Friday, March 23, 2007

Chirag - E - Sahar



Bhagat Singh wrote these words in a latter to his younger brother on 3rd March 1931 from Central Jail, Lahore just 20 days before his death punishment.


The death sentence of Bhagat Singh, Rajguru and Sukhdev was not at all surprising, but the most shocking was that the so called law abiding British government stuffed the three dead bodies in bags and discreetly burned them with kerosene oil near the Hussainiwala bridge and threw away half burned bodies in Satluj. First time in the Indian history the death penalty was done in the dusk in spite of morning. Their families were not allowed to see them before the hanging and and of course their dead bodies were not handed over to them. And we still find many Indians proudly extolling the virtues of British Raj while sipping tea in their drawing rooms.


These are some another favourite lines of Bhagat Singh!




Tarz -e- Jafa = Style of cruelty/injustice

Dahar = Misfortune

Adu = Enemy/Against

Sahar = Dawn

Musht - e - Khak = Part of soil (here 'Body')

Faani = Mortal

Uluf = Mixture(ing)

(I tried my best with these words, any suggestions/corrections are welcomed)

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Praney i like to say Thankyou for writing this post .You took me back to those days and the lost josh in me came up with a loud voice saying INKLAAB ZINDABAD.Very proud of u dear.

Anonymous said...

Dahar = duniyaN not misfortune as misfortune is not going to the next line as

Charkh = Asmaan - here referring to the God

and the meaning of "Ulaf" must be love, I'm not quite sure I will check it and come back :).


Really nice to read the poems by Bhagat Shing.

Thank you so much for posting it and giving some information about those Martyrs.

Praney ! said...

Anony : Though I merely played a role of messenger, still I feel honored, thanks for such words full of inspiration. If this post has enlightened even a single heart for this nation I feel my effort is fruitful. Vandemataram to you too. 

Juneli : Really thanks for your suggestions, I did pretty effort to get actual meanings of these words, you know my effort was so interesting that it deserve a post here, may be I will.

Anyway, Dahar I consulted in an dictionary and was given ‘misfortune’ , Charkh was not found in any dictionary but your mean sounds accurate, so did Adu, it was also unavailable and I guessed it as ‘Against / Enemy’, Ulaf was also not found but ‘ul’U’f was so the nearest meaning is given there. I am still trying , hope to find exact meanings.

You are anytime welcome for any information about Indian martyrs, I think I had great privilege to read a lot about them in my childhood.

Anonymous said...

"Dahar" means - World, Period, Era and if it is used as Raah-e-dahar it means "Path Of Life"

I am sure Adoo's meaning what you gave must be correct as it's going with the meaning of the poem.

I also could not find the meaning of Ulaf :(. the meaning uluf of uluf is ok but it's exactly not going with the essence of the poem but "love" would go with it so I think "Love" is also one of the meaning of the word "ulaf".

I could be wrong as you know I'm non-urdu (also non-Hindi) speaker. :).

Unknown said...

Fantastic stuff this. Thanks Praney for sharing them. My inputs on the words.

Dahar - Juneli is right. It means Earth/World.

Uluf - Praney is right. Uluf is plural of words Alf(means thousand) and Alif(meanss a congregation or a union).

Praney ! said...

Manish : Thanks for your inputs. I have a nice poem on Bhagat Singh, but its in punjabi and long. Wish I could translate and post here some time.