{"id":1551,"date":"2013-07-21T10:43:30","date_gmt":"2013-07-21T05:13:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/peacewatchkashmir.com\/blog\/?p=1551"},"modified":"2013-07-21T10:53:15","modified_gmt":"2013-07-21T05:23:15","slug":"tahir-muzters-lament-on-a-blood-soaked-kashmir-will-be-remembered-for-long","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/peacewatchkashmir.com\/blog\/editors-take\/tahir-muzters-lament-on-a-blood-soaked-kashmir-will-be-remembered-for-long\/","title":{"rendered":"Tahir Muzter’s lament on a blood soaked Kashmir will be remembered for long"},"content":{"rendered":"<\/fb:like>
<\/h6>\n

<\/h3>\n

Z. G. MUHAMMAD<\/h4>\n
\n
\n
\u00a0<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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\"tahir\"<\/a>Tahir Muzter is no more. He had a promise to keep. And he kept it. Hundred days after his death his second poetic collection Lahoo Lahoo Kashmir was released. In his journalistic career, he might have had many firsts but journalistic writings being ephemeral, it is difficult to say if posterity remembers him for these writings. Nevertheless, through his \u2018Lahoo Lahoo Kashmir’, he has carved a niche for himself in what has now come to be recognized as the \u201cresistance literature\u201d.
\nIt is true; Kashmir is yet to produce as a good a poet as Mahmoud Darwish, who with his defiant verses \u201cstarted out basically shaping Palestinian nationalism and the Palestine identity in words and consciousness.\u201d Through his poems like \u2018Passing Between Passing Words\u2019, he provided national agenda to Palestinians. And, was recognized national poet of the land.\u00a0 \u2018He described Palestine as a metaphor–for exile, for the human condition, for the grief of dislocation and dispossession.\u2019 In our case only Aga Shahid could be compared to\u00a0 Mahmoud Darwish, in describing Kashmir as a metaphor for\u00a0\u00a0 \u2018 they make desolation and call it peace\u2019, \u2018I am being rowed through paradise on a river of Hell\u2019, and \u2018I have been cold long time before\u2019.
\nAga Shahid, I do believe in the contemporary Kashmir is the only poet we can call as our national poet. In the just released poetic collection, Lahoo Lahoo Kashmir\u2019, I see the traces of pain and agony of Kashmir that permeate the later work of Aga Shahid.\u00a0 So far as sublimity of Shahid\u2019s poetry is concerned it would be inappropriate to draw comparison between his poetry and that of Tahir Muzter. In the \u201cgalaxy\u201d of Urdu and Kashmir poets of land conversant with the craft Tahir Muzter perhaps stands at the periphery. Conscious of his deficiencies as a poet\u00a0\u00a0 he writes in an introduction to his collection, \u201cI do not dream of becoming\u00a0 a path breaker in introducing a new form of poetry \u2013 I am not bothered about structure and form but I believe in communicating my thoughts and ideas directly without any embellishments.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Tahir quotes, Jagan Nath Azad, prominent poet and writer having said about his poetic diction, \u201cThat he has artfully blended all the four forms of Urdu poetry and created his distinct form of poetry \u2013 I have no name for it at present but credit for invention of this form goes to Tahir Muzter.\u201d And, yet another prominent Urdu writer has called his form of poetry as a, \u201cunique blend of poetry in prose.\u2019
\nWhich genre of literature\u00a0 \u2018Lahoo Lahoo- Kashmir\u2019 belongs to, I leave this question to be decided by critics of Urdu literature but knowing Tahir Muzter from his days as editor of the Daily Political Times, a leading Urdu paper during my student days I see this collection of poems as metamorphosis of his political beliefs and outlook.\u00a0 The paradigm shift in the thinking of author\/ poet is distinctly visible when his new book is compared\u00a0\u00a0 to his\u00a0\u00a0 earlier poetic collection of poems Neelam Ghar written ten years back and released in Jammu.
\nTahir Muzter writes about his book, \u201cI had forgotten everything, I found myself standing on crossroads of Kashmir. It was 2010, when I was \u2018weaving warp and woof of my book. It was June and July 2010, everything around was soaked in blood. Sobs and wails resonated from all sides. Coffins \u2013 chain of them carrying bodies of our blooming youth with their chests pierced with bullets were being carried towards burial grounds— I was feeling that the future of Kashmir is being buried. I questioned myself if the graves in border area of Machal have spoken the truth and it has been proved that innocent young men have been killed in a fake encounter- are we committing a sin by stating this truth.\u201d
\nThe author admits that for ten long years the happenings in Kashmir did not bother him much but he was\u00a0 mostly thinking\u00a0 about a \u201cborderless world\u201d. \u201c2010 shattered me, he writes, \u201cMy conscience started questioning me \u2013 being a witness to this bloodbath in Kashmir- are you still bothered about borderless world and I responded to my inner conscience and cried:
\n\u201cKhoon Kashmir kay see\u2019nay say rawan deekh kay bee
\nMain rahoon sakat u khamoosh yah kay jurm nahi\u201d
\n(\u201con Seeing fountains of blood\u00a0 sprinkling out from bosom of kashmir
\nHow can I be inert,\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 is not my a silence a crime\u201d)
\nThis collection of poems spreading over 187 pages containing 43 poems has been dedicated to year 2010, which saw 116 youth and students killed. The first poem titled, \u201cunmarked graves spoke the truth\u201d is about Machal encounter. Second poem is titled as, \u201cIt is 2010\u201d. In this poem- or poetic prose the author is deeply moved on seeing coffins after coffins of youth being carried towards the martyrs graveyards:
\n\u2018how many names should I count,
\nschoolchildren,
\nWith bullet riddled bodies,
\nbathed in blood are going,
\nInnocent,
\nwithout shrouds are being carried\u2019 (to graveyards)
\nIn this collection Tahir Muzter has chosen to reproduce some of poems already published in his earlier collection Neelam Ghar and some poems written before 2008.\u00a0 Many of these poems manifest earlier political beliefs of the author that are different from\u00a0 those that he started professing after 2008 more particularly after 2010.\u00a0 In poems like yah muluk \u2013 this country he hails Indian secularism and in yet another poem Gujarat gawah (Gujarat is witness) he feels suffocated in the same country because of religious bigotry and prejudices\u00a0 ruling the roost.
\nIn poem, Machal- aakhar kab tuk (How long to endure\u00a0 Machals) starting from a famous verses of Sahir Ludhianvi :
\nZulm Phir Zulm hai, Badtha\u00a0 Hai Tau Mit Jata hai
\nKhoon phir khoon hai, tapke ga tau jam jaye
\nThe poet is not optimistic about ending of \u2018tyranny\u2019 in Kashmir in the immediate past. He believes that there is more \u2018hemlock in store for people because their political consciousness is yet to mature- so far they are just crying and\u00a0 lack determination needed for deliverance.\u2019
\nThe book however is an addition to literary landscape of Kashmir.<\/p>\n<\/fb:like><\/span>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Z. G. MUHAMMAD<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

 
\nTahir Muzter is no more. He had a promise to keep. And he kept it. Hundred days after his death his second poetic collection Lahoo Lahoo Kashmir was released. In his journalistic career, he might have had many firsts but journalistic writings being ephemeral, it is difficult to say if posterity remembers him for these writings. Nevertheless, through his \u2018Lahoo Lahoo Kashmir’, he has carved a niche for himself in what has now come to be recognized as the \u201cresistance literature\u201d.
\nIt is true; Kashmir is yet to produce as a good a poet as Mahmoud Darwish, who with his defiant verses \u201cstarted out basically shaping Palestinian nationalism and the Palestine identity in words and consciousness.\u201d Through his poems like \u2018Passing Between Passing Words\u2019, he provided national agenda to Palestinians. And, was recognized national poet of the land.\u00a0 \u2018He described Palestine as a metaphor–for exile, for the human condition, …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1555,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1551","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-editors-take"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/peacewatchkashmir.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1551"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/peacewatchkashmir.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/peacewatchkashmir.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peacewatchkashmir.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peacewatchkashmir.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1551"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/peacewatchkashmir.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1551\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1553,"href":"https:\/\/peacewatchkashmir.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1551\/revisions\/1553"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peacewatchkashmir.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1555"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/peacewatchkashmir.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1551"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peacewatchkashmir.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1551"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peacewatchkashmir.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1551"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}