Malaika Chishty
ہم پرورش لوح و قلم کرتے رہیں گے
جو دل پہ گزرتی ہے رقم کرتے رہیں گے
Forever will I nurture pen and paper,
Forever express in words whatever my heart undergoes
Faiz Ahmed Faiz, was a recognised poet of Anjuman Tarraqi Pasand Mussanafin-e-Hind or Progressive Writers Movement of India, an anti-imperialistic literary movement presided by Rabindranath Tagore and Munshi Premchand. Faiz was aware of the exploitation of poor people by colonialists and feudal chiefs. He was the most celebrated yet controversial iconic poet whose words infuse the sense of socialism into the masses. The content we find in his literature has always dispatched an articulate message of eradicating social injustice, political dominance, suppression and any act which is a product of class struggle and regressive behavior. His literature is embellished with the jewels of Marxism which creates tranquility for Karl Marx’s followers. This hero of left has always been a source of discomfort to right and far-right wing due to his Marxist ideology and counter-narrative literature to extremism. According to him Marxism was not a dogma but a discipline or science which optimises day-by-day. Faiz’s revolutionary literature and conceptualisation of communism have always been a hot potato. His ideology was never liked by mullah-military nexus. The nation which he wanted to see had never been the one he was living in. He lived his life in the atmosphere of obliteration and always demanded the development of socialism in the county.Faiz used the elements of dialectical criticism which glorifies his strong stance against the status quo this subsequently entrenched the theme of socio-political revolution in his poetry. He was a poet of people, he always counteracted right and far-right-wing and talked about the ingrained communal issues. His poetry is the voice of labourers, peasants, suppressed, freedom fighters of nations that struggle forthe liberation of subjugated. Faiz advocated the political independence which traces trajectories for intellectuals towards the resistance against bourgeois hegemony. Plus he has always agitated communism against the exploitative system which is supported by the capitalist culture and which has been bolstering despotism through the ages. Questioning suppressive ascendancies and encapsulating the doctrine of marxism is the apex of Faiz’s poetry which is famous amongst progressive youth.
منظور یہ تلخی یہ ستم ہم کو گوارا
دم ہے تو مداوائے الم کرتے رہیں گے
I accept this bitterness, even this tyranny I will endure
But till my last breath I will not stop caring for this world
When we go through the historic landscape of Urdu literature and politics we find that in 1979 Faiz picked up his pen against the bureaucratic-military oligarchy to address the fundamentalist rule of General Zia-ul-Haq in his momentous poem called, “Hum Dekhenge”. Zia was a despotic ruler who not only hanged the democratic, elected head of the state, Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, but, also massacred the communal harmony that existed in Pakistan. He used political instruments and religious tools to throw the country in the darkest times of the human history. He sown the seeds of social injustice, political dominance and patriarchal patterns in the name of Islamization which rose religious radicalism. Dictator Zia, was a champion of power politics, he knew how to change the political dynamics of the state in his favour by silencing human voices and by gaining religious foothold. Faiz’s humanist approach is a threat to the authorities that he was imprisoned. His words are so powerful that it scared a dictator, his lyrical call to revolt is extremely spurring that establishment backed him against the wall, his desire to perish oppression and fascism is never liked by the rulers that “Hum Dekhenge” was declared an anti-state poem. Had Faiz been a traitor he would have never gotten the Lenin Peace Prize and Human Rights Commission Peace Prize. To date the question remains constant, if humanists socialists or communists use the right of freedom of speech under a decorum, recognised by the constitution of the state even then too, will the authorities mute their voice, censor their words and crush their pen down?
Still, the poem of resistance, the anthem of left against the prerogative and it’s revolutionary couplets will always be chanted on the streets.
Long Live Resistance
Inqulilab Zindabad!
ہم دیکھیں گے
لازم ہے کہ ہم بھی دیکھیں گے
وہ دن کہ جس کا وعدہ ہے
جو لوح ازل میں لکھا ہے
We shall Witness
It is inevitable that we too shall witness
the eternal truth, day that has been promised
of which has been prescribed in the destiny of mankind
جب ظلم و ستم کے کوہ گراں
روئی کی طرح اڑ جائیں گے
ہم محکوموں کے پاؤں تلے
جب دھرتی دھڑ دھڑ دھڑکے گی
اور اہل حکم کے سر اوپر
جب بجلی کڑ کڑ کڑکے گی
When the mountains of oppression
Will reduce into dust and blow away like cotton
When oppressed will be united against oppression on the earth
The earth will pulsate deafeningly
and on the heads of our rulers
when lightning will strike with the wave of revolution
جب ارض خدا کے کعبے سے
سب بت اٹھوائے جائیں گے
ہم اہل صفا مردود حرم
مسند پہ بٹھائے جائیں گے
سب تاج اچھالے جائیں گے
سب تخت گرائے جائیں گے
When all the self-proclaimed Gods who rule on us will be removed and their tyranny will end from the pure land
We pure people will rule our own destiny and will be given our right of authority which has been taken away from us
And we will be seated on the throne and oppressors will be thrown out
( The most controversial couplet in which Faiz was pointing to military officers specifically Dictator Zia-ul-Haq at GHQ (General Headquarters, Rawalpindi) who were brutally ruling Pakistan in the name of Islamization as false icons and would lose power when the revolution succeeds)
بس نام رہے گا اللہ کا
جو غائب بھی ہے حاضر بھی
جو منظر بھی ہے ناظر بھی
Only truth and justice will prevail
Which is just like God who cannot be seen but is also present
Who is the spectacle and the beholder
And we can see it’s manifestation like truth and justice
اٹھے گا انا الحق کا نعرہ
جو میں بھی ہوں اور تم بھی ہو
اور راج کرے گی خلق خدا
جو میں بھی ہوں اور تم بھی ہو
ہم دیکھیں گے
لازم ہے کہ ہم بھی دیکھیں گے
Anal-Haq, a Sufi thought which means a state of killing your ego and any impurity that comes between you and divinity (Mansoor Al- Hallaj, a Persian Sufi was executed on this statement for being blasphemous)
I am the Truth, this slogan will rise,
Which is I, as well as you
And then God’s creation, his manifestation will rule
Which is I, as well as you
We shall Witness
It is inevitable that we too shall witness
