Raag Darbari – Shruti Sagar – Noor Zehra Kazim
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The Dream Journey: Coming to terms with music in Pakistan’s Indo-Islamic culture
by IMRAN MULLA
The problem with Islam, a Hindu classical musician in India once quipped, was “that it has downgraded music”.
Devout Muslim and maestro of the north Indian oboe, Ustad Bismillah Khan, responded with a twinkle in his eye.
“As you know, most of the best classical musicians of north India are Muslims,” Khan said. “Can you imagine what would have happened if Islam had upgraded music?”
All of those present, Hindu and Muslim alike, roared with laughter.
Islam’s complex relationship with music has greatly influenced the art form in South Asia. It helped shape the music industry in India, but in neighbouring Pakistan it has had a definitive footprint. There, debate over music has simmered for decades as part of a profound struggle over Pakistan’s national identity.
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Herald Exclusive: In conversation with Raza Kazim
by SAROOP IJAZ
Raza Kazim is a lawyer, philosopher and political activist. He is also the inventor of a musical instrument called Saagar Veena and a photographer of international standards. He is a lapsed Marxist — he prefers to call himself a post-Marxist. One of the top lawyers in the country, Kazim has handled many seminal cases in his long legal career.
Most importantly, perhaps, Kazim is a witness. He is a witness to the history of this country — its political and social history. His political career started when he organised a protest in his school during the Quit India Movement in 1942. He later joined the Communist Party of Pakistan but left it soon. He went to prison several times for opposing the government of the day, most famously on the allegations of trying to overthrow General Ziaul Haq’s military regime.
Kazim divides his time between his legal practice, supervising Sanjan Nagar Institute of Philosophy and Arts, which he has set up in his home in Lahore, developing his philosophy of “mentology” and doing many other things.
Here he talks about his life which, in his own words, is “a journey of rejecting ugliness and pursuing human happiness.”
Saroop Ijaz: What do you consider your primary identity — a lawyer, an innovator, an artist, a philosopher or a political activist?
Raza Kazim: I identify myself as a person, as an individual; being a human being is certainly a sufficient canvas for one to find an identity within that. Had I lived a hundred years ago, perhaps, I would have known what it was to be a human being in the Darwinian sense. This is a time for a man to rediscover what it is to be a human.
In the context I grew up – in pre-partitioned India – a man was defined as someone who grew up, got a good job (preferably in government service), got married and perhaps added some frills to it, and that was it. That is no longer relevant. Now, don’t you think that we need to rethink the human dimension?
We are still in the yippee period. We have agreed that it was not enough to be hippies.
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