Javed Akhtar and Sangeeta Datta at The Chambers, Taj Bengal, for An Author’s Afternoon. Pictures: Rashbehari Das

Zanjeer, Deewaar, Sholay... Javed Akhtar has given us unforgettable scripts and lyrics, but on August 23, it was Javed Akhtar the poet who mesmerised a select audience at An Author’s Afternoon. Steered by filmmaker Sangeeta Datta, the session was presented by Shree Cement along with Prabha Khaitan Foundation and Taj Bengal, in association with Jaipur-based literary consultancy Siyahi.

Sangeeta: You have spoken about poetry as a combination of bekhudi and hoshiyari.... Why do you think people still believe in poetry?

Javed: This is a very interesting line by Ghalib, Saadgi va purkari, bekhudi va hoshiyari. It means simplicity and intricacy, self-forgetfulness and total awareness — these are four things that are required to create art. Perhaps that is the magic of poetry. Like any form of art, poetry also has two aspects, one is craft that is totally logical, the other is passion, emotion, fantasy, imagination. But you need both the things together.

I will give you an example which is more physical. Take an actor playing Hamlet. The actor can play Hamlet only when he believes ‘I am Hamlet, I am Prince of Denmark’. At the same time, the director has told him that when you say ‘to be or not to be’ you have to reach that spot under that light. But if he remembers that spot, logic says that he can’t believe himself to be the Prince of Denmark and if he believes he’s Prince of Denmark then he can’t take that spot. But the fact is that both the things are done together, which are ostensibly almost incompatible.

Javed Akhtar and wife Shabana Azmi enjoy ‘cutting chai’

In the same way in poetry, on the one hand you have passion, imagination, you move away from your own self and on the other there is a part of your mind that is very logical, rational and craftsman-like. So ultimately when you need these two things, where would you produce the parts? In your subconscious or your conscious? Like countries, there is a no-man’s land between the conscious mind and unconscious mind, and that is where poetry takes birth. And that is where it makes contact with the reader or listener.... That is the magic of poetry.

Sangeeta: You come from a family with seven generations of writers and poets. That is a great literary legacy, yet you started writing poetry quite late, from the 1980...

Javed: Perhaps that was the reason for my not writing poetry! My father, my uncle, my grandfather... all of them were extremely well-known poets and very competent poets. Since I knew I wasn’t writing good poetry, that was a bit too intimidating, perhaps because the standard, the bar was so high. That was the reason I started writing poetry after my father passed away, so I was sure he wouldn’t be able to admonish me!

On son Farhan and daughter Zoya: they are too shy about their own work, they very reluctantly share it with me. I am afraid they are closet poets. They are very, very coy about it. For reasons unknown, because whatever I have heard is very good

Sangeeta: Was it also a sort of rebellion or moving away?

Javed: Perhaps, yes. I was in college in Bhopal, and Bhopal has a huge population of Urdu-speaking people. Wherever there are Urdu-speaking people you will find poets by the dozen. There are certain things where mediocre looks a bit too mediocre. A bad qawwal is a really bad qawwal, a bad wrestler is pathetic and a bad poet is totally undesirable. So, on the one hand I had good poets who were intimidating me and on the other hand, I had very bad poets who were telling me, ‘Don’t you do that!’

Sangeeta: In Urdu poetry there is also this shared experience of poetry — mushaira. Many years ago, you had said you don’t participate in mushairas, you see your poetry as a solo experience. Was that your way of defining yourself?

Javed: No, not at all. But what has happened recently is very tragic. The kavi sammelans or mushairas have very low standards. There was a time when it was the middle and upper-middle classes that nurtured art, literature and ideas. Industrialisation, globalisation, corporatisation, whatever you call it, the middle class of India has left its vernacular languages.

Now the vernacular languages have been left to the poorest of the poor. And there the circumstances don’t allow any room for developing poetry, art and literature. There life is too harsh, too hard and life always influences language. If life is not smooth then language will cease to be smooth and if life is ugly then the ugliness will enter language too. So, gradually the law of lowest common denominator is applying to poetry.

Sangeeta: In your first book (Tarkash), the tone of poetry was autobiographical, confessional, emotional. And then you took many, many years to come out with Lava (2012). How different is Lava from Tarkash?

Javed: If after 18 years — Tarkash was in 1994 — I give you a second book and it is exactly the same, that is dangerous. That would mean in 18 years nothing has happened to this man, he hasn’t changed at all!

The moment you feel this is my image, this is what I am expected to write, then you are in trouble. Because then you may be imitating, and sadly imitating your own self.

Sangeeta: In Lava, there are so many ghazals, a formal structure within which you are putting your thoughts... that often reminds me of the Petrarchan sonnet or the Shakespearean sonnet — would you like to explain the format of ghazals here?

Javed: Ghazals are different from sonnets. The sonnet carries one idea from the first line to the eighth. But ghazal is a very, very interesting form of writing. It gives you tremendous possibilities. Because in a poem you take a topic, you take a statement, it starts and ends. Ghazal gives you the opportunity to say many things which may or may not be connected at all. It is like a box of assorted biscuits.

What makes a ghazal is the metre, the rhyme, and there is one more thing, which is found in not many languages, not in Greek, Latin, Arabic, Hebrew, Sanskrit... that is called a radeef. Traditionally, a couplet ends on a rhyme. Suppose we take a doha: Rahiman uski raah padhi, tedhe toh woh kaam/ Seedhe se jag na miley ultey miley na Ram…. Here ‘kaam’ and ‘Ram’ rhyme. Yeh cheez ek hai Urdu poetry mein jise radeef kehte hain, woh ek extra musicality paida karti hai. Something which is recurring after the rhyme. The line doesn’t stop on the rhyme.

Dil-e naadaan tujhe hua kya hai?

Akhir iss dard ki dawa kya hai?

‘Hua’, ‘dawa’ toh rhyme hai, yeh ‘kya hai’ kya hai? Yeh radeef hai.

Two lines make a sher and it’s a complete statement within itself. Uska agle sher se koi vasta ho, iski koi zaroorat nahin.

Ismein ek aapko yeh freedom mili ki aap paanch baatein keh saktey hain, doosri ek condition bhi hai ki aapko poori baat do hi line mein kehni hai. Toh jab do line mein aapko baat kehni hoti hai, toh aap in cheezon ko kisi tarah se compact kartein hain. Ab hum logon ka ek problem aajkal hai, jo hum sab face kartein hain ke 140 characters mein hi aap tweet kar sakte hain. Toh phir iska asar spelling pe para hai.

Because you have to complete the statements in two lines, you need symbols. When you use these symbols, a trained reader would know what you mean. Traditional ghazals developed a number of symbols. Like maikhana. Now maikhana means a tavern, but in poetry it’s not a tavern. Maikhana was a symbol of free thinking. Rind or peenewala is the man who is not bound by tradition, a man who doesn’t believe in the fundamentals of tradition or society.

Jinhe pyaas hai, unhein kam se kam/

Jinhe pyaas kam, unhein dam badam/ Mere saathiya tere mehkade

ka nizam hai toh mazaak hai.

Is he talking of tavern, is he talking about wine, is he talking about a drunkard? No, he is talking about an unjust economic system.

Sangeeta: Both your children [Farhan and Zoya] are writing poetry, in English. Do you at all get moments to discuss poetry with them?

Javed: Well, they ask me some questions about poetry and what I am writing or they have written. But they are too shy about their own work, they very reluctantly share it with me. I am afraid they are closet poets. They are very, very coy about it. For reasons unknown, because whatever I have heard is very good.

Sangeeta: Where would you draw a distinction between the popular songs that you have written and your poetry?

Javed: No genre is superior or inferior on its own. You can make a very bad painting and a superb poster. The thing that film songs are inferior per se is wrong. The basic difference is that it is in a way a commissioned work. You are given a situation, more often than not a tune. Writing a dialogue or a film song is a kind of latent acting. You take that role and think from the point of view of that character.

While you are writing your own poetry, you are free to choose your meter, your topic, language and hope that it will be read by people who have a developed aesthetics and are familiar with the subtleties and nuances. So you can be more understated in your literary work, while for film songs it is the complete reverse since it is for everybody.

But you can write a very good song from any standard. If we fail to do it, it is our failing, not the failing of the genre. That is why if you take song writers like Sahir, Shailendra, Kaifi [Azmi] or Majrooh [Sultanpuri] — they have done some great work. They have written songs according to given situations and tunes, and those songs are as good as any literary work.

ARINDAM SIL, actor-director

We have travelled through a 100 years of Indian cinema and in those 100 years, the language of cinema has evolved. How do you keep yourself still in demand? How do you keep yourself in pace with the times as a writer?

JAVED AKHTAR: How do you remain relevant or contemporary? I think what happens is that we develop some rules of the game and if those rules provide a certain success, then the conviction in those rules becomes very strong. And then we live with those rules. But the world is not the same, it is changing by the second. The value system changes. The language changes. The priority, the morality, the aspirations — everything changes. And if we remain loyal to a set of rules because this is something that had given me success in 1975, that is how we fall flat on our face.

Generation gap is the strangest thing. What is generation gap? It’s when I believe that anybody who was born after me cannot be wiser than me. Although I don’t believe that anybody who was born before me is wiser than me (laughs). As a matter of fact most of these [younger] people are wiser than me. Because they belong to the world of today. I belong to the world that has gone away. The only way I can remain contemporary is by keeping my eyes and ears open and by listening to young people carefully.

After showing all this modesty I will tell you something. There are certain things that I know much better than them. Because I have brought it from the world which has gone away. The happy combination would be that they should respect what I have to offer to them and I should respect what they can give me. As long as I have this, I will remain contemporary.

There is a lot to learn from the new scriptwriters.

Kahaani, Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara, Saheb Biwi aur Gangster, Udaan... I really look at their screenplay with great awe. And I ask myself, ‘Am I able to write this kind of a script?’ I learn from these people.

ANIK DUTTA, filmmaker

My first question is very short. Are you going to write a script? My second one is a bit long. I remember you had once mentioned that Hindi films take place in a strange country, which has no resemblance with any part of India, or the world for that matter. Hindi films those days used to have very different sensibilities, with heroes, heroines, villains, vamps, cabarets, bhajans, melodrama, fights and all the masala. Now it has drastically changed, in the last 10-15 years... barring one Dabangg or Chennai Express, and even they have changed in their treatment and everything. But rural India hasn’t changed much, though they now have access to television. Why is there such a change in cinema writing? I don’t want to sound condescending but I miss the quintessential Hindi film...

JAVED AKHTAR: Yes, I will write a script. In fact, I have finished one. The screenplay is done, I am yet to do the dialogues.

I really appreciate the second question. It’s very relevant. In 1950s, ’60s and till ’70s, the middle class of India was necessarily formally educated. Or you were the extended family of the professors, lawyers, doctors, college teachers, engineers etc. This middle class was the patron of theatre because you have theatre in urban areas. Till ’70s, industrialisation was not that big, mobility of population was much less. I have never lived in a village, but I can write Awadhi, a folk language spoken in the villages of UP. Because my grandmother used to speak it, our visiting relatives used to speak it. I am familiar with the language. Somehow with folk songs, folklore, festivals... we were rooted on the one hand, and educated on the other.

When I went to films, my mentor told me that if you want to become a successful filmmaker, write a script that will work in small cities. Because that is where the money is. In big cities there is theatre and in any case how many big cities do we have? But in three decades this mantra is standing on its head because of many reasons. One, industrialisation. People who are living in big cities, they have come — or their fathers or mothers have come — to big cities. They have lost touch with rural India, and as I said earlier, the middle class and upper middle class are sending their children to English schools, to convents. These boys and girls are brought up on American paperbacks and American films. They are not related to quintessential Indian films. People who are producing films, they too are not related to Shailendra or SD Burman. They give their music directors a CD of an American singer and say, ‘Aisa gana chahiye, iss tarah ka hona chahiye.’ They don’t want to plagiarise it, but their sensibility is of that.

Today we are told that if the film runs in big cities, in multiplexes, good enough! The films we are making today are not for people who are poor. These are being made for the middle class and the upper middle class. They don’t want to know what is happening in Kalahandi. They don’t want to see a film like Do Bigha Zamin. They want to have fun. They want a high.

Never have we had the variety of stories that we have today. And never were films so indifferent to social realities as they are today. Instead of making a film where the ticket costs Rs 50 and has to be bought by 10 people to make a total of Rs 500, why not make a film for one person who is willing to buy the ticket for Rs 500? So, these films are being made for a segment of the society. In the last 10-15 years you will see the hero is not from the working class. In the ’50s, ’60s, ’70s, an average Hindi film protagonist... I am not talking about his IQ or aesthetics... but the hero was from the working class. A rickshawwallah, taangewallah, taxiwallah. Can you imagine making a film today where the hero will be a rickshawwallah? A gangster, yes. That is aspiring, you know! That tells something about our development!

ANUPAM ROY,singer-songwriter

Aap ko toh royalty milta hoga kitaabon ka? Last time we met [in January], we spoke about the royalty cases in the Barasat court. Has there been any progress?

JAVED AKHTAR: A lot of change has taken place. Now you have a law [The Copyright (Amendment) Act, 2012]. And we should be very proud of that law. I think it is one of the finest laws in the world. Not only the government but the whole Parliament passed it unanimously, so we should be thankful to all the parties. Now it has to be implemented. How do you implement these laws?

There are two government-recognised societies in the country, IPRS [The Indian Performing Right Society] and PPL [Phonographic Performance Ltd]. When a song is played at a theatre or on television, radio or anywhere, two royalties are generated — performing royalty and sound recording royalty.

Sound recording royalty belongs to the man who has recorded the song, be it the music company or the film producer, whoever has spent money on the song. Performing royalty is not the performer’s. By performance it means the music and the words. Fifty per cent of that goes to the composer and the lyricist, theoretically. We have the IPRS and it is the only society in the world that is controlled by music companies! They have PPL and this also. And writers and composers are given some money to keep the facade on because otherwise they won’t be able to collect money from all over the world.

Now the government has made a foolproof law, which makes it impossible for them [music companies to deny full royalty to performers]. But till you fix these societies, the money will not reach.

RUPSHA DASGUPTA, manager of Fossils and Rupam Islam’s wife

Rupam is a member of the IPRS and Anupam is not. Rupam gets some royalty, which is so nominal that we should not even mention it. What would be your suggestion to Anupam? Should he become a member of the IPRS? If more artistes become members of IPRS, it just makes the IPRS stronger. But Rupam is getting so less that he wants to back out...

JAVED AKHTAR: He should become a member of the IPRS, there is no doubt about it. I met a lot of composers and writers here and many were not even aware of what was happening. Better late than never. But despite becoming a member you will only get your fair share when IPRS is set right. So I will give you (Anupam) two pieces of advice. One, become a member of IPRS. Two, make her (Rupsha) your representative!