The Nawab of Pataudi. It was one of India’s greatest triumphs…with a most remarkable man leading the way… (Published in The Sportstar on October 19, 1985) PHOTO: THE HINDU ARCHIVES
Cricket and music? Yes, they are perfectly in tune with each other
It was January 1973. India was playing England in a Test series. Ajit Wadekar was leading India, while Tony Lewis was the English captain. The Nawab of Pataudi had been inducted into the team after a fine show in a tour match. The two teams had wound their way to Chennai (then Madras) for the third Test. The series was tied one-all. And the match at Chepauk was crucial.
But this story is not about cricket and the unflappable Pataudi’s exploits with the bat or of Wadekar’s marshalling of his troops on a turning Chepauk pitch. In those days, Test cricket was played over six days with a rest day after three days. I was a student of the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras. The institute had a music club (still does), and a violin concert by Lalgudi Jayaraman had been organised for Sunday evening.
The ace violinist had just begun his concert and essayed the varnam, when suddenly there was a minor commotion at the entrance. In walked Pataudi with Tony Lewis (Monday was a rest day). They proceeded to the front row, where two seats had been hastily vacated for them, and sat in rapt attention while Lalgudi, after a courteous bow to acknowledge their presence, proceeded with his concert. We later learned that Tony Lewis was a part-time musician and violinist, and Pataudi wanted to expose him to how India had adapted this instrument for its classical music.
Even in those pre-WhatsApp days, word of the great man’s presence in the Central Lecture Theatre spread like wildfire on the campus and the hall which had till then only a sprinkling of listeners, fast filled up and was soon overflowing. Concert over, Pataudi and Tony Lewis exchanged a few pleasantries with the maestro and left.
I dare say that Pataudi had unwittingly acted as a catalyst to convert quite a few of the Pop, Rock, Blues and Jazz aficionados among the young IITians to serious listeners of Indian classical music.
srinivasan.bhashyam@gmail.com
source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> Opinion> Open Page / by S. Bhashyam / May 09th, 2021
An old record of Sheik Chinna Moulana’s nadaswaram recital from his son Subhan Kasim’s collection.
The archive is being maintained at ‘Alapana’, the 1950s-era house in Srirangam that was formerly Sheik Chinna Moulana’s residence.
Nadaswaram exponent Subhan Kasim has put the long spells of isolation caused by the lockdown this past year to good use by cataloguing at least 250 hours of music recitals by his grandfather and guru Sheik Chinna Moulana in a digital audio format along with a collection of video performances.
The archive is being maintained at ‘Alapana’, the 1950s-era house in Srirangam that was formerly Sheik Chinna Moulana’s residence and is now Mr. Kasim’s home.
“From the age of 14, I was interested in collecting music discs as a hobby. This shifted to cassette tapes and CDs. I still remember the gramophone which we had to crank up manually to play three-minute recordings in those days,” Mr. Kasim told The Hindu.
The archive is a good example of the advancements in sound recording technology, added Mr. Kasim. “At first we had releases from Columbia Records, [established in 1889], where the discs played only for three minutes. When HMV took over, LP discs introduced in the late 1950s, which allowed for up to 18 minutes of recording per side, made it easier to accommodate lengthier recitals,” he said.
Though he had meticulously preserved much of his grandfather’s work in various formats from an early age, Mr. Kasim opted to digitise the invaluable collection only recently, when some of the tapes started deteriorating. “Though I had the records from HMV and Columbia, the machines to play them were out of production. So I used digital technology to convert everything from wax records to spool tapes, cassettes and CDs into digitised copies, which I have saved in .mp3 and .wav formats.”
In addition to several complimentary discs given by recording companies, Mr. Kasim completed his collection of his grandfather’s work with the help of V.V. Sundaram, a key organiser of the annual Thiyagaraja aradhana (homage concert) in Cleveland, Ohio, and V. K. Viswanathan, a NASA scientist and ardent fan of Sheik Chinna Moulana.
Among the most significant recordings in the archive is that of a live concert in Chennai in the 1950s, whose broadcast by All India Radio had to be extended beyond its allotted two-hour slot to over three hours on popular demand.
The collection also includes the album of Sheik Chinna Moulana’s recital at Haus der Kulturen der Welt (House of World Culture) in Berlin released by German authorities as part of ‘Festival of India’ in 1991.
Mr. Kasim says the digital archive will be useful for aspiring artistes. “I am quite willing to guide serious students of nadaswaram, and share copies of the recordings with them. As per our grandfather’s guidance, the research and education will be free of cost.”
Mr. Kasim collaborates professionally with his younger brother Subhan Babu. Dr. Chinnamoulana Memorial Trust run by them has been encouraging the growth of traditional nadhaswaram music and supporting aging artistes since 1999. Both brothers are special nadaswaram artistes of Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanams.
source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> News> Cities> Tiruchirapalli / by Nahla Nainar / Tiruchi – May 11th, 2021
Sahitya Akademi awardee and former PCS officer, Mohd Idrees Amber Bahraichi (71), died of Covid-19 complicat ..
He was the husband of All India Muslim Women Personal Law Board (AIMWPLB) president Shaista Amber.
Both Mohd Idrees Amber and Shaista Amber had tested negative for Covid-19 in their RT-PCR report which came out on April .
“Both my parents gave their samples on April 25 and tested negative. They were both at home. When my mother’s oxygen saturation level started dipping, I got a CT scan done for my parents which confirmed both of them had coronavirus infection,” said their daughter Aaisha Sumbul.
“My mother is currently on oxygen support at home and is not very stable and needs prayers,” she said
“My father was fine and all his other vitals were getting better too. Suddenly, he had a heart attack and a stroke and left us on Friday,” Aaisha said.
source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / Home> News> City News / by TNN / May 09th, 2021
Yasmin Zaidi’s new artworks reflect on the COVID pandemic, isolation and grief
Yasmin Zaidi has begun to paint grief. It comes through in her two new works: one shows a young woman holding chrysanthemums in her arms, with graves behind; another has masked, socially distant people along a stairway (to heaven?).
She asked her family what to name them, and got a number of replies: Viral Apartheid 2021, Loveliness and Loneliness. “I realised that everyone is feeling personally involved during this pandemic… They will give their own names to the paintings,” says the 70-year-old artist who paints flowers and people.
Zaidi has lived across India — Firozpur Jhirka (in Haryana), JK Puram and JK Gram (in Rajasthan), Delhi and many more — where she worked as an educationalist through her life, mostly in administrative positions, though she trained as an English and Social Studies teacher. “I taught art sometimes because I was just able to,” says the hobbyist, whose home, when growing up, was filled with letters and pictures. Her father, Syed Ali Jawad Zaidi, was an Urdu poet and scholar, and her grandfather dabbled in art.
Yasmin Zaidi | Photo Credit: Special arrangement
She draws from the various elements of Nature she has encountered through life: The stairway in her current oil on canvas leads towards birch trees she retrieved from mental images of Kashmir. The red bottle brush and yellow tecoma in the ‘girl with chrysanthemums’ are from her ground floor flat in Mumbai, where she has a little garden. “My mother was very fond of gardening,” she remembers.
This time though, flowers have been used as a metaphor for the departed. Urdu poet Afzal Ahmed Syed’s Hamein Bahut Sare Phool Chahiye, which seems to allude to war and talks about how we need a lot of flowers to cover our dead, played in her head as she painted.
“When I paint, personal things come in — a book by Annie (her daughter, a writer), but the whole world was becoming personal,” she says of the shock waves that seemed to have affected everyone.
She hasn’t thought of selling: “I hardly think of the paintings as belonging to me.” She adds she wouldn’t know how to, and even if she did, it would go to COVID relief.
Right now, she’s recovering from a gall bladder surgery and is with her son in Pune. “I want to paint more, but I have run out of canvas, and it’s difficult to get it right now,” she says.
source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> Entertainment> Art / by Sunalini Mathew / May 04th, 2021
What started as documenting his own life in Europe while pursuing his Masters gradually gained direction and came to focus on wildlife photography.
Hyderabad:
His photographs of a snow leopard from Spiti, Himachal Pradesh broke the internet, literally. Yet the man is still calm, unassuming.
Ismail Shariff, Hyderabad-based nature and wildlife photographer, is known to wildlife and photography enthusiasts as the ‘Snow Leopard Man of India’. His long and passionate association with photography began in his student days. What started as documenting his own life in Europe while pursuing his Masters gradually gained direction and came to focus on wildlife photography.
Picking up his first camera in 2005, Ismail was treated to the magnificent sight of a huge male tiger in 2008 while on a trip to the Kanha National Park in Madhya Pradesh. That was the defining moment of his life. “It became one of the reasons for me to move back to India to pursue of wildlife photography and tourism here,” he said.
Ismail, an alumnus of the Hyderabad Public School, Begumpet, has been part of nine snow leopard expeditions in the last seven years with the recent one being in 2020, apart from several other wildlife expeditions. The first thing that strikes his mind about snow leopards is the long fluffy tail, blue eyes, thick fur and a true-blue cat attitude. Snow leopards are one of the world’s most elusive animals and the most common way to spot one is high up on the mountain ridges. After an hour or more of patient stalking in Spiti in 2017, he finally spotted a snow leopard passing by. The shots he posted on various wildlife photo websites are trending even today.
“I was obsessed with snow leopards ever since a photograph taken in 2012 by Dhritiman Mukherjee, India’s leading wildlife photographer,” said Ismail, adding that seeing the mysterious ghost of the mountains for the first time in Hemis National Park, Ladakh, was an unforgettable experience in itself.
Ismail said the snow leopard is a notoriously elusive creature. It is also listed as “Vulnerable” on the IUCN Red List since the global population is estimated to be between 4,000 to 6,000. India is believed to have less than 1,000. That adds stars to his journey from just another photographer to being called the Snow Leopard Man of India.
“There were struggles. My parents were expecting me to get a corporate job. But I chose photography as my career. It was tough initially, since you’ve to invest a lot of time and money with very uncertain returns to make a name. But at the end of the day, if you want to be successful, you have to be willing to work hard, even if it means making more than a few sacrifices along the way,” said Ismail, a Computer Science engineer from Central European University, Budapest, Hungary.
He moved to Paris to work there for two and half years before wildlife photography took over him.
Ismail, who has had solo photography exhibitions on Snow Leopards even in Los Angeles and New York, also indulges in fine art printing. He also works with the Snow Leopard Trust in helping raise funds for their conservation efforts.
source: http://www.telanganatoday.com / Telangana Today / Home> Hyderabad / by Sowmya Sangam / May 01st, 2021
The Great Mughals is a term used to describe the most powerful of the Mughal emperors; Babur, Humayun, Akbar, Jahangir, Shah Jahan and Aurangzeb.
The Great Mughals by Farhat Nasreen
Professor of History at Jamia Millia Islamia, Farhat Nasreen has published a new book The Great Mughals (publisher: Rupa). The book encompasses the stalwarts of Mughal Empire from Babur to Bahadur Shah Zafar. It charts the origin, rise, success and downfall of an empire that ruled India for three centuries.
One will find myths and mysteries of the Mughal times, including narratives about its courts and harems, bazaars and battlefields, blood and gore, and the gloss and glamour of the Empire. Nasreen previously penned Kashful Baghaavat Gorakhpur – a rare eyewitness account of the Revolt of 1857 – along with several monographs and articles on historical themes, including the much acclaimed, If History Has Taught Us Anything.
Please introduce us to The Great Mughals. The Great Mughals is a term used to describe the most powerful of the Mughal emperors; Babur, Humayun, Akbar, Jahangir, Shah Jahan and Aurangzeb. Their empire played the double role of being a modern version of an ancient state and an ancient version of the modern one. Like players of the Rubik’s cube, they twisted and turned their policies to create the Mughal brand. Raw power supported their sovereignty but only just. They made a great play of spirituality to unify people of their multi-religious empire. Eventually, the Mughal brand grew to command an almost unbelievable brand loyalty even as late as 1857.
Could you reflect on the research you undertook for this book? My relationship with history is romantic, which made the research easy. I read most of the primary and secondary sources relevant to the Mughals. Grasping of the significance of sub themes like economic and social history, etc., is critical because many pieces complete the jigsaw. To situate the Mughal Empire as a microcosm of the medieval times, reading non-Mughal histories was equally vital. My father; a judge by profession and my teachers taught me to hold on to facts and then approach history from various angles. It is only then that one can see a new fantastic point of view.
What are the certain paradigms of history writing that an author should consider before bringing out a title? A historian must be watchful of the statics and dynamics of the past and present. Characters of the past were implicated in the power relations of their own times. Therefore, using current standards to judge, criticise or mythicise them could be unfair. Likewise, deconstructing time frames and labelling them as good or bad can be tricky. With the passage of time it becomes difficult to retrieve the past, luckily the historians are trained to recover it. They must spend the treasures of memory-facts and interpretations in such a way that they can buy peace and humanism.
How has history shaped your life? More than anything else, history has taught me to be humble. It has shown that the countless riches of the rich perished, blood of celebrated bloodlines spilled unaccounted, blinding dazzle of glory faded away and so on. It has taught me to value what I have now, because I may not have it forever. History extracts the truth and presents it before decision makers – individuals who decide for themselves and leaders who often decide for many. It maintains a logbook of choices made and prices paid. It reminds us that nothing is free.
Are you working on any new book? Yes, I do hope to present more writings on history. Besides, there is the idea of ‘Omnipresent Past’ which argues that past is the most everlasting thing. A simple anecdote from one’s childhood brings an instant smile on the most unsmiling of faces. Each passing second adds to its immeasurable volume. Present speeds towards the future, but both are eventually overtaken by the phenomenon of passage of time and get converted into the past. I feel each of the Mughal rulers deserves a book that contextualises their lives in the present-day scenario.
source: http://www.newindianexpress.com / The New Indian Express / Home> Lifestyle> Books / by Express News Service / April 25th, 2021
Writer, translator and poet Bushra Alvi Razzack about her journey with words
At the book launch of Dilliwali, IIC
Meet Bushra Alvi Razzack – Founder of the poetry group, Delhi by Verse. She has compiled and edited Dilliwali: Celebrating the Woman of Delhi through Poetry (2018), an anthology by 94 poets. Her poems have featured in anthologies and online magazines, and her articles were published in Khaleej Times, Dawn, Rising Kashmir, among others.
She just completed translating writer Manzoor Ahtesham’s Hindi novel, Basharat Manzil, into English, is translating Urdu writer Jeelani Bano’s short stories into English, and is working on her novel. Photography and old buildings are other fascinations.
our writing schedule?
I don’t follow a rigid schedule, but I plan to rectify that soon. A lot of ideas take root while commuting, and so I always keep a pencil and paper handy to jot down stray thoughts.
Does writing energise or exhaust you?
I would say both. It energises and is cathartic too. Creating something beautiful from a mere thought can be very satisfying. Translating is fun, but can drain you pretty soon. Sometimes, it’s really difficult trying to find the right word to convey in the target language. So, I leave that portion and come back to it later. It always works. I also switch between projects on whim. So, if a Eureka moment for the novel I am working on pops up during a dull phase in the translation, I jump and pursue it till i t ’s there in my headspace.
Writing advice for your younger self ?
If there’s a novel in your head, just write it quick because the idea won’t remain floating in your mind till you’re ready to tick off other ‘have-to-do-it-first’ things.
Your favourite books?
Top on the list is The Golden Treasury – poet Francis Turner Palgrave’s compilation of the best songs and lyrical poems, by the greats including William Shakespeare, John Milton, Alexander Pope, William Wordsworth and John Keats. This book was part of my school syllabus in Grade 8 and 9, and has been with me ever since. Then Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen… one of the most adored love stories that finds an echo in Indian families too. I have taught this book as part of my teaching assignments. Z` Then Delhi by Heart, where Raza Rumi offers unusual perspectives into the political and cultural capital of India.
Literary success vs number of copies sold?
Literary success is that praise and acknowledgement I receive from readers on how they loved my writing and how it has touched them deeply. However, receiving awards for my writing would be great, once I have a larger body of work.
Favourite spot/s in Delhi to write at?
I find my creative juices flowing when in the midst of nature. At home, my writing table is set near the window so that I can see the trees and hear birds sing. When deciding which direction my story should take, a stroll through the shaded environs of my neighbourhood or the park, gets me on track. But poetry tumbles out in my observation of people – be it at home, on the road, a crowded space, etc.
source: http://www.newindianexpress.com / The New Indian Express / Home> Lifestyle> Books / by Bhumika Popli / Express News Service / March 08th, 2020
Manzoor Ahtesham was a Hindi writer from Bhopal, who raised important questions about the identity of the increasingly alienated Muslim minority
Decorated Hindi writer Manzoor Ahtesham signed off on a well-spent life in a hospital around midnight in Bhopal on Sunday last. When he breathed his last, he was in the company of a doctor and some paramedical staff as he was a COVID-19 patient and family members were not allowed.
He is survived by the families of two daughters and that of younger brother Aijaz Ghafoor, a well-known interior designer in Bhopal. Manzoor had recently lost his wife and elder brother to COVID-19.
Born in April 1948, Manzoor belonged to one of the middle class families of Afghan lineage in picturesque Bhopal. He was handsome, very polite, unassuming, and friendly. A gentleman to the core, Manzoor had a sensitive heart, a sharp mind, and frugal lifestyle. For more than seven years that I spent in Bhopal as Resident Editor of Hindustan Times from 2000, and even later during numerous visits to the city, I found people had only good things to say about him.
His parents wanted him to do engineering. He took admission, tried for a few years, but gave up, as his interest was in literature. When his brother Aijaz started a furniture showroom in late 70s, he requested Manzoor to help him out by being there. Aijaz fondly says, “Many visitors to the showroom would tell me that Manzoor Bhai was not to be seen, though he used to be around, sitting in one corner surrounded by books.”
Over my 35 years in journalism, I have interacted with numerous writers and public figures, but none can match Manzoor’s depth of understanding of world literature. There is hardly any classical or contemporary writer of repute in English, Hindi, and Urdu literature whom Manzoor had not read. “Our younger generation has stopped reading books,” he would often lament.
During one of the several evenings that I spent with him discussing poetry, novels, plays, and world affairs, he talked very fondly of Orhan Pamuk’s writings. It was in July or August of 2006 that he had told me he expected Pamuk to win the Nobel Prize in Literature that year. A couple of months later in October, Pamuk did get the Nobel.
Bhopal’s topography — an abundance of greenery, large water bodies, and generally pleasant weather through the year – also helped Manzoor’s literary sensibilities to flourish. I remember him telling me once that the name of his highly awarded novel Sukha Bargad (A Dying Banyan), came from Dela Wadi, a forest area near Bhopal having several banyan trees. The novel tells the story of a middle-class Muslim family’s struggle to come to terms with the transformation of Indian society after partition, particularly worsening Hindu-Muslim relations.
Some institutions, such as Bharat Bhawan, a premier multi-arts autonomous complex and museum, and theatre and literary personalities such as BV Karanth, Habib Tanvir, and Shani Gulsher Ahmed helped Manzoor hone his literary skills. His interest in theatre helped him get the role of a professor in Merchant Ivory Production’s film In Custody (Muhafiz in Urdu) in 1993.
In 2007, New York magazine cited Dastan-e Lapata, (The Tale of the Missing Man) as one of “the world’s best untranslated novels.” The book, which raises important questions about Muslim identity, was translated into English in 2018 by Jason Grunebaum and Ulrike Stark of the Department of South Asian Languages and Civilizations at the University of Chicago. It has received the Global Humanities Translation Prize.
Manzoor was a recipient of several awards such as Shikhar Samman, Bharatiya Bhasha Parishad Puruskar, Vir Singh Deo Award, and several others. The government of India honoured him with the Padma Shri, the fourth highest Indian civilian award, in 2003. However, writer and poet Rajesh Joshi was recently quoted in a Hindi newspaper saying that Manzoor had wanted to exchange his Padma Shri with his Sahitya Akademi award which Rajesh had got at about the same time.
Manzoor Ahtesham’s first published short story in 1973 was Ramzaan Mein Maut (Death in Ramzaan). Ironically, we lost him during this time of fasting and prayer.
source: http:///www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> Society> Obituary / by Askari Zaidi / April 19th, 2021
The cast rehearsing for the play, which is to be staged on March 8 in Bengaluru. | Photo Credit: HandOut EMail
They are part of the cast of Safdar Hashmi’s play Aurat staged by Theatre for Change
Safdar Hashmi’s play Aurat, a commentary on patriarchy, was first staged in 1970, but remains relevant even five decades later. On International Women’s Day, celebrated on March 8, the Bengaluru-based Theatre for Change will be staging their version of Aurat.
What makes iteration of the play different is their decision to cast members from the Bilal Bagh community. Bilal Bagh in Bengaluru, and notably its women residents, made national headlines in early 2020, for their protest against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA). It eventually came to be known as the Shaheen Bagh of the South.
Sujatha Balakrishnan, one of the directors of Aurat, said her decision to work with the women from Bilal Bagh stemmed from her firsthand experience of seeing them in action during the anti-CAA protests. “They were just amazing out there. I immediately thought I should do our next production for Women’s Day with them,” she said.
It proved to be an eye-opener for Ms. Balakrishnan. “Working with them showed me they enjoy far more freedom than many women from ‘privileged classes’,” she said. She added that the experience has only strengthened her belief that it is a lack of opportunity that holds people down. Theatre cannot be the privilege of a particular class, she said.
The usual trajectory of a girl’s life — childhood, higher education and marriage — form the premise of Aurat. “We wanted it to be a multi-lingual effort. So, each act will be performed in a different language,” she added.
The first part of the play, where a girl and her father are discussing the necessity for her to go to school, is in Tamil and has been directed by Sujatha. “Alfiya Shaikh, a 10-year-old from Bilal Bagh, is playing the daughter in the first act. I was pleasantly surprised by the way she picked up Tamil to deliver her lines, even though it is not her mother tongue,” she said.
The second act portraying a young girl’s fight to study in college is in Hindi, and is directed by Vandana Amit Dugar. The final act depicting her life as a married woman is in Kannada, and has been directed by Sachin Sreenath.
The play touches upon harassment, patriarchy, the toll of childbirth and other everyday problems of women.
Apart from Theatre for Change’s rendition of Aurat, actor Urvashi Goverdhan will be reading a few of Maya Angelou’s poems. This will be followed by school children from different sections of Bengaluru reciting from an anthology of Safdar Hashmi’s work Duniya Sab Ke, which deals with social justice.
(Venue: Lahe Lahe, HAL 2nd Stage, Bengaluru from 6-8 p.m. on March 8. Entry free)
source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> News> Cities> Bengaluru / by Ruth Dhanraj / March 02nd, 2021
On Tuesday morning, a resident of Belapu Military Colony, senior author, writer, Mumtaz Begum (72) passed away in a private hospital in Mangaluru.
Mumtaz Begum, who was engaged in the field of literature and writing for five decades has written various works including Avyakta, Paradeshi, Vartula, Bandalike, Chimpi, Sarva Rathugalu Ninagagi, Ankura Sahita Kathe, poetry, novels, and various other books.
For her contributions to the field of literature and writing, she has won various awards and accolades including Attimabbe, Chennashri, Jilla Rajyotsava, Matrashri Ratnamma Heggade Book Prize, Meevundi Mallaari Children’s Story Prize, Kittur Rani Chennamma Award, Kannada Literature Council’s Charitable Award, Senior Citizens Literary Award, and Basava Literary Arts Forum’s Basava Jyoti Award among various others.
