings, it is always the poor that work in every harsh season, but even then they do not have a single grain in their houses. Translation from an article by Shaikh Aziz)— Mufti Jamiluddin Ahmad