Akbar Allahabadi also had a
mansion built for his family and it was named for his son as ISHRAT
MANZIL. MotiLal Nehru (Jawaharlal’s father) had named his palace by
translating the Arabic/Urdu name ISHRAT MANZIL into Hindi as ANAND
BHAWAN. Akbar’s son, Khan Bahadur Ishrat Husain had married the youngest
daughter of Nawab Ahmad Husain Khan of Paryanwan, another small state
lying on the railway line between Lucknow and Allahabad. The Nawab
himself was an author and a poet. My late grandmother used to tell me
that the railway service between Lucknow and Allahabad was inaugurated
in 1914. Ten miles from Paryanawan is the Unchahar station. If a train
was standing at Paryanawan with the engine headlamp on, we would be able
to see it from Unchahar. Two miles down the road from Unchahar station
lies the village of Mustafabad, where my grandfather, Mir Syed Diyanat
Husain, lived on his lands. Mustafabad is also the hometown of another
Urdu scholar and educationist named Syed Zamin Ali. It was actually Syed
Zamin Ali who has established the department of Urdu at Allahabad
University and he had actually retired from there. The famous girls
college of Lucknow named Karamat Husain Girls College began in 1912 in
Allahabad as a girl’s school.
Ali Abbas Husaini had a circle
of friends, which included writers, thinkers and poets. Ali Abbas
Husaini himself was a man of some consequence. He had lands in and
around Allahabad. This circle of friends, which also was joined later by
the late Syed Ehtesham Husain, when he had joined the University of
Allahabad as the professor of Urdu in the late 1950’s, was active as a
discussion group. During those discussions, one day the topic was “WHAT
IS THE FUTURE OF URDU PUBLICATIONS?” The general line that was emerging
in that discussion was that the only viable (Urdu) literature that was
going to sell in the near future was pornographic literature. There
indeed was a market for such books. They were sold and circulated by a
black-market kind of booksellers and private libraries. The most famous
name in that line was that of WAHI WAHAANAVI. This was a pen name for
obvious reasons and nobody knew the true identity of that person.
A person named Asraar Ahmad intervened in that discussion and said that
there was a market for yet unexplored literature in Urdu and that was
for Detective Stories and Crime Thrillers. Others disagreed with that
line of reasoning. Asraar Ahmad took it upon himself to produce a
prototype. Abbas Husaini vowed to support that publication. He had also
owned a printing press. As a side effect, three other members of that
group volunteered to produce the so-called Roomanavi novels. The only
name I remember now in that group is that of Shakil Jamali (I think he
still lives in Allahabad). C.M. Naim has mentioned his name in one of
his Annuals of Urdu Studies.
Anyway, Asraar Ahmad produced
his first prototype under the banner of Jasoosi Dunya (The World of
Espionage) in 1952. The name of that novel was DILAIR MUJRIM. After
reading a lot of Ibn-e-Safi and after meeting him in 1972, I came to the
conclusion that Ibn-e-Safi was a very widely read man. I will not be
surprised if he got that name for his maiden novel from Hafiz, from his
famous line: CHEH DILAWAR AST DUZDEH KI BAKAF CHIRAAG DARAD.
I was a student of seventh
grade in Lucknow in those days. It was produced in the shape of the
penny-books of England and the Beadle’s Dime Books of America. Let me
just give you an idea about the Dime Books by a quote:
“BEADLE'S DIME BOOKS (from
North American Review, July 1864, pp. 303-309)
Beadle's Dime Books.--Novels and Library of Fiction; Biographies;
Song-Books; School Series; Hand-Books for Popular Use; Hand-Books of
Games, &c.; &c., &c. New York. 1859- 1864.
A young friend of ours was
recently suffering from that most harassing of complaints,
convalescence, of which the remedy consists in copious draughts of
amusement, prescribed by the patient. Literature was imperatively called
for, and administered in the shape of Sir Walter Scott's novels. These
did very well for a day or two,--when, the convalescence running into
satiety of the most malignant type, a new remedy was demanded, and the
clamor de profundis arose. "I wish I had a Dime Novel." The coveted
medicament was obtained, and at once took vigorous hold of the system.
The rapidity of cure effected by it induced us to investigate somewhat
more deeply into the attractions and character of the "Dime Books" of
all kinds, and a pile of forty-five volumes--all, with the exception of
a few double numbers, sold at ten cents each--lies before us, being
merely a selection from among them.
These works are issued by
Messrs. Beadle & Co., of New York, in virtue of an enterprise started in
the year 1859. They already amount to several hundred separate
publications, and circulate to the extent of many hundred thousands.
This need hardly be stated to any one who is in the way of casting his
eye on the counter of any railway bookstall or news dealer’s shop. But
the statistical statement, from authority, may excite some interest,
that, up to April 1st, an aggregate of five millions of Beadle's Dime
Books had been put in circulation, of which half at least were novels,
nearly a third songs, and the remainder hand-books, biographies, &c.
After this we are prepared for colossal statements as to the millions of
reams of paper employed, &c. The sales”
(End Quote from:
http://www.merrycoz.org/books/BEADLE.HTM)
This turned out to be a master
marketing ploy. The price of the first proto-type of Jasoosi Dunya was
kept at ten annas (An Indian Rupee had sixteen annas). In its buying
power, a Rupee was stronger than the Dollar but much weaker than a
sterling pound – just to give you a comparison. The first mass-market
Urdu paperback was an overnight success. That in the 1950’s of India,
where the government policy was to shun Urdu and propagate Hindi was
going ahead with full steam.
Let me first give you an
overview of the series that became a best seller in a few months time.
Asraar Ahmad wrote with the pen
name IBN-E-SAFI. He wrote absolutely fluent Urdu. He translated the most
common English expressions in simple Urdu and expressed his ideas,
thoughts, feelings and events with such simplicity and great graphic
details that he created a new world of fantasy for his readers. But for
the readers, it was a real world where people moved, lived and died. It
was a remarkable world.
In that process, Ibn-e-Safi
introduced some of the most common English phrases known only to English
speaking world such as: “COVER ME.” He would translate that only to the
extent of: MUJHE COVER KARO. A t the same time he introduced some new
phrases in pure Urdu such as: “IS SARDI MAIN TO MAYN MARNE SE BHI
EHTERAAZ KARUNGA (I would even avoid dying in this cold weather. The
interesting word here is EHTERAAZ (to avoid) is a purely Arabic word
from the Arabic root H-R-Z. However, the fluency of the narration that
Ibn-e-Safi had achieved did not allow any hindrance in comprehension for
an Urdu-reader who was being introduced to such deep Arabic the very
first time. This was not your common everyday Urdu of the Lucknow
streets.
The two main characters of the
series were Detective Inspector Ahmad Kamal Fareedi later promoted to
honourary Colonel in one of the episodes and Detective Sergeant Sajid
Hameed later promoted to honourary Captain in the same episode. Fareedi
came from a very wealthy family of landowners (Nawab) who were
independently wealthy and did not have to care for money. That was the
pretext for Fareedi and Hameed being above and beyond any corruption,
which was and still is the hallmark of both Indian and Pakistani police
– a “glorious” heritage that the British left with us.
Fareedi was over six foot tall,
very strong, muscular and virile handsome young man, who could move
mountains with his bare hands. Fareedi is a very disciplined person. For
that, Ibn-e-Safi created him out of an Afridi Pathan heritage who had
been Urdu-ized over years. Actually that character is based on some
facts. A town named Malihabad, close to Lucknow, is inhabited by the ex-Pathans
from the Frontier Province. Most of them own mango groves. The SAFAYDA
of Malihabad is famous for its unique fragrance and taste. Most of the
men in that population are very good-looking, fair, well built and true
to that portrayal of chivalry shown in Inspector/Colonel Fareedi. Most
of the Afridi tribe living in Lucknow and the surrounds have changed
their surname to Fareedi by dropping the initial ‘A.’ They are Pathans
in looks but culturally they are true UPites. The famous Urdu poet Josh
Malihabadi was one of them.
Fareedi is a graduate of
Cambridge University where he has done original research in criminology.
So he fights crime as a professional, not just as a government servant.
He is always in full command of his self and knows exactly what he is
doing. He has curbed his sexual instincts and diverted all his energies
wholeheartedly to catch the criminals of the world. In one of his
weakest moments, Ibn-e-Safi portrays Fareedi facing Ghazala, a beautiful
girl, who is the daughter of another Nawab and an old friend of
Fareedi’s father. All he can say to Ghazala was: AAP BAHUT ACHHI LAGTI
HAYN. As Ghazala looks to him in anticipation, he holds his own
instincts back and does not do any more. That was in number 6, the title
being PUR ASRAAR KUNWAN.
I did not meet Ibn-e-Safi until
1972, when I had moved to England and he to Pakistan. So, I asked him
about this particular trait that he had created in his hero. He
explained to me. The reckless disregard of danger for fighting crime and
the daring that he had envisaged for his hero was not possible in any
man without curbing his sexual instincts and desires.
Sergeant Hameed, on the other
hand, is a playful young man, with an eye for beautiful girls. He also
drank occasionally and even got drunk. Fareedi, even though, had always
kept all kinds of wines and even hard liquors in his closet, he himself
never drank. He hated the habit but felt that it was necessary for his
work. In one of the episodes, he finds Hameed drinking with some men and
girls. He picks up Hameed by grabbing him by the neck. Drives him home
and then takes him to the bathroom. He holds Hameed under a cold shower
until he is completely exhausted and then throws him in the bed for him
to get out of the stupour and the hangover.
Ibn-e-Safi produced one such
novel every month. Not only did the series become a moneymaker for both
Ibn-e-Safi as well as for Abbas Husaini, Asraar Ahmad proved his point
that he had raised years ago in that private meeting with his friends.
Most of his readers were
middle-class Urdu-speaking crowd all over India and later in Pakistan,
but the series was popular in a very diverse readership. I still
remember during my school days in my old neighbourhood in Lucknow, there
was a rickshaw stand. All the rickshaw drivers would come and rest there
after-hours. Many of them who were single and had come to Lucknow to
earn a living as labourers had nowhere to go after dark. They would
stand their rickshaws by the roadside and sleep in their rickshaws. Many
of them had got hooked on to Ibn-e-Safi. But they were all stone
illiterates. They were farmers from places like Gonda, Barabanki and
other surrounding areas of Lucknow. Every month they would find a young
man who would be able to read Urdu but only just. They would rent the
new Ibn-e-Safi book from the corner-library for two-annas (that was an
average fair for the Rickshaw in those days – but the rickshaw drivers
used to share that money among four or five of them) and the one
literate person would read the book out loud to them under the street
light – that was the extent of the popularity Ibn-e-Safi had acquired in
a very short period of time.
Ibn-e-Safi introduced his
readers to such western ideas as nightclubs, luxury hotels, Cadillac and
Lincoln (air-conditioned) cars, 38 bore service revolvers (one of which
was always carried by Inspector/Colonel Fareedi), and many other names
of places and objects which I myself learned only after I traveled
around the world. I came to live in Princeton only in 1985 after we
moved to the United States. But I came across the name 'Princeton'
thirty years before that in Ibn-e-Safi’s novels.
Ibn-e-Safi got his material
from his wide reading of both local as well as western works. He seems
to have borrowed from Agatha Christie, Ian Fleming, Earl Stanley
Gardner, Mickey Spillane, Arthur Conan Doyle and many mores.
A year passed very quickly,
Ibn-e-Safi produced eleven novels, one every month. Each one of those
used to be 120 pages and priced at ten annas. It was only after I had
published one of my own books in 1992 that I realized the significance
of the number 128. For Urdu (as well as Farsi and Arabic) books have to
be transcribed by hand on special paper (in Urdu it is called a MISTAR,
in English it is butter paper.) That then is transferred onto brass
plates. The large amount printing is done from those brass plates. This
is your standard photo-offset process (there is also a camera involved
in the middle). Previously, it was done from stone-blocks and that
process is called litho-graphic printing. Anyway, the brass plate can
either take eight, sixteen or thirty-two pages of a standard book.
Because of the process of the folding of the pages, the total number of
pages in a bound book has to be a power of two. Because it will be most
efficient cost-wise to print both sides of the paper at the same time,
128 is the optimum number of pages in a book to print exactly in two
brass-plates. So Ibn-e-Safi’s work was not only brilliant writing, it
was done under the most pressing marketing and pricing structures.
The twelfth issue of Jasoosi
Dunya was a special number. It was some two-and-half times thicker than
the standard issue. It was a thriller-cum-adventure story. Ibn-e-Safi
had set the main plot in Egypt and it was named "Mawt ki Aandhi" (The
Tornado of Death). The story is brilliant and Ibn-e-Safi’s narrative
touched new heights of excellence in that story. He draws such a
picturesque image in that story that the reader finds himself a part of
the great adventure. It is one of the most interesting mystery stories
of Ibn-e-Safi.
Ibn-e-Safi was a prolific
writer. His art improved with every new story. It looked like he had an
unlimited amount of material stored in his 1200 c.c. brain.
The 25th issue of Jasoosi Dunya
was the Silver Jubilee Number. It was titled “Khawfnaak Hangaama.” This
was another crime thriller cum adventure story. One of the main
characters in that story is borrowed from Conan Doyle’s THE LOST WORLD.
Ibn-e-Safi also wrote a series
of continuous novels – Pahla Shola, Doosra Shola, Teesra Shola, and
Jahannum ka Shola, numbers 56, 57, 58 and 59.
Ibn-e-Safi introduces new
characters frequently. In number 87 we are introduced to Qasim, a seven
foot tall, fat, half-wit who was raised by a very strict father,
forcibly married to a beautiful young woman, actually his first cousin,
who is also a petit beauty. Qasim cannot satisfy his sexual urges by her
so he is always out looking at big sized healthy women – in that process
he gets into really precarious situations and provides the reader with
hilarious moments.
That is an indication how
Ibn-e-Safi has handled delicate psychological issues in our society.
Perhaps, one of his masterpieces in that line is number 29, LASHON KA
AABSHAAR. The villain/hero of that story is an illegitimate son of his
parents. In his early childhood he is taunted for being a bastard. But
he works hard, educates himself and becomes a powerful and wealthy man
in the society but he carries that stigma of an illegitimate birth all
along. As a consequence he develops a dual personality. Outwardly he is
a philanthropist, secretly he is a mass-murderer. Inspector Fareedi,
being an honest and realistic police officer, catches him in the act and
he is prosecuted for the mass-murder. As he is being lead to the
gallows, he looks at the crowd and asks: Is there anyone who would say
just once that I am NOT a bastard? No one. The crowd watches him
silently; he has a big laugh and walks up to the gallows.
As if that was not enough, very
soon, Ibn-e-Safi leaves that series of Fareedi and Hameed and introduces
a new duo of private detectives. The main character in that series is
Anwar, an investigative journalist who enjoys solving crimes and making
fun of the corrupt police offices at the same time blackmailing them.
His helper is Rasheeda, who works for the same newspaper, but actually
she is a long-lost princess of an island kingdom, which is rich in
minerals and other natural resources. In one of the main numbers,
Rasheeda is taken to her kingdom, but refuses to become the ruler and
forsakes her kingdom for Anwar (we see the traces of Edward VIII
renouncing his kingdom for a divorcee named Mrs. Simpson!!!) After
producing 5-6 numbers on those lines, Ibn-e-Safi returns to his Fareedi
Hameed series and from then on, both Anwar and Rasheeda are seen as
Fareedi’s unofficial helpers.
But, once again, Ibn-e-Safi’s
talent oozes out in a new series and he begins the famous Imran Series.
The main character in that is Ali Imran, the son of a very successful
civil servant who has no inkling as to what his son is up to. Imran
works closely with the secretary of National Security and runs a secret
anti-crime and anti-spy ring as its head who never shows his face, not
even to his own assistants, under the codename X-2. Imran's mother is a
typical Muslim lady raised indoors. She prays to Allah for the safety of
her son while the son is out and about catching all kinds of bad guys or
just killing them off with his bare hands. In the Imran series we are
also introduced to one of the most hilarious, and artfully created
characters known as Joseph. Joseph is an African who believes in
witchcraft and he is a drunkard but a very powerful and strong man, who
has the instincts of a Cheetah. Most of the time, he acts as Imran’s
bodyguard and watches his back. Also interesting is Imran’s assistant
named HUDHUD (the word means a hoopoe) who stammers and always quotes
Farsi proverbs profusely, and Juliana Fitzwater a Swiss young woman (In
my opinion Angelina Julie is a very close model of this character).
Ibn-e-Safi works like an expert
painter. He paints his pictures fully, expertly, using his brush as well
as paint in such a manner that the painting comes alive in the eye of
the beholder – he does not make any mistakes of fact or fiction.
He tried his hand on all kinds
of stories. The stories in the Jasoosi Dunya series concentrate on
expert and brilliant detective work and those in the Imran series are
mainly centered on action and adventure. In both arenas he appears
equally comfortable – the comparison that comes to mind is that of Earl
Stanley Gardner, who wrote his courtroom dramas with Perry Mason
character and at the same time produced the Bertha Cool-Donald Lamb
stories of adventure under the pen name of A.A. Fair.
In the late 1950’s, Ibn-e-Safi
moved to Pakistan. He continued writing in the Jasoosi Dunya series and
Abbas Husaini kept publishing it from Allahabad. In total there were 125
novels written by Ibn-e-Safi in that series. In Pakistan he did his own
publishing under the banner of Asraar Publications. A similar number he
produced in Imran Series. In one of the episodes, he makes Fareedi and
Imran come together and meet. But, apparently he thought better of it
and gave up the idea.
During one of my return visits
to Karachi from England, in 1972, I went to see Ibn-e-Safi. He lived in
a house in Nazimabad Nnumber-3.
If Ibn-e-Safi was born in an
English speaking country, he would have become a millionaire. Film
companies would have produced big blockbusters on his stories. But
unfortunately for him, (and fortunately for us) he was born in an
Urdu-speaking environment and that is where he produced his brilliant
work.
Urdu language, writing and story-telling has
lost a gem in Ibn-e-Safi.
