New Delhi: Famous women poets such as Parveen Shakir, Kishwar Naheed, activist Fahmida Riyaz and Zehra Nigar, in the late 20th century entered the male domain of Urdu poetry and altered the scenario.
Feminist poetess and activists from Pakistan used ghazals -a poetic form comprising a collection of couplets – to give voice to a variety of issues like female foeticide, live-in relations, prostitution, dowry and materialisation of marriage as well as seeking an end to all forms of sexism.
Till then Urdu ghazals and poetry were considered a medium of male-dominated society to marvel at the beauty of women, while often stereo typing them as cruel beloved.
The contribution of female poetess in ameliorating the plight of women in Pakistan was recalled recently by Saif Mahmood of South Asia Alliance for Literature, Art and Culture (SAALARC). “Earlier Urdu poetry always used to be woman-centric.
It was filled with descriptions of women. Either the woman was a cruel beloved or she used to be the one whose beauty can’t be described in words,” said Mahmood.
Mahmood recited gazals penned by female Urdu poets at an event held here recently dedicated to ‘Feminism Beyond Boundaries’ and inspired by 20th Century Pakistani gazal writer Kishwar Naheed’s ‘Hum Gunahgaar Auratein: We Sinful Women’. Kishwar Naheed is among the best-known contemporary woman poets of Pakistan who “advocated the freedom of women.”
“Her poetry insists for the rights for women in Pakistan,” said Mahmood.
Born in Bulandshahr, Uttar Pradesh and moving to Lahore in Pakistan, Kishwar had to fight to receive education as women did not go to school then.
“Although European and American feminism started way earlier, the significance of women poets in the Urdu poetry is that it changed the course of ghazal in some way.
What makes these women really special is the fact that they spoke so boldly on various issues,” Mahmood said. An educationist and activist in Pakistan, Fahmida Riaz was a great influence in introducing educational reforms in Singh region, educating girl child more on a push.
Her notable works ‘Godaavari’ and ‘Khatt-e Marmuz’ have won awards. “For another feminist Parveen Shakir ‘ghazalyaat’ was her feminine perspective on love and romance, beauty, intimacy, separation, break-ups, distances, distrust and infidelity and disloyalty at a time when Pakistan was under dictatorial rule,” he said.
In the 19th century, there were many male poets who wrote on the emancipation of women and spoke of “equal right”.
Altaf Hussain Hali is one such poet who talks about female foeticide in his ghazals. Many ghazal writers also condemned purdah and sati.
“Lines like ‘That which is not visible, is highly exquisite. That which is hidden, is hardly the truth’ established the fact that feminist movement in Urdu poetry started in the beginning of 19th century but was mostly propagated by males,” said Mahmood.
The poetry by Kaifi Azmi, who is remembered to have brought Urdu literature to Indian motion pictures, also had trajectory of feminism in them. Urdu poet Amjad Islam Amjad, hailing from Lahore, has also been noted among the outspoken feminist supporter. (PTI)
