Driven by the passion for Urdu poetry, I have successfully completed three diplomas in Urdu. When you talk about Urdu poetry, who else comes to mind but Mirza Ghalib, poet laureate in the court of the last Mughal king, Bahadur Shah Zafar? Ghalib’s nazms (verses) are replete with pathos; his quitaat (quatrains) are veracious; his ghazals (lyrical poetry) soul soothing; and his falsafa (philosophy) has no parallel. I consider him a hakeem-e-zehn (healer of mind). He spent his last days in a small house located in a narrow lane — Qasim Jaan Gali, Ballimaran, Chandni Chowk. Today, his house is called Ghalib ki Haveli (Ghalib’s house).
Last week, I visited it. The moment I stepped in, his couplets resonated. His attire was hung in a glass cabinet fixed on the wall of his study and two large books with his handwritten poetry were placed in glass boxes. In another room, a chessboard and chausar board (dice board) belonging to him were displayed. It was the chausar game that landed Ghalib in prison, the only ignominious event in his life, which happened because of a kotwal (policeman) who ‘fixed’ Ghalib because the poet was in love with a domni (dancer) whom the kotwal wanted to marry, at least according to the 1952 Hindi film Mirza Ghalib. The film starred Bharat Bhushan and Surayya as Ghalib and the domni respectively.
Ghalib ki Haveli also has the poet’s hukkah (smoke pipe), the utensils used by his wife — Umrao Jaan — in his last days, murals depicting the bard in writing postures, his Urdu couplets inscribed on the walls, and a lively bronze bust of him looking at you strikingly.
Ghalib ki Haveli is full of life — I mean full of Ghalib’s life. It gives an impression that the rhymester still lives there.
Coming to the patio of the haveli, its dutiful concierge stationed there takes you around its small precincts and explains to visitors the quintessence of Ghalib’s poetry and the sad life of the poet, who pleaded with the British for his paltry pension soon after the 1857 war that paved way for the Englishmen to take a stranglehold on the country till Independence.
In the narrow lane — Qasim Jaan Gali — where Ghalib ki Haveli is situated, even today one finds fakirs (saintly beggars) reciting Ghalib’s shers (couplets) seeking alms from passers-by, reliving zeest-e-zamana-e-mughal (life of Mughal era).
I stood in front of a couple of fakirs and lent my ear to their incantation of meethi shayiri-e-ghalib (sweet poetry of Ghalib). My eyes turned moist and tears rolled down my cheeks. I was transported to early 18th century, Ghalib’s naubat (time). During evenings in those days, Urdu nazm nigaars (poets) organising mushaira (symposium of poetry readings) near Ghalib ki Haveli was a common sight. The appreciatory exclamations, “wah! wah!”, “suhaan allah”, “shaabash”, “azeem huzoor”, “behad khoob”, etc., rent the air during these mushairas. I say that truly, Mirza Ghalib still lives in his Haveliat Chandni Chowk.
This December 27 marks the 218th birthday of Mirza Asadullah Khan Ghalib, mushtarak bashar-e-shayir (common man’s poet). On that day, there cannot be a better homage to the poet than the renaming of Chandni Chowk as Mirza Ghalib Chowk. I request the Delhi government to do so and organise Government-sponsored mushairas in New Delhi in the honour of the great versifier, who may be considered the William Shakespeare of Urdu poetry.
pradeeplaw2000@yahoo.com