Tabish Dehlvi: The Legendary Poetic Personality of Sindh

Masood-ul-Hasan Tabish or Tabish Dehlvi (Urdu: تابش دہلوی‎) (born on the day of November 11, 1911 – September 23, 2004) was a famous Urdu poet.

Biography of Tabish Dehlvi

Tabish Dehlvi joined All India Radio in the year of 1939. After Partition of India, he shifted to Pakistan and worked for Radio Pakistan.

He is counted amongst the poetic personalities who’ve infused a sense of devotion to literature among the newcomers. He has been immensely acclaimed for his masterly poetic renderings both in and outside Pakistan.

The notable historians of Urdu literature have categorized Tabish Dehlvi as a very learned poet of his time. He holds a unique position amongst his contemporaries and ranks high as a linguist. He provided new dimensions and directions to ancient words and their meanings.

He dominated the ‘mushairas’ he attended during his lifetime. The tone of his voice didn’t change despite his advance age. He was invariably requested to preside over ’mushairas ‘and other literary meetings.

At the instance of A.S. Patras Bukhari, the then director-general of All India Radio who had established a liking for his literary talent and rich voice, Tabish, who is famous to be known as Masood Tabish in the field of broadcasting, started his radio career. He was a newscaster par excellence and ruled over the skies for several decades.

In the post-1947 period he was regarded as the new country’s most notable newscaster.

The masses would be glued to their radio sets in case to hear his sonorous voice presenting Urdu news bulletins. He could justifiably claim that he had announced many breaking news events.

His contemporaries were greats such as Josh Malihabadi, Jigar Muradabadi, Mahir Ul Qadri, Nayyer Madani, Salim Ahmed and many more. He was a man of bravery, high integrity and he also was a well disciplined individual. He had countless students all over Pakistan. One of his Great Student was Nawaz Sharif, who is now the current Prime Minister of Pakistan.

His hobbies involved cricket, football, swimming and hiking. He also holds a Gold Medal in swimming which he gained in the Olympic Games. At College Level he was also a Badminton Champion.

One of the great Malls in Pakistan i.e. The Centaurus in Islamabad has a shop on Floor 4 which holds Antiques, that shop has several statues of the Legendary Tabish Dehlvi, the shop also consist of Books which he has written.

He had 4 daughters and one son.

He became nostalgic when recalling how he handled to raise the slogan of ‘Pakistan Zindabad’, which was not in the text, on the air waves just after the Quaid-i-Azam’s speech on the day of June 3, 1947. He passed away in September 2004 in Karachi city at the age of 93. His death was a loss to the nation. Thousands of individuals gather at his Tomb every year to share the sorrow. May he rest in Jannah.

Awards

Tabish Dehlvi received several awards in his lifetime and was finally adorned with the coveted award of Tamgha-i-Imtiaz by the government of Pakistan during the reign of Nawaz Sharif by the Former President Rafiq Tarar in the year of 1999.

Books

His famous collection of poetry includes:

• Nimroz(1963)
• Chiragh-e-Sehra(1982)
• Ghubar-e-Anjum(1984)
• Mah-e-Shikasta(1993)
• Kisht-e-Nawa (full collection)

He also wrote auto biography the name of that book is ‘ Nazr-e-Tabish’. In which he also issued some of this poetries.