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Urdu
Urdu is probably the most poetic of
all languages. Urdu language is spoken by more than 28 million heads in
India. It is written in the Perso-Arabic script. The word Urdu (court or
camp) stems from the Persianized Turkish word (Ordu) which meant ‘the
camp of a Turkish army’. North Indian Muslims with their own
dialects moved to South and Central India and settled among the
Marathas, Kannadigas and Telugus. These dialects formed the basis of a
literary speech known as Dakhni or the ‘Southern Speech’, and
was spoken in the Deccan. Later, north Indian Muslims, who came with
Aurangzeb for his conquests down south and some Dakhni writers, saw the
possibility of evolving a new language. This language would be based on
the literary traditions of Dakhni and have the Persian script alongwith
generous usage of Perso-Arabic words, idioms and theme ideas. Shamsuddin
Waliullah a famous poet of the Dakhni actually started the North Indian
Urdu. Other poets also joined in this new literary upsurge and came to
Delhi subsequently. Delhi style of Urdu thus took birth. Court circles,
Persian and Arabic scholars and especially the Muslims of Delhi adapted
this language with great eagerness and by the end of the 18th century
the Mughal house turned only to Urdu. For the first 60 years or so the
influence of Dakhni poets, Sufi thinking and Indianness of diction
prevailed over Urdu. The term Four Pillars of Urdu is attributed to the
four early poets: Mirza Jan-i-Janan Mazhar (1699-1781) of Delhi, Mir
Taqi (1720-1808) of Agra, Muhammad Rafi Sauda (1713-1780) and Mir Dard
(1719-1785). During this time Lucknow became a rival centre for the
patronage of Urdu literature and masters of Urdu poetry received
patronage from the court of the Nawab. The most illustrious poets of the
pre-modern period were Muhammad Ibrahim Zauq (1789-1854) of Delhi and
Nazmuddaulah Dabiru-i-Mulk. However, Urdu literature can never be
complete without the mention of Mirza Asadullah Khan Ghalib (1797-1869).
A Sufi mystic, Ghalib wrote both in Urdu and Persian and through his
letters he brought in literary history and criticism. The humane
feelings, Sufi sentiments, simplicity of his lines and the depth of his
observations made Ghalib the greatest Urdu and Persian poet.
Modern Urdu literature covers the time from the last quarter of the
19th century till the present day and can be divided into two periods:
the period of the Aligarh Movement started by Sir Sayyid Ahmad and the
period influenced by Sir Muhammad Iqbal. However, Altaf Husain Panipati
(1837-1914), known as Hali or ‘the Modern One’, is the actual
innovator of the modern spirit in Urdu poetry. Hindu writers of Urdu
were not far behind, and among the earliest writers was Pandit Ratan
Nath Sarshar (author of Fisana-e-Azad) and Brij Narain Chakbast
(1882-1926). One of the most famous poets of modern Urdu is Sayyid Akbar
Husain Razvi Ilahabadi (1846-1921) who had a flair for extempore
composition of satiric and comic verses. After 1936, Urdu picked up a
progressive attitude and leaned more towards the problems of life.
Poetry, novels, short stories and essays were the avenues of the liberal
expression. The main exponents of this new line of approach were the
short story writers Muhammad Husain Askari, Miranji, Faiz Ahmad ‘Faiz’,
Sardar Ali Jafari and Khwajah Ahmad Abbas. Munshi Premchand, the
greatest novelist of Hindi, began writing in Urdu and later switched to
Hindi.
Inspite of Urdu being considered a little tilted towards Islamic lines,
there were some great Hindu writers who made Urdu their very own, like
Krishan Chandar, Rajindar Singh Bedi and Kanhaiyalal Kapur.
Unfortunately, the lyrical language of Urdu no longer enjoys the same
position that it used to. However, Urdu is still encouraged in Jammu &
Kashmir, Punjab and Hyderabad. Present day Hindi borrows a lot from Urdu
– for grammar, diction and idiom.