An evening of poetry was organised at Mavalankar Auditorium in the memory of Nida Fazli this past weekend.
The event was decorated with shayari and dohe of Nida Fazli recited by Tom Alter. The veteran actor said Fazli guided him, supported him and taught him Urdu very humbly. “Nida Sahab never used to recite shayari, he used to live shayari. He will always be remembered.” Alter talked about ‘adabi cocktail’, the word itself perplexed him initially but when he got the essence of it, he loved working with Fazli. “Nida Sahab ehl-e-zubaan bhi the, ehl-e-dil bhi the” (Nida Sahab was the one who knew the language inside-out and had a generous and loving heart).” Reciting Fazli’s “Allah hai Quran mein, Ramayan mein Ram, jitni jag mein boliyaan, utne uske naam”, Alter said, “These dohe have the elixir of life, they make me teary-eyed.”
Later in a conversation, Alter said, “Nida Sahib’s ghazals had a certain kind of innocence and simplicity attached to them. Film industry never intrigued him but film people were surely lucky to have Nida Sahab contributing a share of his immense wealth to the industry. What actually intrigued Nida Sahab was life and humanity, these two things caught his attention always.”
Jazim Sharma, the Sa Re Ga Ma Pa singer, took the centre stage introducing audience with the best of Fazli’s ghazals such as “Kabhi kisi ko mukkammal jahaan nahin milta” and “Garaj baras pyaasi dharti.”
Jazim and Parul Mishra’s album Suno Tum, which was released at the event by the poet’s wife, Malti Joshi Fazli, is a celebration of Fazli’s work.
Jazim said, “Nida Sahab was very down to earth, very subtle and soft spoken. He used to write in a language which everybody understood. He was a ustaad in Urdu but he never used heavy Urdu words as he wanted common man to relate and connect with his ghazals. Straight forward, he would speak from the heart, without applying filters, irrespective of the fact that people like it or not.”
When asked about young generation’s diminishing interest in this genre of music, Jazim said, “My album is in contrast with what youngsters like these days, so maybe they’ll find it different. I think that youngsters should pay more attention to ghazals as it is a divine genre which values meaningfulness. Ghazal is part of our heritage.”
