Remembering Dr. Rahi Masoom Raza, the legendary Urdu poet, Hindi Film Lyricist, and Scriptwriter on his death anniversary today.
Rahi Masoom Raza was born in Ghazipur, Uttar Pradesh. After completing his primary education in Ghazipur, he attended Aligarh Muslim University (AMU) for his higher studies.
After getting a doctorate in Hindustani literature from AMU, he started his career as an Urdu poet and went on to become a writer penning several novels like “Neem Ka Ped” and “Topi Shukla” based on themes like the plight of the lower caste, Partition and the relationship between the Hindu and Muslim communities.
In the 1960s and 70s, Dr. Raza became a prolific writer for Hindi films, contributing dialogues, screenplay as well as song lyrics. In 1979, he won the Filmfare Best Dialogue Award for his work in the blockbuster movie “Main Tulsi Tere Aangan Ki”.
Gulzar used to be the lyricist and dialogue writer of Hrishikesh Mukherji’s films but since Dr. Raza’s associated with Hrishikesh Mukherji, Gulzar was taken only for lyrics and Dr. Raza wrote dialogues for so many films of Hrishikesh Mukherji viz. “Mili”, “Jurmana”, “Golmal”, etc.
Dr. Raza also became an enduring writer for B. R. Films after he wrote their TV serial “Bahadur Shah Zafar”. Though the central idea of the story of the film “Nikaah” was of Achla Nagar, but Dr. Raza contributed a lot in the script and dialogues of the film, but his name was credited only as the literary advisor (along with Umar Khayyam Saharanpuri). The names of the heroes of the film viz. Afaq Haidar and Shahid Akhtar were those pen names by which Dr. Raza used to write in his early days in Allahabad. He also wrote script and dialogues for one of India’ most popular television serial “Mahabharat” for B.R. films which was highly appreciated. Few of the films for which he wrote script or dialogues are “Raste Ka Patthar” (1972), Doosri Seeta (1974), “Mili” (1975), “Bairaag” (1976), “Alaap” (1977), “Kisi Se Na Kehna” (1983), “Main Tulsi Tere Aangan Ki” (1978), “Golmaal” (1979), “Karz” (1980), “Judai” (1980), “Ek Baar Kaho” (1980), “Hum Panch” (1980), “Rocky” (1981), “Disco Dancer” (1982), “dard Ka Rishta” (1982), Sunny (1984), “Tawaif” (1985), “Lamhe” (1991), “Parampara” (1992), “Aaina” (1993), etc.
His books of poems are ‘Mauj-e Gul Mauj-e Sabaa’(Urdu), ‘ajnabi sheher ajnabi raaste’ (Urdu), ‘main ek pheriwala’ (Hindi) and ‘sheeshe ke makaan wale’ (Hindi).
The highlight of his career was his contribution to the script and dialogues of the immensely popular TV serial “Mahabharat” that ran from 1988 to 1990.
