Between the 16th and 18th centuries, Persian language poets in Iran and India established a parallel universe of poetic expression, which sought to engage the mind with complex metaphors, personification of abstract concepts, and imagery that was both intellectually complex and marvellously fresh. Despite its focus on engaging the intellect, like all sophisticated artistic expressions about the human condition and its subjective reality, it was also emotionally moving.

This style of poetry came to be known as Sabk-i-Hindi (Indian style), which critic Nasir Abbas Nayyar calls the modernist movement of Indian Persian poetry, and which preceded the modernist movement in the West by four centuries.

Some of the greatest proponents of Sabk-i-Hindi were Baba Faghani Shirazi (d. 1519), Jalaluddin Muhammad ‘Aseer’ Shahrestani (d. 1639), Abu Taleb Kalim Kashani (d. 1651), Ghani Kashmiri (d. 1666), Nasir Ali Sirhandi (d. 1697), Muhammad Ishaq Shaukat Bukhari (d. 1699), Ghanimat Kunjahi (d. 1713), Abdul Qadir Bedil (d. 1720) and Mirza Qateel (d. 1817).

In Rang-i-Asrar-i-Digar [Transcendental Hues], internationally acclaimed poet Afzal Ahmed Syed offers, in Urdu translation, a selection of nearly 450 verses from Abdul Qadir Bedil, the prince of Sabk-i-Hindi poetry, whose influence reaches beyond India and Pakistan into Central Asia and all Persian-speaking regions. He also left a profound impression on both Ghalib and Iqbal’s thought and poetry.

Nasir Abbas Nayyar’s insightful preface to this important selection offers a useful frame for understanding the reasons why Afzal Ahmed Syed has translated Bedil and other Sabk-i-Hindi poets in the past, and how Syed’s engagement with Bedil and this tradition has helped to integrate it into the world of contemporary Urdu poetry.

Nayyar writes: “Modern Urdu poetry has faced a rupture since its birth in the late 19th century, and to express itself, it has employed the logic of the same rupture. The resulting vacuum is simultaneously historical, cultural and aesthetic. To be a modernist poet in our time is to completely negate the classical tradition, history and the indigenous literary canon. This negation becomes absolute when not only the corpus of classical poetry, classical aesthetics, and the temporality which provides them meaning are sidelined, but the ingredients of the narrator’s selfhood are also changed. And not only that, to legitimise this negation and change, progress is presented as an overriding principle…

“In our time, the one who has addressed this rupture creatively is Afzal Ahmed Syed. Others have explained this rupture with the ideas of nationhood, religion, history and metaphysics; Syed has only focused on literature… Syed does not see classical and modern traditions from a post-colonial lens. He bases his understanding on literature’s free-spirited, feral nature. This is the main reason for his interest in the Sabk-i-Hindi poets, especially Bedil…

“The reason he is not striving for a revival of the classical literary world view is because the desire for revival sprouts where the past remains a static, sanctified presence and one feels an existential alienation towards the present. It is something extraordinary that he studies the Sabk-i-Hindi poets like contemporary poets. He sees many commonalities in poetical approach between them and the exponents of modern poetry, which is to say that he sees a continuation of the poetic vision introduced by the Sabk-i-Hindi poets in the contemporary poetry, in his own work and in the work of his contemporaries… In simple words, he does not consider Bedil a fossilised presence from the past, but an eminently engaged poetic presence.”

The poetic world view presented by the Sabk-i-Hindi poetry was so novel that it was not immediately appreciated and, for 200 years of its existence, poets writing in this tradition faced an inner exile from the accepted literary tradition of their time. The Sabk-i-Hindi poets were heretics in the established poetic order of their time.

The ultimate test of any artistic expression is whether or not it is able to engage our humanity. Through their abstraction, the Sabk-i-Hindi poets created a rarified vision of human existence that is both delicate and endearing and imbues our physical and emotional existence with venerability.

I have attempted a translation of some verses which give a flavour of the couplets Syed has selected for his translation:

Aik shokh [mashooqa] jis ki aasteen rag-i gul se bani hai, humain giraftar karnay ki ghaat mein hai
[Magar woh itni nazuk hai ke] Rang-i-hina ke saaye se [bhi] uss ka haath [jaisay] pathar ke neechay aa jata hai

[A coquette whose sleeve is made from the veins of rose-petals, sets her eyes on my conquest/ When her hands are [so delicate they are] bruised even by the imprint of henna]

Meena khana-i-hairat ki aaghosh mein bohat si nazakatain hain
Palkon ko na jhapka ke kahien tu rang-i-tamasha ko bigaarr na de

[Many subtleties exist in the embrace of existence›s mirror house/ Do not snap your eyelashes or their interplay would go awry]

Saari umr teray saath jaam takratay rahay aur hamara
ranj-i-khumaar nahin gaya
Kya qayamat hai ke tu hamaray pehlu se hamaray pehlu tak nahin pohanchti

[We knocked cups together a lifetime and could not dispel hangover’s pangs/ What a pity you did not budge from my side to my embrace]

When an oversized presence like Bedil appears on poetry’s horizon, and leaves a lasting imprint on his own and subsequent ages, it saturates the poetic vision with multifarious hues. Afzal Ahmed Syed’s selection from Bedil is also important in that he has delineated his own imaginative and intellectual galaxy from the universe created by Bedil.

This selection is a demarcation of the metaphors, abstractions and ideas in Bedil’s poetry that appeal to Syed and, in this respect, it is also a perpetuation of his own poetic expression.

The columnist is a novelist, author and translator.
He can be reached via his website: micromaf.com

Published in Dawn, Books & Authors, April 19th, 2026

Ethnicity and Development: Addressing the Gaps in New Institutional Economics
By Shahrukh Rafi Khan
Routledge
ISBN: 978-1032630830
92pp.

Identifying the factors that caused some nations to progress and prosper, while most others continue to struggle in poverty and deprivation, is the holy grail of development economics.

There are a number of theories, ranging from the obvious effects of the gains of colonialism (which essentially involved plunder), to theories on the effects of climate on development (the idea that people work less in hot countries). The only consensus is that there is probably a mix of factors — geography, history, environment and the occasional sagacious ruler — that have, over millennia, shaped the world as it exists now.

Amongst the long list of development economists who have tried to crack the code, so to speak, the name of Douglass North — and his framing of New Institutional Economics (NIE) — has stood out over some decades. North was an economic historian who emphasised the role of institutions in shaping development.

The core idea was simple — that economic agents may well be considered rational, but they lack complete information on markets, and incur costs in investigating potential partners and rivals, as well as market trends in general. However, if countries build institutions that can enforce contracts, ensure basic law and order, and provide reliable information on how markets are operating, then rational economic agents can operate with minimal transaction costs. This gives them an incentive to invest and save and thus drive economic growth. North’s essential premise has been examined further by many academics, notably Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson.

A brief treatise by a well-known Pakistani economist explores the impact of ethnic friction on the success or failure of nations

The brief treatise that is the subject of this review was written by Dr Shahrukh Rafi Khan, a well-known Pakistani economist. It examines the NIE hypothesis and posits that it is blind to the effects of ethnic diversity and conflict on development. Thus, according to Dr Khan, low- and lower middle-income countries (L/LMICs) that have ethnically diverse populations need to build national cohesion as a priority, along with building institutions for economic regulation and the establishment of the rule of law.

This premise is explained in some detail in this book, which reads like a paper in an academic journal, and is also structured as such. The book begins with a detailed review of literature on the success and failure of nations. But the first chapter concludes with the contention that L/LMICs, most of which are post-colonial states characterised by hastily drawn borders, need to focus first on “horizontal inclusion”, and build a sense of nationhood amongst their (often) ethnically diverse populations, before institutions of the state and regulators can effectively do their jobs.

To explain his point further, Dr Khan makes a distinction between what he calls “natural” nations, or those which feature a dominant ethnic identity, and “constructed” nations, which are ethnically, as well as culturally and/or religiously diverse. He cites a number of quantitative, cross-country studies that uphold the hypothesis that ethnically diverse nations are more prone to internal conflict, which in turn undermines social and economic development.

Dr Khan picks up two case studies to further explore how ethnic diversity (or, on the other hand, uniformity) may impact economic development. The first is a “natural” experiment, ie the comparison of Pakistan and Bangladesh. This is a case that lends itself to the examination of Dr Khan’s hypothesis, given that the two nations were once two wings of the same country, but had quite different ethnic characteristics. East Pakistan (now Bangladesh), being largely ethnically homogenous, and West Pakistan being anything but.

After the 1971 war, and Bangladesh’s declaration of independence, the two countries have diverged significantly in terms of economic and social progress. Dr Khan examines a range of economic and governance indicators and, unsurprisingly, finds that Bangladesh has not only left Pakistan behind on key indicators, but has also succeeded in progressing without exacerbating inequality in society. Thus, Bangladesh has not only demonstrated sustainable growth over the last decade or so, but seems to have achieved this in an inclusive manner.

The second case is that of the Balkans, mainly the nations that once constituted the former Yugoslavia. Of the eight Balkan states whose data was analysed, two (Croatia and Kosovo) are largely ethnically homogenous, while two more (Serbia and Slovenia) also have a homogenous population (with more than 80 percent of the population belonging to one ethnic group). But the four other nations are ethnically diverse, and have not only witnessed ethnic tension, but in some cases, outright conflict.

However, the social and economic progress of all eight Balkan states was exceptional, post-independence. According to Dr Khan, the push factor in this case may have been independence itself, which encouraged national development, with or without ethnic diversity.

There is no denying that the basic hypothesis of this study is intriguing and has interesting policy implications. And the hypothesis, stated simply, is that building an inclusive and just society that can counter ethnic and social conflict is crucial for long-term sustainable development. Whether or not it is proved from the data and two case studies cited is a point for discussion.

One could argue that Bangladesh, despite its ethnically homogenous population, was a low-income economy for many years post-independence. Its growth is more due to corporate giants searching for cheap labour (reference Daewoo’s pioneering partnership with Desh Garments, which launched readymade garments manufacturing in the country) and quota restrictions on China and India than any social developments. The author also acknowledges that, while ethnic conflict is practically non-existent in the country, it is riven by political and ideological conflict.

Similarly, with the Balkan states, their emergence as independent nations was preceded by more than four decades of Communist rule, which may have been oppressive and stultifying but did equip them with systems for universal healthcare and provision of basic education across the board. With that strong base, the move towards high growth and social development was perhaps easier to accomplish.

As the extensive literature on the subject suggests, it is notoriously difficult to understand what makes human societies develop (or descend into anarchy). Often, there are too many factors at play. But any scholarship that seeks to shed light on the underlying issues is welcome, and Dr Khan’s research has added a new dimension to the existing work.

The questions raised here need to be discussed more widely, and presented to a wider research community. We hope that the publication of this book will set that wheel in motion.

The reviewer is a researcher and policy analyst

Published in Dawn, Books & Authors, April 19th, 2026

Idol Interrupted

Whatever the reason behind the abrupt halt in the airing of Pakistan Idol Season 2 (which was being watched avidly before the month of Ramazan), the fact remains that it’s a deeply disappointing situation. The people responsible for the show should sit together and reflect on the embarrassment this has caused them, as well as the exceedingly talented contestants who have been left in limbo. The sooner they resolve the issue, the better. Also, keep in mind that the Pakistan version of the international franchise was giving its Indian counterpart a run for its money. Food for thought?

A Classic Gone Awry

Make no mistake, Shafqat Amanat Ali is an excellent singer. He has a number of incredible songs to his credit. But his attempt to redo Mohammad Rafi’s classic song ‘Hum bekhudi mein tum ko pukarey chaleygaye’ from the 1958 Dev Anand classic Kala Pani leaves much to be desired. Rafi sahib sang the song with the kind of emotion and on a scale that was perfect for the protagonist of the story. Kudos to the legendary composer S.D. Burman, too! Emotion is the key word here, which Shafqat A A’s version seriously lacks.

Won’t Hear Ye

Rapper Ye, formerly known as Kanye West, was set to come to England for the Wireless Festival, which will be held in the summer and which he was supposed to headline. Not anymore. The British authorities have banned Ye from travelling to the UK because of his repeated “antisemitic and pro-Nazi” comments, which he has been making for the past few years. British PM Keir Starmer himself announced the ban. The organisers of the Wireless Fest have claimed that, before booking musicians, “multiple stakeholders” were consulted and no concerns were expressed at the time. Well, it’s good to know the UK PM has something important to say and do while the world struggles to avert World War 3.

For World Peace

It was heartening to see Pakistan mediate peace talks between the US and Iran, which led to a two-week ceasefire between their warring armies. Pakistani celebrities, like the entire country, felt super happy and proud about it. The likes of Mahira Khan, Shaista Wahidi and Farhan Saeed expressed satisfaction and breathed a sigh of relief that the world was saved from a possible major catastrophe. Indeed, that was the case. On the other hand, Indians (whose government is not even close to the international diplomatic table) are flocking to cinema houses to watch Dhurandhar: The Revenge, perhaps to ponder how brave their actors are in make-believe fights.

The Fall

Indian actor Akshay Kumar is known for not using stuntmen or visual effects for the action sequences that he performs in films — after all, he is a black belt in karate. But then age is a ruthless thing. Recently, while shooting for Bhoot Bangla, helmed by Priyadarshan, the 58-year-old actor lost his balance mid-kick and fell awkwardly. It hurt him, though thankfully not too seriously. The little accident caused a delay in filming. We urge Akshay K to kick the habit of not seeking a stuntman’s help. No point in kicking the air in an ungainly manner.

Nepo Talent?

K-pop star Dayoung has a new video out, titled What’s a Girl to Do, which features Shiloh, the 19-year-old daughter of divorced Hollywood couple Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, as one of the background dancers. Apparently, she didn’t get the dancing role because of her famous parents. Here’s what the Korean star’s management team has said: “We held an open audition in the United States of America to cast performers for Dayoung’s music video. Among those who took part were several performers affiliated with a dance crew called ‘Culture’. Shiloh was selected in the final round and ended up joining Dayoung’s music video.” Yes, and horses can fly.

Published in Dawn, ICON, April 19th, 2026