साहिर लुधियानवी

Sahir Ludhianvi (8 March 1921 – 25 October 1980) was Hindi cinema's greatest poet-lyricist — the pen that dragged the film song out of romantic convention and into the witness box of society. Born Abdul Hayee into a landowning family of Ludhiana, he grew up in the shadow of his mother Sardar Begum's struggle: her separation from his father and the poverty that followed turned him into a rebel for life. While still in college he published his first collection of verse, Talkhiyaan ('Bitternesses', 1945), which shook Urdu letters. A Progressive Writers' Movement man, he was editing journals in Lahore when, in 1949, the Pakistan government's hostile eye fell on his revolutionary writing — he moved via Delhi to Bombay.

He began with Azadi Ki Raah Par (1949); recognition came with 'Thandi Hawayein' (Naujawan, 1951) and Guru Dutt's Baazi (1951), both with S.D. Burman. Then came Pyaasa (1957) — 'Yeh Duniya Agar Mil Bhi Jaye To Kya Hai' and 'Jinhen Naaz Hai Hind Par Wo Kahan Hain' — the highest meeting of poetry and rage in Hindi cinema. 'Woh Subah Kabhi To Aayegi' (Phir Subah Hogi), 'Main Zindagi Ka Saath Nibhata Chala Gaya' and 'Abhi Na Jao Chhod Kar' (Hum Dono), 'Jo Wada Kiya Woh Nibhana Padega' (Taj Mahal, 1963) — which won him his first Filmfare Award — and the title song of Kabhi Kabhie (1976), which won him his second, alongside the Yash Chopra films Waqt, Daag and Trishul.

Sahir was the first lyricist to fight for royalties and to force All India Radio to announce lyricists' names along with singers and composers; he famously demanded one rupee more than Lata Mangeshkar's fee. His unfulfilled loves — Amrita Pritam and Sudha Malhotra — are among the most poignant stories in Urdu-Hindi letters; he never married, living with his mother and, after her death, with his poetry and his cigarettes. Honoured with the Padma Shri (1971), he died of a heart attack on 25 October 1980. 'Kal aur aayenge naghmon ki khilti kaliyan chunne wale' — he had written his own elegy; but no one like Sahir ever came again.