Imam Baksh Nasikh ( ur, ; 1776-1839) was an

Urdu poet Urdu poetry ( ur, ) is a tradition of poetry and has many different forms. Today, it is an important part of the cultures of South Asia. According to Naseer Turabi there are five major poets of Urdu which are Mir Taqi Mir (d.1810), Mirza Ghali ...

of the

Mughal era The Mughal Empire was an early-modern empire that controlled much of South Asia between the 16th and 19th centuries. Quote: "Although the first two Timurid emperors and many of their noblemen were recent migrants to the subcontinent, the d ...

who has been noted for his role in promoting

Lucknow Lucknow (, ) is the capital and the largest city of the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh and it is also the second largest urban agglomeration in Uttar Pradesh. Lucknow is the administrative headquarters of the eponymous district and division ...

as a centre of poetry and innovation. He first succeeded in gaining the patronage of Meer Kazim Ali whose property he inherited. In the 1830s Nasikh developed a rivalry with fellow ghazal writer and Lucknowi

Khwaja Haidar Ali Aatish Khwaja Haider Ali Aatish (1764 –1846) of Lucknow was an Urdu poet. Khwaja Haider Ali Aatish Lakhnawi is one of the giants of Urdu literature. Aatish and Imam Baksh Nasikh were contemporary poets whose rivalry is well known. Both had hundreds o ...

. After "contemptuously" denying an offer of patronage from the

nawab of Awadh The Nawab of Awadh or the Nawab of Oudh was the title of the rulers who governed the state of Awadh (anglicised as Oudh) in north India during the 18th and 19th centuries. The Nawabs of Awadh belonged to a dynasty of Persian origin from Nishapu ...

, Nasikh was forced to leave Lucknow. Afterwards, he went back and forth from and to Lucknow, fleeing when minister Hakim Mehdi was in power. Nasikh finally returned from exile after the death of Mehdi in 1837 and died in Lucknow in 1839. It took until

Bahadur Shah Zafar Bahadur Shah II, usually referred to by his poetic title Bahadur Shah ''Zafar'' (; ''Zafar'' Victory) was born Mirza Abu Zafar Siraj-ud-din Muhammad (24 October 1775 – 7 November 1862) and was the twentieth and last Mughal Emperor as well a ...

's reign for the art of

ghazal The ''ghazal'' ( ar, غَزَل, bn, গজল, Hindi-Urdu: /, fa, غزل, az, qəzəl, tr, gazel, tm, gazal, uz, gʻazal, gu, ગઝલ) is a form of amatory poem or ode, originating in Arabic poetry. A ghazal may be understood as a ...

poetry to be restored to its former glory, now in Delhi.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Nasikh, Baksh 1770s births 1838 deaths Urdu-language poets from India

See also

References