FREE PRESS GUJARAT Sunday, December 16, 2018 2 Literary legend of native tradition Kunwar Narain was a indigenous humanitarian literary icon, who with his outlook that prompted Narain exceptionally refined literary to avoid all kinds of polemical sensibility, stylistic as well as criticism of art and literature. linguistic sophistication, and Such criticisms tend to ignore a tremendous sense of the need to understand Advent of inevitable humanism embedded in intricacies and complexities native traditions, made behind the creative processes enduring contributions to of a literary work of art, and water wars Indian literature. He brought remain preoccupied with Each one of us have already experienced the impact of perpetuating predominance of water shortages at some point of our lives and definitely back not just enormous accolades for his immensely a particular point of view over expressed our gratitude when the scarcity passed. others, mostly for personal or However, these instances of water shortages might come impressive creative output in various genres such as political aggrandisement. back sooner than expected and might, perhaps, stay Narain the critic never tried permanently. Water scarcity is the lack of sufficient available poetry, short-story, translation, literary criticism, to reduce a creative piece to water resources to meet the demands of water usage the point of a theoretical within a region. It affects every continent and around 2.8 and writings on cinema and music, but also numerous premise which often governs billion people across the world at least one month out of ideologically-oriented critics. every year. More than 1.2 billion people lack access to awards and honours that include the Sahitya Akademi Perhaps the best way to clean drinking water. understand Narain as a critic Water scarcity can manifest itself as water stress, Award, the Padma Bhushan, the Sahitya Academi Senior is to read his creative shortage or deficits and water crisis. While the concept of presuppositions intimately as water stress is relatively new, it may refer to the difficulty Fellowship and the Jnanpith Award. His literary is amply clear from his way of in obtaining fresh water sources and the deterioration and doing criticisms of celebrated depletion of the available water sources. endeavours chart a trajectory to explore those possibilities poets like Agyeya, Shamsher Water shortages may be caused due to climate change and Muktibodh and novelists factors such as altered weather patterns, including that can effectively strengthen core human like Nirmal Verma, Yashpal droughts or floods, increased pollution, rise in human and Hazari Prasad Dwivedi demand and overuse of water. Water crisis is a situation values in a deeply divided and perpetually painful modern respectively. where the available potable, unpolluted water within a Narain was a living region is less than that demanded by the region. Many world where prerequisites for a peaceful and satisfying co- legend. He remained countries across the world are already grappling with throughout his life different manifestations of water problems. existence are increasingly being ignored. remarkably reclusive but Given the sensitivity of the issue of water scarcity, the effectively articulate in his World Economic Forum has already listed this problem as Narain is often said to be a highly contemplative and writings and speeches. An one of the largest global risk in terms of potential impact excellent human being who over the next decade. Currently, a mere 0.014 per cent of visionary bard who chose to creatively engage with some was held in high regard by his all water on Earth is fresh and easily accessible. Of the contemporaries, he was quite remaining water, 97 per cent is saline and a little less than of the fundamental questions surrounding human unambiguous in his three per cent is hard to access. repudiation of any diktats Though there is sufficient amount of freshwater on the existence. Issues that kept the practitioners of the heroic character in an extremely successful poet choices we make in our lives ruthlessly sabotage the coming from the arena of global scale, due to unequal distribution and worsening politics to unnecessarily climate change, some geographic locations have ample Upanishad and the followers Chakravyuh, does not flinch who was almost always as was evident from the short supposedly good intentions of of Buddhist thought wide even an inch in the face of immaculate in his selection of story Kameej in which an a seemingly upright man. influence the sacrosanct availability whereas the rest are exceptionally dry. This journey of poetry. But he was accompanied by a sharp rise in global freshwater demand awake come to occupy a impending death and instead language, impeccable in his apparently innocent man, who Despite giving an appropriate central space in Narain’s displays remarkable courage treatment of content and had already renounced the voice to deeply disturbing simultaneously candid in recent decades, driven by industry, is causing humanity enough to acknowledge the to experience water crisis like never before. If this poetic compositions. The and extraordinary skill of extremely careful about the world having sacrificed the thoughts and emotions primary objective behind his warfare while fighting against idea of enriching the genre material comfort of home with associated with the importance of politics for our continues, the demand for water is expected to outstrip modern day existence. It was supply by 40 per cent by 2030. This is bound to give rise enormously speculative a gang of deceitful warriors of Hindi poetry itself. wife and children, is not only overarching experiences poetic temperament is to on the other side suggests a While Narain was most put into the bar of judgement about borderline in Seema this clarity of thought about to conflicts. the different roles of politics The ongoing tussle between India and Pakistan over reinforce belief in the primacy certain kind of sincerity and famous for his praiseworthy but also declared guilty. With Rekha, Narain emphasised on of human bonding as well as dedication that gives a poetry, he had written the assertion of the plight and the significance of a and literature that enabled Indus waters is an apt example of the conflict that we are him to effortlessly embrace increasingly bound to notice in other parts of the world as the supremacy of definite purpose to wonderful short stories too. indeed despondency of the compassionate and caring humanitarian perspectives of contemporary people to His two collections of short man named Vireshwar Babu, kind of politically neutral the useful insights being well. For decades, the Indus Waters Treaty kept the two offered by the cultural and countries from entering into a full-fledged conflict but that life. Drawing upon sustain themselves even stories — Akaron ke Aaspaas Narain encouraged us to think humanism. information and insight, during the worst phases of and Bechain Patton ka Koras through the fallacious nature It is this connecting thread philosophical traditions of our seems to be a thing of the past as exploding population, country. worsened by climate change, is forcing the neighbours to knowledge and wisdom their lives. — were particularly praised of judicial structures that with a profound sense of fight for every bit of the natural resource. So much so that gathered from both historical Narain brought another for their evocative even cross-border terrorism is now a subject of discussion and mythical characters such heroic figure Nachiketa into expressions of contemporary around which the sharing of waters is concerned. This as Sarhapa, Abhinavgupta, the picture in two other realities in such a way that was bound to happen. Kumarjiva, Amir Khusro and poetry collections namely his concerns for the Where there is sufficient resource, there is never a Gandhi, Narain preferred to Atmajayi and Vajasrava ke cultivation of a sense of moral conflict but when the same becomes scarce, it brings weave an interesting and Bahane. Nachiketa asks discrimination and genuine conflicts of scale. Tired of one-way courtesies from its side inspiring web. This made it extremely difficult questions commitment to humanitarian in the face of relentless cross-border and state-sponsored evident that he possessed a to Yama and his own father, principles were much terrorism by Pakistan, India is now changing gears and credible historical sense. Even Vajasrava, about death and obvious. water has become a diplomatic leverage weapon. India when he employed mythical existence, attachment and While reading these recently fast-tracked hydropower projects worth $15 billion figures for his poetic renunciation respectively. stories, readers get curious in Kashmir. Projects in the form of nine dams will be purposes, he never lost sight Nachiketa story was taken before getting poignantly completed following the due procedures and requisite of historical sense that from Kathopanishad, but it conversant with the clearances. These dams will help Pakistan understand that enabled him relocate those was employed to give it a protagonists, subject matter the act of abetting terrorism has led to a cost where an figures. This helped him contemporary meaning. they deal with and the already scarce resource is all set to become even scantier. render them absolutely Here. we may also seek an ambience they create in meaningful in a adequate answer to those stories. For instance, contemporary social and questions about human life, Gudiyon ka Khel not only Writing for the regimes cultural set-up. Additionally, its annihilation and truths underlines the struggles and it helped him find out about the existence of an hardships of brother-sister Early this year, a clip from an Urdu play produced by PTV plausible solutions to those afterlife. duo who conduct the circus, went viral. It showed a discourse between two famous TV lingering problems that had Issues raised by Narain in but also highlights the actors, Firdous Jamal and the late Khayyam Sarhadi. The been major concerns for the these collections were undercurrents of existential clip was from a play, Man Chalay Ka Sauda, that was telecast modern society. relevant for contemporary angst and unhappiness of the in the early 1990s, and was penned by Ashfaq Ahmed. Jamal His historical sense did not readers precisely because hero who is otherwise able to plays the role of a modern-day Sufi sage, who through some allow anyone draw divisive they motivated them to manifest a lot of enthusiasm simplified quantum physics, tries to explain the complexities lines among individuals. meaningfully engage with the and zeal for the celebration of spiritual understanding of the universe to an existentially Instead, it made an earnest highly unpredictable twists of life. Alongside he shows a lost character played by Sarhadi. attempt to put hostile people and turns, often mysterious, great deal of compassion and To some, the dialogue delivered by Jamal was brilliantly together for the sake of miraculous and even generosity weaved together by the playwright, while to others, it was forging a harmonious monstrous pulls and for the nothing but pseudo-scientific/pseudo-spiritual mumbo jumbo. relationship between them. pressures of human life with people from But that was Ashfaq Ahmed, perhaps one of the most This kind of inclusive a view to encourage them to the polarising Urdu playwrights in Pakistan. His name still provokes approach with an explicit think along the lines of living periphery. distinct responses of reverence or repulsion. His admirers optimism suggests Narain’s a purposeful and productive Narain see him as a sage. His detractors decry that he was an unflagging commitment to life, and not just a posed some opportunist who had no qualms about using his writings to the essence of nativist ideas superficially happy and tough serve the ideological inclinations of the Governments of the and principles that appear to materially sound one. questions day. Ahmed was only a minor library figure up until the 1950s. govern his poetic In his other collections of about the This was the heyday of the much celebrated Progressive preoccupations. poems, Narain proved to be kind of moral Writers’ Movement. It had produced a number of highly In his very first innovative Urdu novelists, short-story writers and poets. They collection of commented on various social and political issues through poetry, styles of writing inspired by realism, Marxism and the theories Chakravyuh, of the controversial psychologist, Sigmund Freud. Narain made it Ahmed first tasted fame in 1962 when he began to host a very clear that he show on Radio Pakistan (RP) called Talqeen Shah. There he had a deep desire befriended writer Qudratullah Shahab, who was part of the and high Ayub Khan Government that had come to power through a aspiration apart military coup in 1958. According to an article in Dawn by from those Harris Khalique, Shahab helped the regime usurp the ordinary ones that publications of the Pakistan Progressive Papers and made defined the Ahmed the editor of one of these publications. No wonder, existence of Ahmed praised the Ayub regime’s ‘modernist’ policies to no people who were end. At RP, he also became a close associate of Urdu short happy and content story writer, Mumtaz Mufti. It was due to the influence of with the fulfilment Shahab and Mufti that Ahmed developed a deep interest in of their immediate Sufism. However, in the late 1960s, Ahmed became material needs disillusioned by the Ayub Government. He believed that Ayub’s and requirements. ideas about human progress were overtly materialistic. In It was precisely an his article, Khalique quoted Urdu poetess Fahmida Riaz, as acute awareness saying that with the coming to power of ZA Bhutto’s left- about those deep leaning Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), Ahmed began praising desires and high Bhutto’s brand of socialism. aspirations that set creative fertile Edi:Mayur C. Bhatt, Printer & Publisher-Mayur C Bhatt., Place of Pub: 37/ A, Rajlaxmi Tanament, Opp. Rami Vidhyalaya, minds apart and Laxmipura, Gorva,Vadodara-Place of Printing : Mahadev explained their Offset, H-47, Ravi Estate Rustam Mill Compound Dudheswar, pre-occupations. Ahmedabad-19. Owner : Kalyani Pub. Pvt. Ltd. The way Abhimanyu, his