Krishan Chander (Urdu: كرشن چندر) was an
UrduUrdu is a register of the Hindustani language that is identified with Muslims in South Asia. It belongs to the Indo-European family. Urdu is the national language and lingua franca of Pakistan. It is also widely spoken in some regions of India, where it is one of the 22 scheduled languages and an...
and
HindiStandard Hindi, or more precisely Modern Standard Hindi, also known as Manak Hindi , High Hindi, Nagari Hindi, and Literary Hindi, is a standardized and sanskritized register of the Hindustani language derived from the Khariboli dialect of Delhi...
Afsaana Nigaar, or short story writer. He wrote mainly in
UrduUrdu is a register of the Hindustani language that is identified with Muslims in South Asia. It belongs to the Indo-European family. Urdu is the national language and lingua franca of Pakistan. It is also widely spoken in some regions of India, where it is one of the 22 scheduled languages and an...
, but was well-versed in Hindi and English.
He was a prolific writer, penning over 20 novels, 30 collections of short stories and scores of radio plays in Urdu and later, after
partitionThe Partition of India was the partition of British India on the basis of religious demographics that led to the creation of the sovereign states of the Dominion of Pakistan and the Union of India on 14 and 15...
of the country, took to writing mainly in
HindiStandard Hindi, or more precisely Modern Standard Hindi, also known as Manak Hindi , High Hindi, Nagari Hindi, and Literary Hindi, is a standardized and sanskritized register of the Hindustani language derived from the Khariboli dialect of Delhi...
.
He also wrote screen-plays for Bollywood movies to supplement his meagre income as an author of satirical stories. Krishan Chander's novels (including the classic : Ek Gadhe Ki Sarguzasht, trans. Autobiography of a Donkey) have been translated into over 16 Indian languages and some foreign languages, including English.
His short story "Annadata" { trans: The Giver of Grain - an obseqeuious appellation used by Indian peasants for their feudal land-owners }, was made into the film
Dharti Ke LalDharti Ke Lal is a 1946 Hindi film and the first directorial venture of the noted film director Khwaja Ahmad Abbas...
, by
Chetan AnandChetan Anand was an acclaimed Hindi film producer, screenwriter and director from India, whose debut film, Neecha Nagar, bagged the Palme d'Or award, at the Cannes Film Festival in 1946....
in 1946 - which led to his being offered work regularly as a screen-writer by Bollywood, including such populist hits as SHARAFAT, 1970.
Biography
About his place of birth Krishan Chander wrote: "Lahore is a place where I was born, where I was educated, where I started my literary career, where I achieved fame. For people of my generation it is difficult to forget Lahore. It shines in our heart like a jewel -- like the fragrance of our soul". Apart from his love for Lahore actually he was born in
WazirabadAYAZ KHANWazirabad is an industrial city located in Gujranwala District, Punjab, Pakistan. Wazirabad is situated on the banks of the Chenab River nearly 100 kilometres north of Lahore on the Grand Trunk Road. It is 45 kilometres from Sialkot, 30 kilometres from the district capital - Gujranwala...
,District
GujranwalaGujranwala is a industrial city in the north-east of the Punjab province. It is the sixth largest city in Pakistan with a population of approximately 2,661,360 as on 24 June 2011...
British India (now in Pakistan). Krishan Chander spent his childhood in
PoonchPoonch is a town and a municipal committee in Poonch District in the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir. Based on the Mahābhārata evidence, and the evidence from 7th Chinese traveler Xuanzang, the districts of Poonch along with Rajauri and Abhisara had been under the sway of the Republican Kambojas...
, in the state of Jammu & Kashmir, where his father worked as the physician of
MaharajaMahārāja is a Sanskrit title for a "great king" or "high king". The female equivalent title Maharani denotes either the wife of a Maharaja or, in states where that was customary, a woman ruling in her own right. The widow of a Maharaja is known as a Rajamata...
PoonchPoonch is a town and a municipal committee in Poonch District in the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir. Based on the Mahābhārata evidence, and the evidence from 7th Chinese traveler Xuanzang, the districts of Poonch along with Rajauri and Abhisara had been under the sway of the Republican Kambojas...
. His novel
Shakast (Defeat) is related to Kashmir's partition.
Mitti Ke Sanam one of his most popular novel is about the childhood memories of a young boy who lived with his parents in Kashmir. His famous Afsanay (short stories) are the stories of Kashmiri villages, as well as those of displaced expatriates and rootless urban man. He used Pahari (dialect of people living in Poonch) words while writing in Urdu.
In the 1930s he studied at
Forman Christian CollegeForman Christian College University, or FCCU, is a chartered university in Lahore, Pakistan, named after its American-born founder, Dr. Charles William Forman.- History :...
and edited the English section of the college house magazine, and was at that time interested in English writings. As the then editor of the Urdu section of the magazine,
Mehr Lal Soni Zia FatehabadiZia Fatehabadi , born Mehr Lal Soni , was a renowned Urdu ghazal and nazm writer. He was a disciple of Syed Aashiq Hussain Siddiqui Seemab Akbarabadi who was a disciple of Nawab Mirza Khan Daagh Dehlawi...
was instrumental to his career in having got published, in the year 1932, Chander's first Urdu short story, "Sadhu".
Chander was against the Hindu-Muslim conflicts - and might actually have been an atheist, as he was a committed Communist & card-carrying Party Member - as many radical writers in India were in the decades immediately preceding the Partition of the country. The forcible division of Kashmir in 1948 after the creation of India and Pakistan left deep marks on his writings.
His literary masterpieces on the Bengal famine and the savagery and barbarism that took place at the time of the partition of India in 1947 are some of the finest specimens of modern Urdu literature, but at other times too he continued relentlessly to critique the abuse of power, poverty and the suffering of the wretched of the earth; but above all he never stopped protesting casteism, fanaticism, communal violence and terror. He was a humanist and a cosmopolitan.
Death
Krishan Chander died working at his desk in
MumbaiMumbai , formerly known as Bombay in English, is the capital of the Indian state of Maharashtra. It is the most populous city in India, and the fourth most populous city in the world, with a total metropolitan area population of approximately 20.5 million...
on March 8, 1977. He had just started to write a satirical essay entitled Adab baray-e-Batakh (Literature for a duck), and wrote just one line 'Noorani ko bachpan hi sey paltoo janwaron ka shaukh tha. Kabootar, bandar, rang barangi chiriyaan…' (since childhood Noorani was fond of pet animals such as pigeons, monkeys, multi-coloured birds…') but before he could complete the sentence he succumbed to a massive heart attack (Ibid).
Krishan Chander Park Poonch
A Fountain Park in [Poonch] City of J&K(India) has been renamed as Krishan Chander Park Poonch in his loving memory. His statue has also been erected in the middle of the Garden.
External links