Celebrating Urdu

Catchy actMirza Ghalib in his element  

School children show how a language can be experienced and celebrated

It was an expo with a difference. No, it was not an art, fashion or product fair. It was all about language, something unheard of till then. The city of domes and minarets was witness to a unique celebration of Urdu. And it took school children to bring out the sweetness and magical lyricism of the Urdu language.

Titled after Daagh Dehlvi’s famous couplet ‘ Urdu hai jiska naam ... ’, the exhibition hosted by students and teachers of Central Public High School, Khilwath, recently at the Mehboob Husain Jigar hall in Siasat daily was a runaway success. Students of different schools in the city and lovers of Urdu flocked the show necessitating extension of the expo.

Language is the road map of a culture. It tells you where its people come from and where they are headed. The expo did just that.

It not only traced the history of Urdu but gave visitors something to remember long after they left the premises. Some of the finest Urdu couplets and ‘nazms’ were on display.

What added to the appeal was the way students donned the attire and looks of the famous poets of yore. One could see the poet of East, Allama Iqbal, reclining in his trademark black suit and Mirza Ghalib with his typical cone cap and snowy beard, holding a hookah. There was also Wali Deccani, Mohd Quli Qutb Shah, Mir Taqi Mir, Hazrath Amir Khusro besides writers like Ibne Safi, Premchander.

Students waxed eloquent about the works of the poets apart from reciting their verses. Presentation of ‘ Shikwa ’ and ‘ Jawab-e-Shikwa ’, the epic poems of Allama Iqbal by students was the high point of the expo.

“We decided to present the language in all its glory as these days everyone is talking about the decline of Urdu,” said Mohd Zafarullah Faheem, Director, Central Public High School.

The limits of one’s language are the limits of one’s world. But there was no limit to the poetical appeal of the expo. Wherever one glanced one was greeted by ‘shayeri’.


Talk to a man in a language he understands, that goes to this head. And if you talk to him in his language, that goes to his heart. 

That’s what the Urdu expo did — it went straight to the heart.

 J.S.Ifthekhar,

Hyderabad based journalist.

Article published in The Hindu

Dated November 27,2015