178. Childhood Memories. K A Abbas Essay Reintroduced By P S Remesh Chandran

178 

Childhood Memories. K A Abbas Essay Reintroduced

P. S. Remesh Chandran

Editor, Sahyadri Books & Bloom Books, Trivandrum

Article Title Image By Rita E. Graphics: Adobe SP.

Khwaja Ahmad Abbas once wrote about how he was brought up to become rude, rebellious and anti-establishment in character under the influence of his father. He cites three incidents from his childhood memories to illustrate how his father influenced him in the development of this kind of a personality. His literary and cinematographic life is a very colourful illustration of how much rude, rebellious and anti-establishment he was brought up. 

Arrival of the school inspector announced weeks earlier.

Experiences of a child in his school times will be remembered vividly forever by him. In today’s times, since school authorities fabricate the number of students admitted in each class so that the class strength won’t lower in statistics, divisions won’t fall and teachers won’t loose their jobs, inspection by higher authorities are conducted as a surprise. But in those fair old times, visit of the school inspector would be announced weeks earlier for the school authorities, teachers and students to begin preparations. The filthy coir mats would be washed, dried and re-spread. Slates and black boards would be repaired and scrubbed. New maps would be hung on the walls with the British India and the Princely India separately shown. Boys would come wearing clothes and shoes, duly starched and pressed. 

Blessings of the British Raj in India are roads, railways, schools, post offices, hospitals, and prisons.

When the school inspector came, he usually asked questions to test the intelligence of students in various classes. It looked, in the eyes of young Abbas, that the school inspector’s character and conduct were not suitable for a school inspector. He appeared to be easily irritated and excessively loyal to the British Regime. He asked Abbas which were the blessings of the British Raj in India. Abbas promptly answered roads, railways, schools, post offices and hospitals, along with prisons. Hearing prisons mentioned in the list, the inspector became furious. ‘Stand up,’ he bellowed and the boy stood up, his legs shaking and his heart beating fast. 

Coming from a house where Mahatma Gandhi was a regular visitor.

Circumstances compelled Abbas to further explain that he belonged to a house where Mahatma Gandhi was a regular visitor. This further angered the inspector. He walked out after giving Abbas a baleful stare, the class teacher following him with folded hands. When this incident was related to his father, he patted his son on the back and simply said “Sabash” which in English means “Well done.” Abbas thankfully remembers that perhaps that paternal pat on the back was an encouragement for him to later grow up rude, rebellious and anti-establishment. 

A child and a dog, if not beaten when needed, will receive one day all the beating from everyone in that street.

Abbas’ father wanted his son to consider all human beings as equal. Boys must not think of themselves as superior to others. Once Abbas called their servant’s little son ‘Ulloo ka pattha’ which meant ‘the son of an owl’. His father who overheard this decided to teach his son a lesson. Accordingly, Abbas was locked up in a room without food for six hours as punishment. He was released and given food only after apologizing to the servant’s boy and embracing him. It was the most important lesson- and the most significant gift- his father gave him in his life. 

A newspaper is supposed to be a window on the world, an eye opener for an intelligent child.

As a boy, Abbas liked all the exciting news about the great things that were happening in the country and the world around. He was familiar with an Urdu newspaper which his father brought home from Delhi. When he passed to the high school he was asked what he wanted as a present. Without hesitation he asked his father to present him with a regular subscription to this Urdu newspaper which he liked the most. His father agreed that it was an apt presentation for an intelligent boy. He said that a newspaper is supposed to be a window on the world. It was not surprising that Abbas later became a great newspaper man.

 Image 01. Dharti-ke-Lal 1946. Scene By Indian People's Theatre Association.

The Life and Works of Khwaja Ahmad Abbas.
  
Abbas’ family background was very rich in literature as well as in revolution.

Khwaja Ahmad Abbas was born in Panipat in Punjab in 1914. His birthplace went to Pakistan when India was divided in 1947. Mirza Ghalib’s student and the famous Urdu poet, Khwaja Altaf Hussain Hali, founded the family in which Abbas was born. Khwaja Gulam Abbas, who was a leader of the Indian Rebellion of 1857 and the first revolutionary to be blown out by the British cannons in Panipat, was his grandfather. His father Ghulam-Us-Sibtain was a scholar from the Aligarh Muslim University and a very successful businessman who was also a teacher to Indian princes. His mother Masroor Khatoon was the daughter of the famous Indian educationist Sajjad Husain. So Abbas’ family background was very rich in literature as well as in revolution. Abbas was a B.A. in English Literature and a LL.B. from the Aligarh Muslim University. 

‘The longest-running political column in the history of Indian journalism.’

Young Abbas started career as a journalist in National Call and continued through Aligarh Opinion, The Bombay Chronicle, The Blitz, and Mirror. His weekly column Last Page- ‘the longest-running political column in the history of Indian journalism for 52 years from 1935 to 1987’- was started in The Bombay Chronicle and after its expiry after 12 years was moved to The Blitz which continued there till his death. In this column he interpreted each week’s event and the column became such popular that throughout India people (including this writer) queued before news stalls every Thursday to get hold of a copy of Blitz which sold out no sooner than it arrived. 

What could a Prime Minister give a 71-year-old man except death?

His stories and columns often infuriated many like his story Sardarji infuriating the Sikhs in India and ending up in court. When Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi commissioned him for writing the history of the Indian National Congress for the government, he declined to unduly praise anyone and returned the money given to him. He was a very bold, courageous and principled man. When the same Prime Minister was angered by his questions in an interview, he later told a friend he was only testing the patience of the Prime Minister and what could a Prime Minister give a 71-year-old man except death. 

Interviewing world premiers, prime ministers and presidents.

As journalist, Abbas interviewed such personages as the Russian Prime Minister Khrushchov, American President Roosevelt, the world-renowned actor Charlie Chaplin, the Chinese Premier Mao-Tse-Tung, the first space traveller Yuri Gagarin and many other dignitaries in India and abroad. 

His first film was the story of missing bread and starving millions.

Image 02. Dharti-ke-Lal 1946. Usha Dutt and Shombhu Mitra By Indian People's Theatre Association.

His experiences during this period also as a film critic naturally led his way to the Indian film industry. His first contributions were screenplays for directors such as Chetan Anand and V. Shantaram, the pioneers of Indian cinema. His first film direction was Dharti Ke Lal 1945 (Son Of The Soil) about the 1943 Bengal famine. It was one of the first Indian cinemas to be shown in the Soviet Union and to gain overseas market. When we learn that the heroine in this film was ‘missing bread’ and the heroes in this film were ‘the starving millions’, we can guess how much rude, rebellious and anti-establishment K. A. Abbas grew in his intellectuality as a creator, what were the ‘progress’ he portrayed as achieved in the British India, and how much his views must have angered the British Indian authorities then. 

Films featuring the first double role, first foreign collaboration, and first foreign show.

In 1951, his own production company Naya Sansar (New World) was founded which produced a succession of fine films on the lives of poor people and workers. He produced 13 outstanding films and wrote the script for many more. Besides, almost all the films directed by Mr. Raj Kapoor carried his script. His film Anhonee of 1952 was the first Indian film featuring a double role. His Pardesi of 1957 was the first Indian film co-produced with foreign collaboration. His Saat Hindustani of 1969 was the film that introduced the famous actor-producer Amitabh Bachchan. But Abbas was a bad businessman unlike his father and never became rich in his career. It was rumored that the famous Raj Kapoor films paid him nothing for writing scripts for most of their films. But Blitz editor, the famous Rustom Khurshedji Karanjia (R. K. Karanjia), sustained him by paying him a monthly salary, though meager, for writing his column. We still do not know whether all of the publishers paid him royalties for his books. 

His character as a director and producer can be gauged from the two incidents of his dividing the cash award with twelve co-workers and the gold given to a house servant to marry his daughter away when his film Shehar Aur Sapna won the President’s Gold Medal. 

From Inquilab to The Naxalites- a cinematographer committed to the poor working class.

Even though Abbas had in August 1949 completed his long novel Inquilab (Revolution) based on communal violence, no Indian publisher was willing to print it for its volatile theme for one thing and its length for another. Considering this very volatile theme the communist Soviet Union came forward to publish it in Russia in 1954, the first run of which went to 90,000 copies! Subsequently Germany also published it in 1955. Then only was it published in India followed by Hindi and Urdu editions. 

Many of his books were translated into Russian, German, Italian, French and Arabic, besides many other Indian and foreign languages. It is interesting to note what he himself wrote about his writing career: ‘The novelists look down upon me as a short-story writer, while the short-story writers condemn me as nothing more than a scribe, while all of them together would contemptuously say that I am nothing more than a film-person.’ 

Books in English, Urdu and Hindi written by Khwaja Ahmad Abbas.

The seventy three books in English, Urdu and Hindi K. A. Abbas published during his active literary career of fifty years include: 

Outside India: The Adventures Of A Roving Reporter 1939, An Indian Looks At America 1943, Tomorrow Is Ours! 1943, Let India Fight For Freedom, 1943, Defeat For Death 1944, Invitation To Immortality 1944, Not All Lies, 1945, Blood And Stones 1947, Kashmir Fights For Freedom 1948, I Write As I Feel 1948, Cages Of Freedom 1952, China Can Make It 1952, In The Image Of Mao Tse-Tung 1953, Inquilab 1958, Face To Face With Khrushchov 1960, Till We Reach The Stars: The Story Of Yuri Gagarin 1961, The Black Sun 1963, Indira Gandhi: Return Of The Red Rose 1966, Divided Heart 1968, When Night Falls 1968, Mera Naam Joker (My Name Is Joker) 1970, Bobby 1973, That Woman: Her Seven Years In Power 1973, Jawaharlal Nehru: Portrait Of An Integrated Indian 1974, The Walls Of Glass 1977, Barrister-At-Law: The Early Life Of Mahatma Gandhi 1977, Mad, Mad, Mad World Of Indian Films 1977, I Am Not An Island: An Experiment In Autobiography 1977, The Naxalites 1979, The World Is My Village 1984, Bombay My Bombay 1987, and How Films Are Made 1999. 

Films directed, produced or supplied story, screenplay or dialogue by Khwaja Ahmad Abbas.

The films directed by K. A. Abbas are the following. He was the screenwriter and producer of most of them: 

Dharti Ke Lal 1946, Aaj Aur Kal 1947, Anhonee 1952, Rahi 1953, Munna 1954, Pardesi 1957, Flight To Assam 1961, Shehar Aur Sapna 1964, Hamara Ghar 1964, Aasman Mahal 1965, Dharti Ki Pukaar 1967, Saat Hindustani 1969, Do Boond Pani 1971, The Naxalites 1980, and Ek Aadmi 1988. 

Also, he supplied the screenplay, story or dialogue or all to such films as: 

Naya Sansar 1941, Dr. Kotnis Ki Amar Kahani 1946, Neecha Nagar 1946, Awara 1951, Shree-420 1955, Jagte Raho 1956, Char Dil Char Rahen 1959, Mera Naam Joker 1970, Bobby 1973, Achanak 1973, Love In Goa 1983, Akanksha 1989, and Henna 1991. 

Always a sympathizer of the poor people and a patron of the proletariat.

Because of his unwavering sympathy to the poor people many believed, and also labeled, him as a communist which he was not. Indeed he was a radical and a patron of the proletariat like the Blitz’ Editor R. K. Karanjia. Karanjia who was a pro-Soviet writer in later years was disillusioned by communism and turned to Satya Sai Baba, the man of miracles. Even in K. A. Abbas’ time, the supposed love of communists for the proletariat had become only in theory, and wherever they were in power they were steadfastly supporting capitalists. So, the love of Abbas for the poor people shall not be mistaken as communism. He died in 1987.

Written in: November 1991
First published on: 04 December 2019
 
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Pictures Courtesy: Indian People's 
Theatre Association
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Tags:

Childhood Days, English Essays, Free Student Notes, Indian Film Industry, Indian Writers Novelists Journalists, K A Abbas, Kwaja Ahmed Abbas, Pre Independence British India, School Memoirs,


About the Author P. S. Remesh Chandran:

03. Author Profile Of P S Remesh Chandran By Sahyadri Archives.

Editor of Sahyadri Books & Bloom Books, Trivandrum. Author of several books in English and in Malayalam. And also author of Swan: The Intelligent Picture Book. Born and brought up in the beautiful village of Nanniyode in the Sahya Mountain Valley in Trivandrum, in Kerala. Father British Council trained English teacher and Mother University educated. Matriculation with distinction and Pre Degree Studies in Science with National Merit Scholarship. Discontinued Diploma studies in Electronics and entered politics. Unmarried and single.

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Post: P. S. Remesh Chandran, Editor, Sahyadri Books, Trivandrum, Padmalayam, Nanniyode, Pacha Post, Trivandrum- 695562, Kerala State, South India.