Krishan Chander
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Krishan Chander (November 23, 1914–March 8, 1977) was an Urdu and Hindi afsaana nigaar, or short story writer. He wrote in the Urdu language. He was a prolific writer, penning over 20 novels, 30 collections of short stories and scores of radio plays in Urdu and later, after partition of the country, took to writing in Hindi. Krishan Chander's novels have been translated into over 16 Indian languages and some foreign languages, including English.
Krishan Chandar lived most of the time in Poonch (Kashmir) and he was proud to be a Kashmiri. His two famous novels Shakast (Defeat) and Mitti Ke Sanam are related to Kashmir's partition. He loved Kashmir and like other progressive authors of Kashmir he wanted Kashmir to be Independent from both Indi and Pakistan. His famous AFSANE (short stories) are the stories of Kashmiri villages. He used Pahari ( dialect of people living in Poonch)words while writing in Urdu. He was against the Hindu-Muslim conflicts and a great messenger of religious harmony a pride of Kashmiri society. The forcible division of Kashmir in 1948 after the creation of India and Pakistan left deep marks on his writings.
His literary masterpieces on the Bengal famine and the savagery and barbarism in 1947 are some of the finest specimens of modern Urdu literature, but at other times too he continued relentlessly to critique the abuse of power, poverty and the suffering of the wretched of the earth; but above all he never stopped protesting casteism, fanaticism, communal violence and terror. He was a humanist and a cosmopolitan (Ishtiaq Ahmed, May 19, 2007).
Krishan Chander died working at his desk in Mumbai on March 8, 1977. He had just started to write a satirical essay entitled Adab baray-e-Batakh (Literature for a duck), and wrote just one line 'Noorani ko bachpan hi sey paltoo janwaron ka shock tha. Kabootar, bandar, rang barangi chiriyaan…' (since childhood Noorani was fond of pet animals such as pigeons, monkeys, multi-coloured birds…') but before he could complete the sentence he succumbed to a massive heart attack (Ibid).
Kitaab Ghar has published selection of his short stories entitled Krishan Chander KE Bahtareen Afsanay as an E-Book.
References:
Ahmed, Ishtiaq, Krishan Chander and Lahore, The News International, Karachi, May 19, 2007.
