‘Dheik Mera Kashmir’: Travelogue of Yaqub Nizami

Ishtiaq Ahmed

Islamabad: Yesterday, Friday 6th, I had the privilege of attending the launch event for the book by the celebrated author Yaqub Nizami, from the UK. The book is based on the author’s travels through Kashmir.

The event was at Pakistan’s Academy of Letters in Islamabad, founded in 1976 by a group of renowned Pakistani writers, poets, and essayists and inaugurated by the former Prime Minister of Pakistan, the late Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto. It is the national institution of its type in Pakistan, dedicated to the celebration and promotion of Pakistani literary pursuits.The prestigious ceremony was presided over by Dr Muhammad Saleem Mazar, the former vice-chancellor of the University of Punjab, the Director General of the department dedicated to the promotion of the national language, and an imminent scholar in his own right. He was flanked by Doctor Nisar Tarabi, a renowned poet and literary critic, and Madam Farkanda Shamim, a foremost teacher in the art of travelogue writing.

The principal architects of this celebration event were the most senior journalist and author, Tariq Masood, and the celebrated fictional writer Hamid Qaiser, in partnership with the management of the Literature Academy of Pakistan in Islamabad. Sajjad Azhar, the author of popular ‘Rawal Raaj’, also kindly graced the occasion.The speakers from the floor included Akabar Niazi, Tariq Masood, Murtaba Sheikh, Hamid Qaisar, Sajjid Qazi, the Additional Secretary, and myself. Different speakers highlighted the salient aspects of this travelogue that provide unique and fresh insights into the physical, cultural, and social beauty of Kashmir.The author’s personal observations of the real Kashmir and wit make this a landmark literary contribution, his love for his place of birth oozing out from every page. It was such a privilege to be included among this illustrious company of thinkers and writers.

The popularity of the ‘Dheik Mera Kashmir’ can be assessed by the fact that every copy at the event stall by the publishers Alfaisal was sold . This in a country where the buying and reading of the books is on a downward trend hastened by digital orientation. This is in reverse of the trends in the other nations, for example ,UK and America, where book buying and reading is on the annual increase. Something for the Academy to engage with creatively.

Yaqub Nizami lives in Britain, but his heart is in Pakistan and Kashmir, as is the case with the millions of others from this much-loved land of ours, despite gigantic failures at every level of nationhood.