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The visiting poet from Maryland amused the audience with his hilarious compositions. The audience was touched with Naseem Farogh’s unique style of deep satiric verses.  From ancient times satirists have shared a common aim: to expose foolishness in all its guises-vanity, hypocrisy, pedantry, idolatry, bigotry, sentimentality-and to effect reform through such exposure. No doubt, Naseem Farogh’s humorous poetry meets many of these standards.

Naseem Farogh has multi-talented personality and his general poetry is also thought provoking. William Hazlitt believed that poetry is the language of the imagination and the passions which relates to whatever gives immediate pleasure or pain to the human mind. Farogh’s poetry is highly imaginative and passionate. Using these skills Farogh highlights the day today problems of a common man. Read Farogh;s poetry  [PDF]
(Urdu Academy is thankful to Hatem Rani and Misbah Rehman for Urdu composition.)

Tribute to Farigh Bukhari

Urdu Academy’s September session also paid tribute to a prominent Urdu, Hindo, Persian and Pushtu poet, Farigh Bukhari (1917-1997) who had a long association with Progressive writers like Faiz Ahmad Faiz, Ahmad Nasim Qasmi and Sibte Hasan.

Farigh Bokhari, whose real name was Syed Mir Ahmed Shah, was poet, writer, critic, researcher, journalist, translator, columnist, sketch writer. He was also the editor of Sang-i-Meel, Peshawar.

In recognition of his literary contribution  Pakistan Academy of Letters [PAL] in 2008 published ‘Farigh Bukhari: Life and Woks’ by Tariq Hashmi. Unveiling the book, Iftikhar Arif, Chairman PAL said that Farigh Bukhari as a leader of progressive writer movement had struggled hard for his whole life for the right to express.

Farigh Bukhari has seven collections of poetry to his credit and also a number of articles and books on Pashto literature. His books are: Piasay Hath; Khushbu ka Safar; Shishay ka Pairahan; Zeer-o-Bam; Bacha Khan; Albam; Ghazalain; Adbiat-i-Sarhad; Ja’rat-i-’Ashiqan.

Now Urdu Department of the University of Peshawar grants Phd degree on the life and work of Farigh Bukhari. In 2005 Ziaru Rehman wrote a thesis on Farigh Bukhari for Phd. [Picture shows from left: Prof. Lubna Manazar, Naseem Farogh and Tashie Zaheer.]

This scribe had the opportunity to meet him since he moved (probably in 1970s) to Gulbahar Colony, Peshawar where my parents were living. He was an Urdu celebrity poet but was down to earth person.  Farigh Bukhari was educated at the Government High School No. 1, Peshawar where at one time Allama Inayatullah Mashraqi served as Principle. Coincidently after many years this scribe also completed Matriculation from the same school.

Prof. Lubna Manzar presented a well researched article on the life and work of this prominent poet.

As usual a number of Urdu enthusiasts read Farigh Bukhari’s poems and ghazals. These included: Mukesh Kackar, Misbah Rehman, Meraj Sultana Ghazali, Syed Mujibur Rehman, Shehzad Basir, Tasadduq Hussain Atari, Abdus Sattar Ghazali, Hatem Rani, Prof Shamsun Nahar, Mah Talat Shazi, Ahmed Ijaz, Jaafar Shah, Naseer Humayun, Rana Khalid, Ahmar Shahwar and Talat Khan.Click here to read poetry of Farigh Bukhari Courtesy Urdu Point

In the second session of the literary evening the Urdu lovers presented poetry of their own choice. Those who presented interesting poetry included: Tashie Zaheer, Mahmood Al Hasan, Mukesh Kackar, Razia Shamim, Shehzad Basir, Misbah Rehman,Tasadduq Hussain Atari, Hatem Rani, Abdus Sattar Ghazali, Manzar Salam, Prof. Nisar Sheikh, Syed Mujibur Rehman,  Prof. Shamsun Nahar, Mah Talat Shazi, Prof. Aftab Iqbal, Jaafar Shah, Talat Khan, Naseer Humayun, Khalid Rana and Nagesh Avadhani.

At the end of the program Nagesh Avadhani thanked the guests for making the literary evening successful. He particularly thanked the Chandni Restaurant owner, Syed Sarwat for patronising the Urdu and hosting the Urdu Academy events.

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