Shahryar’s passing is a monumental loss to modern Urdu poetry and to the world of Indian literature.
What does the award acknowledge? A life time’s achievement? An outstanding talent? Or, an exceptional contribution to a particular language and literature?
It should. For he represented the place that was once a vibrant society, the home for people of all faiths and cultural inclinations. Not the stifled, torn, violent state it has become today
Soon after Ashutosh Gowarikar's film, came Salman Rushdie's "short fiction" in the <i>New Yorker</i>, also coincidentally on Akbar's Jodha. 'Disgruntled' was how I felt when it was over...
Yes, 'Urdu' means 'military camp' in Turkish, but by the eighteenth century, it merely meant 'the city of Delhi'. The fascinating story of how the language whose name(s) were Hindi/ Hindvi/ Goojri/ Rekhta/ Dakhani at various times and places came to
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