Pakistan Literature Festival connecting people culturally

LAHORE:Pakistan Literature Festival opened here on Friday on a sombre note with Fateha for late Amjad Islam Amjad who passed away on Friday morning and speakers paying tribute to the revered poet and dramatist without whom hardly a literary gathering would be complete in the city. His seat on the stage at the inaugural ceremony remained vacant with his photograph on it.

Muhammad Ahmad Shah, Chairman Pakistan Arts Council who has brought this festival to Lahore, Syed Sardar Ali Shah, Education Minister Sindh who was the chief guest, Anwar Maqsood, Faqir Syed Aijazuddin, Kishwar Naheed, Hamid Mir, Zafar Masood of Bank of Punjab, Zulfiqar Ali Zulfi, Executive Director Alhamra, Lahore and Iftikhar Arif spoke on the occasion.

Iftikhar Arif said, “Amjad is among our most popular poets. Few people get this much love and popularity. Amjad and Ataul Haq Qasmi would be the most important persons in any gathering. He would be dearly missed.” Arif knew Amjad for nearly 50 years and not once he could recall a harsh word from him. “He was particularly kind with words,” he said. Baidar Bakht’s English translation of Amjad Islam’s poetry got a special mention from Iftikhar Arif and Kishwar Naheed.

Kishwar Naheed said Amjad won accolades for his TV play Waris all over the world. Hamid Mir had met Amjad Islam recently who told him he went for Umrah where he prayed for forgiveness of all those who had wronged him. Hamid asked the audience, and the hall was packed to capacity, to learn from this act of Amjad Islam and forgive others but not if they wrong their country.

The minister said, “We have brought love to Lahore from Sindh, the land of the Sufis.” Ahmad Shah said Lahore is the city known for cultural activities. “We want to strengthen confederation by connecting people culturally. No government has money but we are grateful that the Sindh government is spending on the literature festival. We will take this festival to other cities,” he said and urged young people to excel in whatever they are doing.

Anwar Maqsood enthralled the audience with his wit. He said, “I had prepared my speech to deliver at the fort but there cannot be a record of anything that is broadcast live from the fort.”

He said, “We hear the government is standing with the quake-hit Turkiye but it is sitting with the poverty-stricken people of its own country.” Fakir Syed Aijazuddin talked about the constantly evolving two-nation theory. Writing is like throwing a pebble into the well, he said and closed his talk with his own English translation of Amjad Islam’s verses.

Alhamra Hall 1 couldn’t accommodate all the people who wanted to be there, so Alhamra had made a very good arrangement of screening the proceedings in the lawn outside. There were rows of chairs on which people comfortably watched the inaugural session.

Civilisational Challenges

The first session after the inaugural, ‘Civilisational Challenges in the 21st Century, Pakistan and Iqbal’s Vision’, was presided by Professor Fateh Muhammad Malik. He said, “Iqbal was also Musawwir-e-Pakistan. Quaid-e-Azam put colours in it. Now we need to see what has become of that. Iqbal came with the idea of a separate homeland in 1930 and the Quaid acted on it a decade later. This decision was well-taken by the masses for they were trained by the Sufis. We need to think how to break the shackles of undemocratic forces. Before, we would hide the begging bowl, now its all out in the open,” he said. Others who spoke on Iqbal were Baseera Ambreen, Tehseen Faraqi, Nomanul Haq and Nasira Iqbal.