Majlis-e-Frogh-e-Urdu Adab (MFUA), one of the most vibrant literary groups of Pakistani and Indian expatriates, is all set to organise its 25th (silver jubilee) mushaira (poetry symposium) this Friday.
The mushaira, the annual trade mark of MFUA, is going to take place at City Centre Rotana where number of Doha-based poets besides the known poets from Pakistan and India will present their fresh and much-celebrated works for the Urdu poetry lovers.
The mushaira that has always been received well in Doha will be preceded by 23rd Aalmi Frogh-e-Urdu Adab Awards, the awards ceremony has also been an annual feature of the literary group for the last 23 years. This year the awards will be presented to Prof Dr Tehsin Firaqi, a reputed Urdu scholar, researcher and critic from Pakistan, and Fay Seen Ejaz, an eminent literary journalist, poet, creative fiction and travelogues writer, critic from India.
The poets from Pakistan who will be taking part in the poetry symposium, includes Amjad Islam Amjad, Ambareen Haseeb Amber, Shaukat Fehmi, Dr Fartash Syed, Junaid Azar and Idrees Qureshi. The guest poets from India, include Charan Singh Bashar, Shakeel Azmi, Nusrat Zaheer Ahmed and Zubair Tabish. The other poets are Dr Syed Taqi Abedi, from Canada; Dr Nausha Asrar, from USA; Sadaqat Tarmazi, from Kuwait; and Qamar Riaz, from Oman. The poets from Doha, include Asif Shafi, Ahmed Ashfaq, Raza Hussain Raza and Sanwal Abbasi.
The poetic symposium will be presided over by Amjad Islam Amjad, a celebrated Pakistani poet. Amjad Islam Amjad is a graduate in Urdu Literature. He has been an Urdu teacher for all his life. The noted playwright and columnist has also served as a director at Pakistan Television Corporation from 1975 to 1979.
MFUA was founded in 1991 by late Malik Museeb-ur-Rehman, who hailed from Lahore, Pakistan. The Majlis started organising its annual poetic symposiums in 1994.
“The Majlis was founded purely to promote Urdu language and celebrate its literature. Later on, we also started the awards to highlight and acknowledge the contributions of prominent literary personalities from Pakistan, India and other parts of the world,” said Mohamed Atiq, Chairman MFUA.
Atiq, who has been associated with the Majlis since its inception, further added, “As we started celebrating the Urdu poets and their works, we were suggested to recognise and award the prose writers of the language. The management of the Majlis decided to launch the awards on annual basis. We set up a committee, each in Pakistan and India, under the watch of prominent literary figures. They first select the jury that further shortlists the literary personalities who will receive the award. The Majlis has no hand in selecting the awardees,” Atiq said.
He added, “Besides giving the medals to the awardees, the Majlis pays them cash as well. We started paying Rs1,00,000 to each awardee from Pakistan and India. Later on we increased the amount to Rs 1,25,000 that was further enhanced upto Rs1,50,000. Later on, the Majlis also started recognising Urdu scholars living outside Pakistan and India. In last 25 years, the Majlis has awarded 700 Urdu scholars, writers and poets hailing from different parts of the world. We have also been inviting much celebrated personalities, who have made contributions to the promotion of Urdu language, from different countries.”
The MFUA chairman further said, “This year’s event is going to be very special. We are going to launch four books on the occasion. The first book is Amjad Fehmi (Understanding Amjad). The book is written by Dr Syed Taqi Abidi, a well-known critic of Urdu literature. The book is quite bulky as it covers maximum poetic work of poet Amjad Islam Amjad. The second book is Zara Si Baat. It’s an anthology of new poems and sonnets by Amjad Islam Amjad. The third book is an Urdu translation of an Arabic novel. The translation has been done by Obaid Tahir, Senior Producer and Announcer at Qatar Radio. This is the first of its kind that a novel by a Qatari writer has been translated into Urdu. The fourth book is Qatar Ki Nakabandi. It is again a translation of an Arabic book by Al Jazeera TV on the unjust siege of Qatar. The book has been translated and published by Ashraf Siddique, a noted member of the Pakistani expatriate community.”
NOTABLE POET: Amjad Islam Amjad, a celebrated Pakistani poet, will be presiding over the poetic symposium.
