Urdu Academy pays tribute to Qateel Shifai

By Abdus Sattar Ghazali

The Urdu Academy of North America dedicated its Sept. 28, 2014 event to the life and work of prominent Urdu poet, Qateel Shifai. The event was held at the Chandni Restaurant, Newark CA. Tthis was the second session of its monthly literary event. The first session was dedicated to the life and work of prominent short story writer and poetess Neelum Ahmed Bashir.

Almas Shabvani was MC. She also presented a paper on the life and work of Qateel Shifai who was born on 24th December, 1919 as Aurangzeb Khan. Qateel Shifai is his nom de plume, the pen-name under which he is known in the world of Urdu poetry. "Qateel" is his "takhallus" and "Shifai" is in honour of his ustaad Hakim Mohammed 'Shifa' whom he considered his mentor.

His father's death at an early age, forced Qateel to quit his education and start his own sporting goods shop. Success eluded him and he moved to Rawalpindi, where he worked at a transport company for a monthly salary of Rs.60. Finally in 1946, Nazir Ahmed called him to Lahore and made him the assistant editor of the monthly 'Adab-e-Latif'.

Qayeel Shifai's first ghazal was printed in the Lahore weekly 'Star', whose editor was Qamar Jalalabadi.

In January 1947, a Lahore based film producer asked Qateel to compose songs for his forthcoming film. His first film as a lyricist was "Teri Yaad". Since then he has won numerous awards as a lyricist. He has had quite a few of his poem collections published, one of which being "Mutriba" which was awarded the highest literature award in Pakistan.

A number of languages including Hindi, Gujarati, English, Russian and Chinese have chewed the essence of Qateel Shifai’s poetry who owns the pride of having over 20 collections of verse and publishing more than 2,500 songs for Pakistani and Indian films. ‘Shayeri sach bolti hai’ is one very renowned nazm of his which can never be forgotten. Besides all the above he also owns the credit of having won a major literary award in the 1960s for one of his collections titled Mutriba (The dancer).

Qateel was honored with several awarded including: 'Pride of Performance Award' - 1994 for his contribution to literature, 'Adamjee Award', 'Naqoosh Award', 'Abbasin Arts Council Award' 'Amir khusro Award' in India.

Qateel was lyricist for more than a dozen movies: Bade Dilwala (1999) Yeh Hai Mumbai Meri Jaan (1999) Auzaar (1997) Naajayaz (1995) Sir (1993) Phir Teri kahani Yaad Aayee (1993) Tahqiqaat (1993) Painter Babu (1983) Shireen Farhad (1975) Naila (1965) Intezar (1956) Gumnam (1954) Gulnaar (1953) Teri Yaad (1948)

The Urdu enthusiasts who joined the recitation of Qateel's poetry included: Irshad Ali Khan, Ishaq Nagpurwala, Tasadduq Hussain Attari, Abdus Sattar Ghazali, Mobeen Khalil, Moeez Khan, Koser Syed, Zafar Khan, Pro. Ibrahim Siddiqui and Khalid Rana. Atia Naaz, Neelum Bashir, Almas Shabvani and Nagesh Avadhani captivated the audience with presenting Qateel's poetry in their melodious voices.