From the Fire into the frying pan

From the Fire into the frying pan, originally uploaded by firoze shakir photographerno1.

This was shot many years back close to Maulana Kalbe Jawad Saabs house at Mandi Lucknow , a Maulana highly respected and revered by the Shias of Lucknow, I did visit the Maulana once with my photographer friend Guddu, I told the Maulana that it was his father the late Kalbe Abid Saab who had read my Nikah held in Lucknow on 26 November 1977..and I felt in retrospection that it was the blessings of his erstwhile father that had kept my marriage intact in spite of the upheavals and vagaries of my marital life.,.

However a certain incident changed the equation with the city of my birth Lucknow and I decided never to visit it ever again.

These are blogs that were blank I am updating today in memory of 26/11

Memories of Lucknow may never go away, as I was bought up by my maternal grand mother Nazmi Begum who was the wife of poet Daroga Nabban Saab descendant of poet Mir Anis.

They lived at Imliwali Gali Pata Nala that was predominantly Shia and on the fringes of this locality was Subatiya Bagh a Sunni locality , this place had a lot of skirmishes and sectarian fights between both the communities, and strangely I was connected to Subatiya Bagh too, as my Paternal grand fathers relatives stayed here, my paternal grand father a Sunni by birth, Bashir Hussain had accepted Shia Islam after he married my Shia grandmother Khurshed Begum..from Vazir Ganj .

My father too continued as a Shia..and both he and his father left all contacts with the main family that were wealthy vinegar merchants. I did meet this family when I was a child briefly..but I have no contacts with them either.


Daroga Nabban Saab poet lies buried in an unmarked grave at Gufra Map Imambada Lucknow.

My paternal grand father and his wife I am told are buried at Talkotara Lucknow.

My maternal grand mother Nazmi Begum died she too lies in an unmarked grave at Rani Malka Jahan cemetery .

My parents both migrants Mumbaikars, Mohomed Shakir and Shamim Shakir of Colaba lie buried side by side at Rehmatabad Shia cemetery Mumbai.