Jaun Elia A Marxist: Master Poet of loneliness and frenzy.

Tum jab aogi to khoya hua paogi mujhe,

Meri tanhayion me khwabon ke siva aur kuch bhi nahin,

Mere kamre ko sajaane ki badi tamanna hai tumhe,

Mere kamre me kitabon k siva aur kuch bhi nahin.

(Jaun Elia)

The renowned poet, biographer and Scholar Jaun Elia died in Karachi, on Nov 8, 2002 after a long illness in a friend’s house. He died away from all his friends and relatives. Jaun Elia’s real name was Syed Jaun Asghar.

Jaun Elia, the renowned poet, biographer Scholar and a Marxist poet, philosopher, dreamer, and charismatic performer was born in 1931 in Amroha, Uttar Pradesh Pradesh of undivided India.He was the youngest of his siblings.

Rais Amrohvi was his elder brother. His father, Shafiq Hasan Elia, worked in art and literature. Shafiq was also an astrologer and a poet. Indian film director Kamal Amrohi was his first cousin.

His real name was Syed Jaun Asghar Jaun Elia.He wrote hard, loved hard, played hard, drank hard, and pranked hardest. His real name was Syed Jaun Asghar. Jaun Elia had very communist views. 

He was against partition, but finally chose to join Pakistan. He transpired in Pakistan in 1957 and chose Karachi as the residing city.

During the past few years, Jaun Elia has taken Urdu poetry circles in cyberspace by storm. A well-known name among fanatics of Urdu literature during his lifetime, it is only after his death in 2002 that his work gained popularity.

Today, Jaun Elia is perhaps one of the most googled Urdu poets. Moreover, his face adorns merchandise that is sold at upmarket stores in Delhi and at various literary festivals.

Facebook pages which share Elia’s poetry have lakhs of followers. People read his poetry in specially organised literary gatherings. Writers write about his poetry.

Still, for some strange reason, everybody has overlooked the important fact that Elia was a Marxist poet whose poetry was highly influenced by communist ideals.

His poetry is still inspiring the thoughts of the masses especially the young community. Elia influenced the youth community as a whole.

Jaun Elia received many awards for his dedication towards the Urdu literature but the most noteworthy and remarkable award given to Jaun Elia was the Presidential Award for Pride of Performance given by the Government of Pakistan in 2000 due to his unalarmed and determined efforts and services for Urdu Literature.

Elia’s divorce with Zaheda Hina in the 80s left him worse off. He became an alcoholic and even more depressed and alone. More than often this reflects very palpably in his poetry.

Darkness was Jaun’s life, a kind of sheath covering him. He was bound to loneliness and misery, because of his own contradictions. Even his negative space was only just grey.

After the divorce, Jaun Elia was living in depression this devadas of Urdu poetry started exploring new excuses to make a lot of hurdles and to ruin themselves.

If Jaun had not died a natural death in 2002, he would have been shot by a mob of crazy extremists of today. His murderers would have been both Sunnis and Shias.

The lines are getting blurred. Jaun was a product of a society that believed in reasoning. Today, in Pakistan you can’t reason with people. It’s blasphemous.

This write-up has been compiled and edited with the help of various articles over Jaun Elia, available on net, with thanks.

The End