Anwar Pirzada

Anwar Pirzada or Peerzada (Sindhi: انور پيرزادو), was a researcher, anthropologist and expert on Sindhi history, language and Shah Abdul Latif Bhittai's poetry.

Anwar Pirzada was born on January 25, 1945 in Larkana's tehsil of Dokri, in Sindh. His original name was Muhammad Paryal Pirzada, He passed his Matric from Dokri High School in 1962. In 1963, he became a primary teacher and in 1965 joined with Dr. George F. Bels of the University of Pennsylvania, USA to work on the archaeological site of Moen Jo Daro. In 1966, He did a primary teacher’s training course and in 1969 received his MA degree in English from the University of Sindh, Jamshoro.

Pirzada joined the leftist movements of the late 1970s, but had to remain underground. He even did a stint in the military when he joined the Pakistan Air Force as a pilot officer for the non-GD Branch training course. He never agreed with the 1971 military action in East Pakistan. He took part in demonstrations and as a result was court-martialed and sent to jail for seven years. He served part of his time in Peshawar and then a portion of it in Karachi.

In 1972, Pirzada filed a review application with a magistrate who let him go but disallowed him from working for any government department. Around that time he joined Gulistan School as a teacher and along with his student, Sohail Ansari, brought out a Sindhi periodical from the school. Three years later, he joined Hilal-e-Pakistan as a sub editor while also working as an editor of an Economic Bulletin, which originated from the Russian Embassy.

In 1976, he joined the Sindhi Adabi Sangat, an organization of literature-loving people. It was around this time that he joined the Communist Party, but remained underground for the most part. In 1979 after political turmoil in the USSR forced the Russians to pack up their bags and close down their embassies, Pirzada went home also.

In 1980, he became Dawn newspaper’s Larkana correspondent. Two years later he was appointed the bureau chief of the now-defunct eveninger Star. In 1983, Pirzada joined the Movement for the Restoration of Democracy and was imprisoned for six months. After his release in 1984, he became the same eveninger’s staff reporter in Karachi and started a column titled "Sindh Scenario" along with a column in Dawn called "Sindhi Press Digest."

In 1989, along with his friends, Kalimullah Lashari, Badr Abro and Ishtiaq Ansari, he roamed the Indus River, from Attock till the Arabian Sea, detailing each and every inch of the peninsula for a study.

In 1990, Pirzada became the editor of Awami Awaz, Sindh’s first newspaper with IT technology. The same year he hooked up with a Chicago-based newspaper called Indus News Network.

Due to his deep historical knowledge, Pirzada started working for the prime minister's media cell during Benazir Bhutto's second government. He also has to his credit a translation of Akhtar Baloch's Qaediaani jee Diary which the MRD leader had written while she was in prison. Baloch is Sindh Culture and Tourism Minister Sassui Palijo's mother.

Pirzada also wrote poetry, which he complied in his Sindhi book, Eh Chand, Bhitai khek chaijan. He was also working on material for an encyclopedia on Qambar.

Pirzada died of cancer^[1] at the Liaquat National Hospital (LNH) at the age of 61.

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