Renowned for a distinct style and the lyrical beauty of his poetry, a Doha resident has been awarded the prestigious Bihar Urdu Academy award for his remarkable poetry collection named Dastras.
Ahmad Ashfaque, an Indian expatriate and General Secretary of Bazm-e-Urdu Qatar, a renowned literary community organisation, had his poetry book considered for national recognition by Bihar Urdu Academy for the 2014-15 award. The award is given every year for the best collection of poetry and services to the Urdu literature.
Bihar Urdu Academy was established in the year 1986 with an objective to promote Urdu language. The academy has since been playing a pivotal role in promoting Urdu language in India, both on state and national level.
Ashfaque, in his work, has discussed all the customs and traditions that are prevalent in the society. He is well known and popular because of his straight tone and impressive voice.
The genre of his poetry is mostly ghazal, nazm (poem), hamd (poem in the praise of God), and naat (poem in the praise of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH)). He is particularly popular for his ghazals. 
Born in the remote district of Samastipur in Bihar, India, Ashfaque comes from a humble background and had no one in his family ever associated with literature or poetry expect for his grandfather, who uttered many Persian poetic pieces and phrases in his talks.
And he became the initial inspiration for Ashfaque, who is also influenced by his professor, Dr Anees Sadri’s poetry. During his studies, he was surrounded by a prolific poetic environment that helped him shape his thoughts into poetic form. 
He moved to Doha in December, 1999 and joined a perfume company, Ajmal Perfumes. Today he is a senior executive at the same company. 
His move to Qatar was an important event in his poetic journey, where he got exposed to a nice literary environment, surrounded by people who have dedicated their lives to Urdu poetry.
In the beginning he was certainly not as good at poetry as he is today, and his association with the Qatar-based Urdu organisations played a key role in his successful poetic journey.
Ashfaque’s contributions to Urdu poetry are not only confined to Qatar, but his efforts have been appreciated across the region and India.  
In spite of his busy schedule, Ashfaque finds the time to promote the Urdu language to people whenever he can. 
He is an active member of the World Bihar Organization and plays a vital role for the welfare of the citizens of Bihar as well as other Indian communities. He is also Joint Secretary of Anjuman Muhibban-e-Urdu Hind Qatar, an active literary organisation.
He is the founding member of Saeban-e-Adab in Samastipur, Bihar and a member of countless organisations that promote Urdu. He is also co-coordinating the literal organisation Bazm-e-Ahle-Qalam in Musri Gharari, Smastipur. He is the editor of the prose section of Dastavez, an international magazine published in Doha and Delhi, and Editor of the quarterly magazine Sadaf.
He has written elaborative articles on Urdu literature and has participated in many poetry expositions, both in India and Qatar. 
Dastras, his poetry collection book, was published in 2014 on the occasion of the Independence Day Mushaira organised by Anjuman Muhibban-e-Urdu Hind. 
Later his book was also launch at an International Seminar on Shibli Nomani, organised by Bazm-e-Urdu Qatar in 2014.