Editor: Shadab Rashid , Pages: 240, Price: Rs. 100/-
The current issue of the magazine viz ‘Naya Waraq-56’ contains fiction, poetry, articles on various literary topics, book reviews and more
By Mohd. Tasleem Muntazir
‘NAYA WARAQ’ (The New Leaf), a quarterly literary magazine published from Mumbai is one of the Urdu journals having their unique identity. Founded by late Sajid Rashid in late nineties, the magazine is ably being run by his son Shadab Rashid who has been taking ahead its tradition of providing literature of worth to readers.
The current issue of the magazine viz ‘Naya Waraq-56’ contains fiction, poetry, articles on various literary topics, book reviews and more. The contents are mostly the portrayal of everyday public life thus having the potential to touch the feelings of readers.
There are eight well-knit short stories reflecting different shades of life. ‘Murda Dhoop’ (Dead Sunlight) by Sajid Rashid ripples through various dimensions of human relationships. Our feelings, hidden or exposed, towards one another and a hidden bond of affection between husband and wife, the intensity of which is manifested when they find their spouse weakened or in pain and distress, are beautifully depicted in this story. Five-page analysis by Mus’haf Iqbal Tausifi on this short story is also included in the issue.
‘Dongarwadi Ke Giddh’ (Vultures of Dongarwadi) by Ali Imam Naqvi revolves around the custom of last rites of Parsis. The sudden disappearance of the vultures that consume corpses as their food has caused a wave of concern among the Parsi community as to where their vultures have gone. This multi-layer short story has also been included in Sahitya Akademy’s bimonthly English journal ‘Indian Literature’ and Muhammad Omar Memon’s compilation of Urdu short stories translated in English. Moreover, a special section on the life and works of Ali Imam Naqvi (1945-2014) is included in this issue (of Naya Waraq).
‘Ek Anokha Sapna’ (A Strange Dream) by Jitendra Billu is about an educated young man who travels from Lucknow to London for fulfillment of his dream and after passing through different phases of hard work becomes successful owner of a restaurant there; but couldn’t succeed in motivating two girl friends to marry him. The story symbolizes that a determined person can make a dream come true with his hard work and that every wish of a person of status may get fulfilled, it is not necessary.
Munira Surati’s ‘Boo Jaan’ is the story of a widowed mother and her son. The emotions of ‘Boo Jaan’, the lifestyle of those living in cramped houses, the sphere of their thinking; all these are well illustrated in the story. The story also hints at the psychological aspect that one’s repressed desires (according to Sigmund Freud) are manifested in different ways and that such a person tries to satisfy those emotions or desires when finds a medium in one way or the other.
‘Eye Contact’ by Anwar Mirza is a story on human thinking swinging between highs and lows. A young girl Afsana is attracted to a married man Jaazib and wants to marry him; but sequence of events compels Afsana to change her will when she meets Jaazib after a long time and learns that Jaazib’s wife Arshi, who has died in an accident, has donated her eyes to Afsana’s daughter Monto who has also lost her eyesight in an accident. Afsana, who too was a widow at that time, tells Jaazib, “Sorry … I won’t be able to marry you. Your house is very high and I am afraid of heights…!”
‘Mera Qusoor Kya Tha’ (What Was My Fault) by Nusrat Shamsi is the story of a boy with girl-like passions who eventually decides to commit suicide out of frustration with his family’s negative attitude towards him. The last lines of the letter he wrote to his mother from the hospital bed were, “I can’t make you a killer. Let me make your job easier. I don’t want to say anything to you, I don’t want to ask anything… just tell me what was my fault?”
‘Doosra Janam’ (Rebirth) by Wasim Aqeel Shah is about the hard-hearted owner of a garment factory Mr. Patil whose wife is a religious woman and strongly believes in reincarnation. She is firm on the belief that man has to pay for his good or bad deeds in the next life if not in this life but her words have no impact on Mr. Patil. Mr. Patil who apparently has a strict attitude towards his employees in order to uphold his principles, makes the widow of a company employee and later his young daughter the victim of his lust. Echoes of the curse of victim have such an effect on Patil’s nerves that when he regained consciousness, found himself in a hospital bed and seems to have inclined towards her wife’s belief.
‘Chennur Mein Parcham Kushaai’ (The Flag-raising in Chennur) is the fiction of Tamil writer Charvakan, real name Hariharan Srinivasan, translated into English by Krishna Sobti and from English into Urdu by Zakia Mashshahdi. Clash of the attitude of present day workers and feelings of a freedom fighter on the occasion of flag hoisting ceremony on Independence Day is the main focus of this story.
Among the articles are Qaiser Zaman’s ‘Lutf-ur-Rahman’s ‘Tanqeed: Ek Baazdeed’ (Lutf-ur-Rahman’s Criticism: A Revisit), Nasir Baghdadi’s ‘Jadeediyat Aur Jadeed Urdu Afsana’ (Modernity and Modern Urdu Fiction), Syed Khalid Qadri’s ‘Zubair Rizvi Ki Yaad Mein’ (In Memory of Zubair Rizvi) and Ali Ahmad Fatmi’s ‘Mithaas Se Bhari Kahaniyaan’ (The Stories Filled With Sweetness). The issue also includes reviews on four books and three sketches. The poetry section is excellent in which Poems of Iqbal Nazar, Shahid Mahuli, Farooq Rahib, Rafiq Jafar, Saleem Ansari, Misdaq Azmi and Ghazals of Noman Shauq, Munir Saifi, Nisar Ahmad Nisar, Badr Mohammadi, Muslim Nawaz, Jamaluddin Jamal, Mehran Amrohi, Obaidi and Qureshi Tahir Naeema are included.
Akram Naqqash’s poetry and Khalid Javed’s essay on his poetry ‘Akram Naqqash Ki Shaairi: Be-Sahar Raat Ka Chamakta Sitara’ (Akram Naqqsh’s Poetry: Shining Star of the Night Having No Dawn) are included in this issue. Arundhati Subramaniam’s ten English poems (Urdu translation by Farhan Hanif Waris) are also part of the poetry section. Readers will like to keep this magazine in their regular reading after reading ‘Naya Waraq-56’.
The author has been in the line of literature for more than forty years and his writings, prose and poetry, have been published in magazines and newspapers of Jammu and Kashmir and outside
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