The last phase of the cold season has taken the life of the five writers closely associated with Punjabi language movement. They include a bureaucrat, two editors, one college teacher and poet who in these times retold the story of Heer-Ranjha in verse. Rahat Naseem Malik was the first editor of Punjab Adabi Sangat, Lahore’s fortnightly bulletin….first of literary bulletin of any of Punjabi literary organisation. Rahat died on Feb 20 at Islamabad.

It was in good old days when Dr Nazeer was the principal of the government college where Punjabi Majlis had attracted most of the brilliant students interested in local language and culture. Apart from Rahat, Naseer Malik, S.M. Anwar, Qurban, Riaz Chaudhry were very active. The students had won over patronage of all the top writers of Punjabi including Ahmad Rahi, Muneer Niazi, Ustad Daman, Hakeem Nasir and Ashfaq Ahmad. Among the college teachers favouring Punjabi included Dr.

Ajmal and Asghar Saleem.

On the other side on the city literary scene, Punjabi Adabi Sangat, Majlis Shah Husain and drama group Lok Rahs were very active. Majli Shah Husain, under Shahzad Ahmad, held a three-day Mela Shah Husain with the help of students of Government College. It was participated by Bengali, Sindhi, Pushto, Urdu, Balochi and Kashmiri writers and artists. These were unprecedented melas as no such cultural function was held in Lahore or any part of Punjab. Rahat has been writing poetry in Punjabi also. He also contributed TV plays to PTV.

Azhar Javed born in a learned family in 1938 and at the earlier stage of his educational career joined the mufasil journalism in Sargodha city. Those were the days when poet Altaf Mash’hadi….Shaer-i-Shabab next to Akhtar Sheerani was in Sargodha.

Among his contemporaries Feroz Kanwal was very close to him. Azhar founded a monthly literary magazine, Takhleeq in 1969 in Lahore, the last issue of the paper was published two weeks before his sudden death. Azhar was basically a poet and he had many collections of Urdu poetry. He served many prestigious Urdu dailies including defunct Imroze as literary editor/columnist. He introduced a section in his takhleeq Punjabi literature permanently. He himself appeared as short story writer in Punjabi world. He visited many countries including UK, USA, UAE and India in connection with literature and was a popular figure in the literary circles of Lahore.

Dr Muhammad Abbas Najmi also expired in the third week of February. Born in 1953 in Dharowal (Wazirabad) he joined education department as lecturer in Punjabi and ultimately landed in Government College Lahore. He did his doctorate on Hamd in Punjabi. He wrote poetry both in Punjabi and Urdu. He also appeared as a successful compere. He conducted many Punjabi shows. He was also a literary activist and founded a publishing house with a view to publishing Punjabi books. The publications included translation of Holy Quran in Punjabi free verse by legendry figure the late Shareef Kunjahi. He joined Punjab Institute of Language, Art and Culture as director after Shaista Nuzhat was thrown out on flimsy grounds. Here Najmi always remained in tension because of the anti-Punjabi attitude of the high-ups. He could not serve the cause of Punjabi according to his objective. Meanwhile he also served a private TV channel as a reviewer of daily newspapers. After his removal from PILAC he suffered paralysis stroke which proved fatal thus depriving Punjabi of a scholar, good TV anchor and an activist.

Afzal Shahid started his literary career as an Urdu poet. He joined journalism and served many news organisations. He also served as anchor person of programmes related to news and views. He also started writing poetry in Punjabi in which his wife Munazza Shahid is also doing well. His more close relationship with Punjabi developed when he came under the influence of Fakhar Zaman’s World Punjabi Conference and became one of its office-bearers. He was given the office of secretary general after the death of Mushtaq Kanwal...a whole time Punjabi worker and writer. Afzaal Shahid also used to edit a magazine of which he brought out a special issue on renowned Punjabi poet Amrita Preetam.

Iqbal Rahat who died a week earlier, was a traditional Punjabi poet and was popular among the literary circles of Sheikhupura and Lahore. Being a traditionalist he accepted the challenge of writing the story of Heer-Ranjha in verse and did well. His work was much appreciated by the modern as well as traditional schools of Punjabi literature.

The death of so many sympathisers and creative writers of Punjabi is a great loss to Punjabi movement not being given due attention by the Punjab government and Urdu writers and educationists of Punjab.