"Meri Tankhwah Keejay Mah-ba-Mah" - Ghalib to Zafar !

[[PURANE PAPPEE]]

[Rajendernath Rehbar in The Tribune, Chandigarh of Sept. 4, 1994
I LOVED this piece - is a beaut really - enjoy].
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"Many of us have read/heard this famous couplet of Mirza Ghalib:

TUM SALAMAT RAHO HAZAR BARAS,
HAR BARAS KE HON DIN PACHAS HAZAR

But very few know what prompted Ghalib to write the couplet. Who
was this person so dear to him for whom he wished a long life
consisting of five crore days.

Did Ghalib wish this long life to one of his children? No Sir. The
poet had no children of his own. His wife, Umrao Begum, gave birth
to seven children but none survived. Ultimately, after living a
secluded life for many years Umrao Begum decided to adopt her
sister's son Zain-ul-Aabdin, alias Aarif. Ghalib opposed the move
fearing that the adopted child might also meet the same fate as
their children. Aarif was promising poet and Mirza loved him like
his own son.

But Mirza's fears turned out to be true and Aarif died when he was
in his twenties, leaving behind two sons, Hussain Ali Khan and
Baqar Ali Khan. Ghalib brought the younger of the two children to
live with him. Shortly afterwards, Aarif's wife also died. The poet
brought home the other child too. He would take the boys in his
PALKI wherever he went. And then Ghalib himself died when they were
youngmen. Both of them died shortly after his death. Nobody, till
date, knows what happened to them.
Should we, then, presume that in his couplet, Ghalib wished
long life for a Delhi singer whom he loved passionately? She, too,
had died young. But it wasn't her either. It was the last Mughal
emperor, Bahadur Shah Zafar.

Ghalib was engaged by Zafar for writing history of the Taimur
dynsty in Persian language. The poet was peerless as far as writing
Persian and Urdu prose was concerned. His appointment was announced
with much fanfare. He was summoned to the DURBAR in Red Fort,
presented an apparel comprising six pieces of cloth, three diamonds
and a monthly salary of Rs. 50. Titles of NAJAM-UL-DAULA (Star of
India), DABEER-UL-MULK (Secretary of State) and NIZAM-JANG
(administrator) were conferred on him.

However, during the reign of Bahadur Shah Zafar, salaries were
disbursed on a six-monthly basis for various reasons, including the
one that giving salaries every month will increase the work load.

But Ghalib, the spend-thrift that he was, would spend his six
months' salary in a few weeks and then go on borrowing for months
together. Once when winters had set in, the poet could not arrange
for woolens for the family for paucity of funds. In that state of
sheer helplessness, Ghalib managed to compose a poem of 30 couplets
which talked of the problems faced by him due to non-disbursement
of salary on a monthly basis.
He went to DURBAR with the poem and recited it to the emperor.
The arguments advanced by Mirza Ghalib in this poem to convince the
latter are interesting and are as below:

"O Emperor, the sky is your throne and the sun your official
insignia. I have become famous by virtue of my employment under you
and many big people have become my friends. If I do not tell the
tale of my sorrows to you, where do I go? I have no desire to wear
costly costumes but in this chilling cold, one requires some
woolens.

"I sit in the sun during the day and by the fireside at night. I am
given my salary after six months. The Muslims perform SHISHMAHI
RASM for their dead every six months. But I am alive and my
SHISHMAHI takes place twice a year. I borrow from the money-lender
who partakes one third of my salary ....
"I am your employee and still I am naked. I am your man and
still I have to borrow. I am a poet. I can write all kinds of
poetry ... But I have not come to you to exhibit my worth as a
poet. I have come here with a prayer."

The emperor was convinced by the poem. He realized the
difficulties faced by his employees. Immediately, a SHAHI FARMAN
(royal order) was issued ordering disbursement of salaries of
employees on a monthly basis.

The couplet with which this write-up opens is the last of the
30-couplet poem. Six of the couplets are reproduced below:

BAS KI LETA HUN HAR MAHENAY GARZ,
AUR REHTI HAI SOOD KI TAKRAR.

MERI TANKHWAH MEIN TIHAI KA,
HO GAYA HAI SHREEK SAHOOKAR.

AAP KA BANDA AUR PHIROON NANGA,
AAP KA NAUKAR AUR KAROON UDHAR.

MERI TANKHWAH KEEJAY MAH-BA-MAH,
TO NA HO MUGH KO ZINDAGI DUSHWAR.

KHATAM KARTA HOON AB DUA PE KALAM,
SHAIRI SE NAHIN MUJHE SAROKAR.

TUM SALAMAT RAHO HAZAR BARAS,
HAR BARAS KE HON DIN PACHAS HAZAR.

Present day employees should be grateful to the great poet for
the practice of payment of salary on a monthly basis.

Another poet of Mirza Ghalib's stature is needed if one wants
salaries every week. Could Ali Sardar Jafri and Kaifi Azmi, two
great living poets of our time, convince Dr. Manmohan Singh through
a poem or two to do the same?