MY DEAR CHILDREN PLEASE READ IT ..... TARANUM NAZ Madam Noor Jahan and the Shattered Memories of Pakistan’s ‘Better Days’ On the first death anniversary of former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, news channels in Pakistan presented special reports on the life and times of the assassinated leader of Pakistan People’s Party. Some programs also discussed the chaos which erupted the night of assassination all over the country as a protest reaction by PPP workers. This violence badly affected Karachi and other cities and towns of Sind province. In a program, a young man from Karachi shared his frightening experiences of the night of 27th December 2007. He told that he was returning from work when he saw protestors coming for him. He had to leave his car on road and take refuge in the famous Gizri graveyard. He found the darkness and dead silence of graveyard safer than the roads and streets of the city of lights, Karachi. He called his sister who sent a car for him. The next day he found his car which was unrecognizable. It was ruined by the protestors. During this conversation, the young man couldn’t restrain his tears and broke out in sobs. Just imagine how this young man must have felt that night alone in the dark graveyard. His fellow human beings, people of his own country, his coreligionists compelled him to take refuge in the city of dead. Thanks to the stories we were told as kids, graveyard at night is always the most frightening situation imaginable. In the same graveyard, Pakistan greatest female singer Malika e Tarannum (Queen of Melody) Noor Jahan is resting in peace. Noor Jahan sang heartwarming patriotic songs in the Indo-Pak war of 1965 when Pakistani nation became one and faced a powerful enemy with bravery. Her voice echoed throughout the country and told every mother that her son is on the sacred mission to protect the motherland, every wife that she must be brave and her husband is going to come back soon and every soldier that both sides of the coin favor him. He lives to see his country free and dies to protect its freedom. The legend of 1965 war is incomplete without Noor Jahan. She stayed in the radio station for 17 days and recorded songs when her infant daughters were ill. She was brave enough to get a curfew pass and drive throughout Lahore in search of musicians. And then she would stand on the microphone and sing “Mereya dhol sipahiya, tennu rab diyan rakhan” (My beloved soldier, God be with you). Her beautiful songs were highly motivating for Pakistan Army soldiers. She got dozens of letters every day from the public and the soldiers at the war front. Her excellent services during the war, for which she refused to accept any payment, earned her a Pride of Performance on the very next Pakistan Day 23rd March 1966. Our Field Marshal General Ayub Khan had to accept that half the credit of this victory goes to Noor Jahan, later Benazir awarded her nishan e imtiaz.
Posted on: Tue, 13 Aug 2013 18:10:41 +0000
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