Saḥar hone tak

the long version

An autobiography that talks to you. It recounts the life of one of India's foremost screenplay, story and dialogue writers who died in 1998, after entertaining six generations with his movies, his wit and his poetry. The book recounts his turbulent upbrining in the highly cultured city of Lucknow in the then kingdom of Oudh (Oude), which has produced some of the finest writers and potets and intellectuals of the era. A truthful and frank account, it starts off by describing his neighbourhood of Wazirgunj (also Wazir Gunj) inLucknow, scores of families who lived there, his close friends, neighbourhood poetry sessions, some very very unusual people with powers that seem almost magical, and then moves on to how he ran away to join the movies (in those days an industry of ill repute among decent folk), shot his film in Rangoon, acted in several films in Calcutta, before moving to Bombay (now Mumbai) and writing his first film for Hemansu Roy of Bombay Talkies, a film called "Vachan," a vow or promise. It explores a depression he lived with all his life, in the background as he moves from one stage of his life to another, his struggles, eventual success, downfall, success and ends in the 1970s. The book was written in his native tongue, Urdu, and also published in the Devnagiri script in Hindi. It is currently being translated into English by his son, Zuhair Kashmeri, of Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario, Canada, and is the subject of a documentary being produced for OMNI-TV of Toronto, Canada, set for release in late 2011.