THE word ghazal is derived from an Arabic root and it means ‘to talk amorously to women’. According to some scholars, ghazal also means ‘a doleful cry of pain uttered by a deer when surrounded by ...

Mellifluous Mohammed Rafi once sang -‘Divaso judai na jay chhe ae jasey jaroor milan sudhi.’ Few know that these lyrics were penned by a Surti ghazalkaar- Abdul Gani Dahiwala. The Persian form of ...

September 6, 2018. A historic day for queer Indians and their allies. The Supreme Court decriminalises homosexuality. My friends and I celebrate by getting a cake with Azadi piped on it in white icing ...

Shadab Zeest Hashmi’s Ghazal Cosmopolitan is, in her own words, “part love letter to Urdu… and part manual for the craft of ghazal.” Writing in English, the author feels that the ghazal has the ...

Ali Shir Navai (left) exposed Persian ghazals to the extinct Chagatai language and Mohammad Quli Qutub Shah (right) was an early practitioner of Urdu ghazals in India The trajectory of the ghazal is ...

Could the incredible and multi-layered tale of social fraternising and spiritual intermingling be easily comprehended through a verse form which seemingly has the bearings of a foisted and derivative ...

I came to know about his death from the Facebook post of young Urdu poet and a Hindi scholar Manish Shukla. The hope that morning brings, instantly turned to sorrow with the learning that renowned ...

Jamshedpur, July 13: He was perhaps the only Chinese who dared to raise his voice against his country’s aggressive stand in 1962. And his poems were his weapons of choice to convey his profound ...