Hasrat Mohani

The poet whose pen carried love — and whose slogan, "Inquilab Zindabad", carried a revolution. Syed Fazlul Hasan "Hasrat" Mohani (1875–1951) — the "Mohani" marking his birthplace, Mohan in the Unnao district of Uttar Pradesh — was an Urdu poet of the ghazal and one of the Indian freedom movement's most fearless voices. A graduate of MAO College, Aligarh (1903), he founded the influential journal Urdu-i-Mualla, endured several British prison terms, coined the immortal slogan "Inquilab Zindabad" (Long Live the Revolution), and in 1921 became the first to demand complete independence (Purna Swaraj) at the Ahmedabad Congress session. A founder of the Communist Party of India and a member of the Constituent Assembly, he was equally a poet: essentially a ghazal poet who blended classical and modern styles and kept the ghazal alive when it was being marginalised. His ghazal "Chupke Chupke Raat Din Aansu Bahana Yaad Hai" — immortalised by Ghulam Ali and the film Nikaah — remains among the most sung verses in Urdu. He died in Lucknow on 13 May 1951.