Gulzar's reading from his book Half a Rupee stirred many emotions in the crowd. E Agha gauged the fever
On the second day of the Spring Fever, the guests were in the grip of various emotions — love, pain and joy! Trust Gulzar saab to give everyone a reason to go back in times of their lives and dig out a lekin or an Ijaazat moment. For him, he practices no rocket science by touching our hearts with his word craft, “I just tell you what you feel, maybe I expose you to your own wounds,” he said when someone from the audience asked him about his accuracy on hitting on the right chord.
The second session of this literary event was poetic. Sunjoy Shekhar, who has translated many of Gulzar’s works in English, was in conversation with him. “Jab mera kaam English mein translate hua toh laga istree ho kar aaya hai, isse pehle mein gunjle kapde pehen raha tha,” said Gulzar leaving the audience in awe of his style.
After some formal introductions Shekhar read out from Gulzar’s latest book Half a Rupee. He chose the story titled Sahir and Jaadu, which is a heartwarming tale of Sahir ludhianvi’s friendship with Javed Akhtar. Next was the poet’s turn. He recited the story Atthanni (title of the book), which was a thought-provoking look inside the life of a common man, who becomes hostage to a politician as well as a terrorist. Where the latter controls common man by the gun, the former holds the strings “by note (money) and then by vote, and holds him captive for five years. This gets renewed after every five years,” Gulzar read from the story.
Expressions on the faces of the visitors brightened when Gulzar said, “A bird fell in love with a kite thinking that the kite is a bird.” The love tale unfolds in one of his stories titled Ghughu and Jamuni, where the dove named Ghughu falls captive to the beauty of jamun (purple) coloured kite.
When the room opened for a Q&A someone from the crowd asked, “How things change when you write for kidsIJ How comfortable are you to move away from the depths of emotions to deal with charms of childhoodIJ” The master writer replied, “When you write for kids you have to kneel down and learn from them… while for elders you just say Kajra Re and they cheer up!”
The session ended with Gulzar signing the books, which must have pained his fingers because the line of fans kept increasing.