Kaifi Azmi

The progressive poet who carried Urdu into Hindi cinema — from "Kar chale hum fida" to "Waqt ne kiya". Syed Athar Hussain Rizvi (1919–2002), takhallus Kaifi — "Azmi" from his Azamgarh roots — was born on 14 January 1919 in Mijwan, Azamgarh district, Uttar Pradesh, and died in Mumbai on 10 May 2002. At eleven he composed his first ghazal ("Itna to zindagi mein kisi ke khalal paDe") and recited it at a mushaira — his father had to be convinced the verse was truly the boy's own. The Quit India agitation of 1942 ended his formal studies of Persian and Urdu; in 1943 he joined the Communist Party of India as a full-time worker and became a leading voice of the Progressive Writers' Movement, writing for the party paper *Qaumi Jung* in Bombay alongside Ali Sardar Jafri. His first collection, *Jhankar* (1943), was followed by *Aakhir-e-Shab*, *Sarmaya*, and the celebrated *Awaara Sajde*, which won the Sahitya Akademi Award (1975); he also received the Padma Shri (1974) and the Sahitya Akademi Fellowship (2002). As Hindi cinema's lyricist he is remembered for *Kaagaz Ke Phool* (1959), *Haqeeqat* (1964), and the all-verse dialogue of *Heer Raanjha* (1970); his story and dialogues for *Garam Hawa* (1973) won three Filmfare awards. His nazms — "Aurat", "Makaan", "Daaera" — gave progressive thought its most humane Urdu voice.