Aaj ik harf ko phir dhoondhhta phhirta hai khayaal
Posted on: January 20, 2015
This article is written by Sadanand Kamath, a fellow enthusiast of Hindi movie music and a contributor to this blog. This article is meant to be posted in atulsongaday.me. If this article appears in sites like lyricstrans.com and ibollywoodsongs.com etc then it is piracy of the copyright content of atulsongaday.me and is a punishable offence under the existing laws.
IN CUSTODY (1994) also known as MUHAFIZ was a film belonging to the parallel cinema based on Booker award nominated novel by the same name written by Anita Desai. The film was produced under the banner of Merchant Ivory Productions and was directed by Ismail Merchant. The star cast included Shashi Kapoor, Shabana Azmi, Om Puri, Sushma Seth, Neena Gupta, Tinnu Anand, Ajay Sahani, Prayag Raj, Virendra Saxena etc. The film picked up published nazms and ghazals of Faiz Ahmed Faiz for songs which were jointly composed by Ustad Zakir Hussain and Ustad Sultan Khan. I had set out in detail the story of the film while discussing ae jazba-e-dil gar main chaahoon. For the sake of the background, I will give here only a gist of the story of the film.
Deven(Om Puri), a college lecturer in Hindi is lured by one of his classmates and the editor of an Urdu journal, Murad (Tinnu Anand) to interview Noor (Shashi Kapoor), a famous but fading Urdu poet for documenting his writings. He travels to Bhopal and after reaching Nur’s house in Bhopal, he finds that his job was not that easy as he expected it to be. He faces a lot of hurdles. The poet is an alcoholic and his health is deteriorating. Most of the time, Noor is surrounded by his admirers more for the free flow of drinks and biryani than for his poetry reading.
The problem is further complicated by Noor’s two wives – Safiya Begum (Sushma Seth) and Imtiaz Begum (Shabana Azmi) for their unpredictable behaviour. After a lot of coxing, Noor’s first wife is ready to help Deven in arranging her husband’s interview for which she demands a hefty fee. His second and younger wife who is from a tawaif’s family and a ghazal singer wishes to be known as a poet of repute and sings her husband’s ghazals as her own. So she resists Deven in his attempt to interview her husband by insulting him as many times as she finds him in her house.
At last, with the help of Noor’s first wife, Deven gets an opportunity to interview the poet. But to his dismay, the recording is not done properly and all his efforts, time and money go waste. Despite his further efforts, Deven is not successful in getting the interview recorded. After a few days, the poet dies due to his ill health. Deven has to be content with a book of poems written by Noor for which he becomes the custodian.
The film is a subtle satire on the declining status of Urdu since the fall of Mughal Empire post-1857. Deven who is an admirer of Urdu has to take a job of lecturer in Hindi as Urdu will not get him a job. The editor of the Urdu Journal wants Deven to interview Noor, the poet not necessarily out of the love for Urdu poetry but as a means of commercially exploiting the rare information on the poet and his poetry. The college where Deven is a lecturer in Hindi, sanctions him amount just sufficient to buy a second hand tape recorder for recording the interview of the poet. Probably, for them, it is not worth buying a new tape recorder for recording an interview of a fading Urdu poet.
I have commented about the role of Shashi Kapoor in this film in my earlier article referred to above. I will not mind repeating here in a more forceful way than the earlier one. I regard Shashi Kapoor’s portrayal of an aging Urdu poet, his greatest performance of his acting carrier of more than 3 decades. That a dashing Shashi Kapoor of ‘Pyaar Kiye Jaa’ (1966) and ‘Haseena Maan Jaayegi’(1968) fame could give a restrained performance in the role of an aging Urdu poet of bygone era more with his expressions, gestures and mannerism than rendering his dialogues is testimony of his acting prowess. For some moments, I felt that I was watching a real Urdu poet.
The film has six songs of which one song has been covered in the Blog. I have selected a nazm from the film written by Faiz Ahmed Faiz and sung by Suresh Wadkar. The film starts with a recitation of this nazm by Shashi Kapoor followed by the main credit titles with this nazm sung as the background song by Suresh Wadkar. The second antara of the nazm is interrupted as the credit titles end. However, in the audio clip, the second antara of the nazm is fully covered. In the published version, this nazm has more verses than what is there on the audio clip.
I like the nazm as well as its rendition by Suresh Wadkar. A short aalaap and beautiful musical interludes of sitar, santoor and sarangi in the song are like icing on the cake. Audio clip has a better audio quality than the video clip.
Video(partial) :
Full Audio
Song-Aaj ik harf ko phir dhoondhta phirta hai khayaal (In Custody)(1994) Singer-Suresh Wadkar, Lyrics-Faiz Ahmad Faiz, MD-Ustad Zakir Hussain-Ustad Sultan Khan
Lyrics ( based on Audio Clip)
Recited by Shashi Kapoor
—————————
aaj ik harf ko phir dhoondhhta phirta hai khayaal
aaj ik harf ko phir dhoondhhta phirta hai khayaal
mad bhara harf koi,
zeher bhara harf koi
dil-nasheen harf koi
qahar bhara harf koi
aaj ik harf ko phir dhoondhhta phirta hai khayaal
harf-e-ulfat koi dildaar-e-nazar ho jaise
jis se milti hai nazar bosa-e-lab ki soorat
itna roshan ke sar-e-mauja-e-zar ho jaise
sohbat-e-yaar main aghaaz-e-tarab ki soorat
harf-e-nafrat koi shamsheer-e-ghazab ho jaise
aaj ik harf ko phir dhoondhhta phirta hai khayaal
Background song sung by Suresh Wadkar
——————————————
aaj ik harf ko phir dhoondta phirta hai khayaal
mad bhara harf koi ee
zeher bhara harf koi ee
aaj ik harf ko
phir dhoondhhta phirta hai khayaal
dil nasheen harf koi
qahar bhara harf koi
aaa aaa
aaa aaa aaaa
aaa aaa aaa
aaa aaaa aa
aaa aaa aaaa aaaa
aaa aaa aa
aa aa aa
dil nasheen harf koi
qahar bhara harf koi
harf-e-ulfat koi dildaar-e-nazar ho jaise
jis’se milti hai nazar bosa-e-lab ki soorat
aaj ik harf ko
phir dhoondhhta phirta hai khayaal
itna roshan ke sar-e-mauja-e-zar ho jaise
itna roshan ke sar-e-mauja-e-zar ho jaise
sohbat-e-yaar mein aaghaaz-e-tarab ki soorat
sohbat-e-yaar mein aaghaaz-e-tarab ki soorat
harf-e-nafrat koi shamsheer-e-ghazab ho jaise
aaj ik harf ko
phir dhoondhhta phirta hai khayaal
mad bhara harf koi
zehar bhara harf koi
aaj ik harf ko phir dhoondhhta phirta hai khayaal
Dictionary meanings of some of Urdu words used in the nazm
Harf = Letter or Alphabet (In the context of the nazm, Word)
Mad bhara= Full of intoxicant ( or wine, intoxication)
Dil Nasheen= Close to heart, pleasing
Qahar = Anger, Rage, Fury
Bosa-e-lab= Kiss on the lips
Sar-e-mauja-e-zar= passing through waves of gold/wealth
Sohbat-e-yaar= Company of the beloved
Aaghaaz-e-tarab= Beginning of joy, pleasure
Shamsheer-e-ghazab= Enraged/Powerful Sword
Translation in English
My mind is once again seeking for a word
A word as sweet as honey and as bitter as poison
A word as close to the heart but full of fury
A word as desirable as a glance of the beloved
Whose glance is like a kiss on the lips
(Whose glance is ) as radiant as the passing waves of gold
The company of the beloved is the beginning of joy
A word of hate is like a hit from a powerful sword
My mind is once again seeking for a word
6 Responses to "Aaj ik harf ko phir dhoondhhta phhirta hai khayaal"
January 21, 2015 at 12:02 am
Kamath Sir,
Simply brilliant. The ‘nazm’ is enough to make any discerning person a lifetime fan of ‘Faiz Ahmed Faiz’ . The operative word here is indeed ‘harf’. It is used to mean ‘word’ where ‘lafz’ could have been simpler. But the fact that it is ‘harf’ here contains the wealth of meanings. ‘ Harf ‘ is a word, no just any word but authentic, indelible and genuine as ‘word of God’ . I just wish all that I understand by this ‘nazm’ can be explained.
Also the recitation is not Shashi Kapoor but Parikshit Sahani. Is Shashi Kapoor credited anywhere for this recitation ?
Regards.
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January 21, 2015 at 9:20 am
nahm ji,
Neither Shashi Kapoor nor Parikshit (Ajay) Sahani has been credited with the recitation of this nazm. I was influenced by the way the word ‘aaj’ in second line and the entire last line were recited which is typical of Shashi Kapoor style.
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January 21, 2015 at 7:44 pm
I am positive about the voice being Parikshit Sahani’s. In the film too it is not recited by Shashi Kapoor, it plays in the background. Not seen the movie, but it is not Shashi Kapoor’s voice.
Parikshit Sahani is part of the cast too.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0107199/fullcredits?ref_=ttspec_sa_1
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January 21, 2015 at 5:35 pm
just beautiful! Very grateful for the graceful translation which enables people like us not knowing Urdu to appreciate the great nazm.
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Atul’s Song A Day- A choice collection of Hindi Film & Non-Film Songs 
January 20, 2015 at 7:09 pm
Your translation is the icing on the cake!
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