The Good, the Bad and the Ridiculous Read Online Free PDF

the freedom movement and spent some months in jail with Jawaharlal Nehru. For four years, he was the undersecretary of the Congress. He topped in the MA examinations and taught English at Allahabad University, before returing as reader in 1958. In 1961, he won the Sahitya Akademi Award; two years later, the Soviet Land Nehru Award; and in 1970, the Jnanpith Award. He could write in Hindi, Urdu and English, but he opted for Urdu as the better medium to convey his ideas. He soon came to be sought after in mushairas, where his closest rival and friend was an equally good poet, Josh Malihabadi (who migrated to Pakistan after the Partition).
    Firaq had a disastrous marriage. His daughter died young, his son committed suicide, and he wrote a lot of nasty things about his wife. His ideal of a female companion was:
     
    Moan aur behen bhi, aur cheheti bhi
    Ghar ki rani bhi aur jeewan sathi
    Phir bhi voh kaamini sarasar devi
    Aur seyj par voh beswa ki petli
     
    Mother, sister, daughter I adore
    Queen of my home, life companion and more
    Much desired as a goddess as well
    But when in bed a voluptuous whore
     
    Firaq was one Urdu poet who—instead of turning to Arabic and Persian vocabulary and imagery, as most poets of that language did—injected a lot of Hindi words in his poems. Instead of using Laila-Majnu, the bulbul, the rose, the moth and flame as symbols of eternal love, he turned to Radha and Krishna. Alongside, he used a lot of imagery from Keats, Shelley, Wordsworth and Tennyson in his compositions. He admitted openly that it often took him weeks to perfect a couple of lines of poetry.
    Firaq died in Delhi in 1982 after a long illness. When he heard of his friend Malihabadi’s death only a few days ago, he is supposed to have said, ‘Once again, the fellow has beaten me to it.’

GEORGE FERNANDES
(1930– )
    If anyone is looking for an appropriate subject for a biography, I can suggest one person through whose life one can tell the story of contemporary India, including the story of its achievements and failures: George Fernandes.
    I have always had a soft spot for George. He had everything I do not have. When I first met him, he was a handsome, well-built young man with zest for life, which attracted the most beautiful of women; I was a flabby, paunchy Sardar, more seeking than sought for. The one thing we had in common was our disdain for all religions.
    I have known George in different incarnations. I recall my first sight of him during a hot summer afternoon on a small platform at Kala Ghoda Chowk in the midst of hundreds of Bombay’s cab drivers, exhorting them to fight for their rights. Later, the same evening, I met him at a cocktail reception given by Mota Chudasama. He was the centre of attention with all the bejewelled glitterati of Bombay’s elite society and as much at ease chatting with them as he was talking to sweaty taxi drivers. He was a trade union leader then, basking in the glory of being a giant-killer, having trounced Maharashtra’s leading dada-politician, S.K. Patil, in the Lok Sabha elections. At one time, he edited a weekly, Pratipaksha , in Marathi and Hindi; in one of its issues, he described Parliament as a brothel house. The case was taken up by the Privileges Committee. And, for reasons unknown, dropped.
    When Emergency was declared, George went underground. However, he managed to let his friends know that he was still around. Once I was summoned by Mrs Gandhi to Delhi for an off-the-record and strictly private meeting; the day I got back to Bombay, I found a letter from George on my table with a one-line query: ‘How did your meeting with Madam Dictator go?’ He was outspokenly critical of Indira Gandhi. A few months later, the Calcutta police nabbed him and he was brought to the Red Fort in Delhi for interrogation.
    The next time I was saw George was at Palam airport. I noticed an enormous limousine flying the Indian tricolour draw up along the ramp. Members of a Russian trade