FSc Part 1 Urdu Chapter 14 Complete Guide Book — O Des Se Aane Wale Bata

The poet of this lesson is Akhtar Shirani (1905–1948), called the Shair-e-Roman (the Romantic Poet). His real name was Muhammad Daud Khan; his father was the famous researcher Hafiz Mahmood Shirani. Born in Tonk (Rajputana), he studied there first, then moved to Lahore, where in 1921 he passed the Munshi Fazil and Adeeb Fazil examinations from Oriental College. He kept up a private study of English language and literature, and began writing essays and poetry, which appeared in many journals.

As an editor he was unlucky with his own magazines: Baharistan (1928), Khayalistan (1930) and Roman (1935) all closed quickly. Yet in those same years his poetry became famous, and he was counted among the country's leading poets. When his father retired from Oriental College and returned to Tonk, Akhtar went with him, and he came back to Lahore during the Second World War. He also edited Maulana Tajwar Najeeb Abadi's magazine Shahkar for a short time.

His poetry collections include Naghma-e-Haram, Shehristan, Lala Toor, Subh-e-Bahar, Akhtaristan and Tayoor-e-Awara; he also wrote a few plays, of which Shahak is the best known. His poems paint nature and romance, and they carry a musical, song-like atmosphere — the reader feels the poet is singing rather than merely speaking. That is exactly the quality you will hear in “O Des Se Aane Wale Bata!”

This poem is taken from the Kulliyat-e-Akhtar Shirani (the collected works). The book lists four teaching aims for the lesson: to introduce Akhtar Shirani's personality and art; to awaken love of the homeland; to sharpen the students' creative and critical abilities; and to explain the rise and growth of the Romantic movement in Urdu literature. The whole poem serves those four aims at once.

The central idea is simple and deeply moving. A man living far from home in a foreign land meets a traveller who has just come from his homeland — and pours out his questions. How are my friends? How does the homeland's garden look now? Do the same carefree breezes still blow? Does the rain still please hearts as it did? Are childhood games still played? Do friends still gather by the river in the evening? And finally, the most personal question of all: does anyone back home still carry love for me in their heart? Does anyone remember me?

The poem has five bands (stanzas). Each band has three lines, and each opens and closes with the cry “O des se aane wale bata!” (“O you who have come from the homeland — tell me!”). That repetition is not decoration; it is the heartbeat of a restless heart. In the first four bands the poet asks about the outer world — gardens, hills, clouds, moon, river — and in the last band the question turns inward: have I been remembered, or forgotten? That turn is what lifts the poem from ordinary patriotism to something personal and touching.

The Romantic style is clear throughout: the poet does not state his feelings flatly. He shows them through nature — the garden breeze, the mountain cloud, the rain, the moonlit night, the moon on the river. A student who feels those scenes has already understood the poem.

The verses: “O you who have come from the homeland — tell me! In what state are the friends of my homeland? To this wanderer in exile, in what colour does the lotus of the homeland bloom? That garden of the homeland, that paradise of the homeland, that cypress of the homeland, that beauty of the homeland! O you who have come from the homeland — tell me!”

The opening line is a direct, restless call. The poet stops the traveller and says just one word: tell me — and all his impatience sits inside that word. His first question is about his friends, not wealth or status, because for him the homeland is those friends.

The third line is the deepest in the poem. The poet calls himself the “awara-e-ghurbat” — a wanderer in exile. Note carefully: ghurbat here does not mean poverty; it means being away from home, in a foreign land. And the homeland is a lotus (kanwal): a lotus blooms in mud yet stays pure, just as the homeland stays beautiful and pure in the poet's eyes. His question is: tell this wandering exile — in what colour is my lotus-like homeland blooming today? Is it still as fresh, or has time changed its colour?

Then, in a single breath, he lists four names for the homeland's beauty: its garden, its paradise (firdaus), its cypress tree (sarv, tall and straight, a symbol of dignity), and its loveliness (ranai). The band closes on the same cry it opened with.

A hidden allusion (talmeeh): the “wanderer in exile” quietly recalls Prophet Yusuf, who was also a stranger in Egypt, far from Canaan. That is why the book's exercise (Question 4) asks for this band to be explained in the light of that allusion, together with the Yusuf couplets of Ghalib and Hali — see the exercise answers below.

The verses: “Do the carefree breezes still come to the gardens there? Does the dark, thundering cloud still gather over the hills there? Does the rain there still please hearts as it did? O you who have come from the homeland — tell me!”

In the second band the poet's questions turn to the homeland's seasons and scenes. First, the garden breezes: are they still mastana — swaying, carefree, delightful breezes that seem drunk with joy themselves and make others joyful too? The poet fears that breeze may no longer be the same.

Next, the hills: does the ghanghor ghata — the dense, thundering cloud — still gather and spread over the mountains? That picture is still fresh in his eyes: cloud covering the hill, and the whole homeland beneath it.

Then the barkha, the monsoon rain: does it still please hearts as before? Notice what he asks. He does not ask whether it rains or not. He asks whether the rain still brings the same joy to hearts — because it is not the rain he misses, it is the happiness the rain used to bring.

All three lines repeat “kya ab bhi” (“does it still”). That little phrase matters enormously: it shows the poet is no longer sure the homeland is as it lives in his memory. Time has passed, distance has grown, and he fears everything may have changed. That fear is the root of his restlessness.

The verses: “Are there still the same joy-giving scenes in the homeland? On pleasant nights, are there still those moons and stars? The games we used to play — are they all still played? O you who have come from the homeland — tell me!”

In the third band the poet remembers the homeland's happiness. Mussarat nazare means scenes that give joy — a blooming garden, flowing water, birds in flight, friends laughing. He asks: do such scenes still unfold in the homeland, or has time dimmed them?

Then the nights: on suhani raaten — delightful, lovely nights — are there still those moons and stars? Again, he is not asking whether the moon and stars exist. He is asking about that quality — the same moon, the same stars, the same nights that live in his memory.

The third line is the most personal of all: the games we used to play — are they still played? Now the poet steps out of scenery and into his own memories: childhood games, days spent with friends in lanes and fields, laughter that came for no reason. Are those days still alive, or do they survive only in my memory? That question speaks for everyone who has left a childhood behind in another town or country.

One more thing becomes clear here: for the poet, the homeland is not only a place, it is also a time — childhood. Place and time have melted together in his memory, so his question is double: is that place still the same, and is that time still alive?

The verses: “Do friends still go in the evening to the river bank? Are those dense trees still fresh and green on the river bank? And does the moon come lovingly and shimmer on the river bank? O you who have come from the homeland — tell me!”

The fourth band paints one complete evening — an evening the poet must have lived many times. First, the friends: do the ahbab (friends) still go to the river bank in the evening? Evening time, a river bank, and a gathering of friends — those three things together make the dearest scene in the poet's memory.

Then the trees on the bank: are those dense trees still shadab — fresh and green? The poet asks whether the thick shade is still as green, or whether heat and time have dried it. The freshness of the trees is really a symbol for the freshness of the gathering itself: while the trees stay green, the gathering lives on.

The third line holds the band's most beautiful image: the mahtab (moon) comes lovingly and shimmers on the river bank — as if a beloved guest had arrived, and its light dances on the water. This is not just the moon in the sky; it is the moon of the poet's memory, the moon he once watched with his friends by the river.

Notice that all three lines repeat “kinar-e-darya par” (“on the river bank”). That repetition turns the river bank into the centre of the poem — as if all memories gather on that one bank. And notice too that here the poet does not praise one thing by name; he brings a whole evening back to life: friends, trees, moon — all parts of a single scene.

The verses: “Is there still, in anyone's heart, any love left for me — tell me. Does anyone among friends still remember me, with a sigh — tell me. O you who have come from the homeland, tell me, for God's sake, tell me, for God's sake. O you who have come from the homeland — tell me!”

In the last band the poem's direction changes. Until now the poet has asked about the homeland — how is the garden, how is the breeze, how is the moon. Now he asks about himself: “Is there still, in anyone's heart, any chah (love, longing) left for me?” This question is more delicate than all the earlier ones, because its answer will strike his own heart directly.

The second line deepens that delicate question: does anyone among friends still remember me with a sigh? The aah is the sigh that escapes without thinking when someone is remembered. The poet asks: does my separation hurt anyone, or has everyone forgotten me? Hidden inside “hamein bhi” (“me too”) is a quiet plea — I remember everyone; does anyone remember me too?

Then comes the line where all the poem's restlessness gathers: “tell me, lillah (for God's sake), tell me, lillah.” This is no longer a question; it is a plea. “Lillah bata” comes twice, because saying it once does not lighten the weight on his heart. And the band closes on the same cry the poem began with — as if a circle has closed, but the answer has still not come.

This is the turn the book's Question 6 asks about: in the last band the poet's wishes change direction. Earlier he wanted to know the homeland's state; now he wants to know whether the homeland remembers him. The earlier questions were about the outer world; the last question is about the world of the heart.

Learn the hard words separately first, then read the verses — each line will open up by itself. Here are the poem's key words with plain meanings:

Des — homeland, one's own country. Yaran-e-watan — friends of the homeland. Ghurbat — exile, the state of being away from home (not just poverty). Awara-e-ghurbat — a person wandering in exile. Kanwal — the lotus flower, a symbol of beauty and purity. Firdaus — paradise. Sarv — the tall, straight cypress tree, a symbol of dignity. Ranai — beauty, loveliness. Mastana — swaying, carefree, joyful. Ghanghor — dense and thundering (of a cloud). Barkha — the monsoon rain. Mussarat — joy; mussarat nazare are joy-giving scenes. Suhani — delightful, lovely. Ahbab — friends (plural of habib). Kinar-e-darya — the river bank. Shadab — fresh and green. Mahtab — the moon, moonlight. Chah — love, longing. Aah — a sigh of grief or longing. Lillah — “for God's sake”, used as a plea.

Two warnings against common mistakes. First, do not read ghurbat as mere poverty: in this poem it means exile. Second, do not read cheez in Band 4 as any ordinary thing: “cheez ghanere” means the dense trees on the river bank. A word's meaning is always fixed by the atmosphere of the verse, not by the dictionary alone.

The book's Question 7 also asks for synonyms (mutradif) of six words; those are answered in full in the exercise section below, with example sentences.

Talmeeh (allusion): when a poet points to a famous historical or religious event without describing it fully, that is talmeeh. Here, “awara-e-ghurbat” alludes to Prophet Yusuf: a stranger in Egypt, far from Canaan, thrown into a well by his brothers, living years of separation. The poet's exile matches that separation — which is why the book's exercise asks for this band to be explained with the Yusuf couplets of Ghalib and Hali.

Tashbeeh and istiara — “kanwal-e-watan”: in a tashbeeh (simile) one thing is said to be like another, with a word like “like” or “as”. In an istiara (metaphor) that word disappears and one thing is simply called the other. In “kanwal-e-watan” the homeland is called a lotus, with no “like” — so as a figure of speech it is istiara. That is the answer to the book's MCQ (iii). A fine point: as a word-combination it is also an izafat, but the question asks about the figure of speech, so the answer is istiara, not tashbeeh.

Murakkabat (compounds), as defined in the book: Murakkab naqis is a phrase that makes sense as an expression but does not give a complete meaning — e.g. “tez ghora”, “naik aadmi”, “raat aur din”. Murakkab izafi is formed when two words join through an izafat (e.g. “shaam-e-ghariban”, “doston ki mehfil”). Murakkab tauseefi joins an adjective (sifat) with the thing described (mausoof) — e.g. “roshan chaand”, “khoob surat phal”. Murakkab atfi joins two words with “aur” or “wa” — e.g. “subh-o-shaam”, “haq-o-batil”, “chaand aur suraj”.

Examples from the poem: izafi — yaran-e-watan, bagh-e-watan, kinar-e-darya (this is also the answer to MCQ iv). Tauseefi — mastana hawaen, ghanghor ghata, suhani raaten, mussarat nazare. As naqis, all of these phrases qualify, since none of them is a complete sentence. And one honest note: the poem has no clear atfi example — the word “aur” in Band 4 joins lines, not two words into a compound — so in the exercise answer the atfi examples are taken from the book's own list, not invented from the poem.

At the end of the lesson (book p. 106) there is an extra-reading poem by the same poet, “Sawan ki Ghata” (The Monsoon Cloud). Read it and you will at once see what a great painter of nature Akhtar Shirani is: here the monsoon cloud is not just a cloud, it is a living character that comes smiling, comes winning hearts, comes singing.

In اردو, its refrain runs: “مسکراتی ہوئی آتی ہے گھاٹا ساون کی / Ji لبھاتی ہوئی آتی ہے گھاٹا ساون کی” — the cloud of Sawan comes smiling, comes stealing hearts — with the songs of flowers, the call of buds, the cry of the peacock; it comes swinging, comes clinging, comes washing the faces of mountains, flower-beds and gardens; and with its wave of fragrance, says Akhtar, the whole world is perfumed as it comes scattering flowers.

Notice تھے technique: every second line ends on تھے same refrain, “آتی ہے گھاٹا ساون کی” — exactly as “O des سے آنے والے بتا!” returns at تھے end of every بند ان our lesson poem. That repetition اس Akhtar شیرانی's signature: his poems carry a tune, a song's rhythm. And notice تھے connection too: ان “O Des” تھے poet remembers the rain and cloud, while in “Sawan ki Ghata” the same cloud arrives, smiling. Read the two poems together, and the poet's Romantic style — love of nature, musical rhythm, and a world of memories — falls into place at once.

In this chapter you have read Akhtar Shirani's (1905–1948) poem “O Des Se Aane Wale Bata!” — the story of an exile's love for his homeland. First you met the poet: Muhammad Daud Khan, born in Tonk, educated in Lahore, an editor of journals, and the author of famous collections. Then you grasped the central idea: a shower of questions poured on a traveller who has come from the homeland. Then you studied all five bands one by one: Band 1 — the friends' state and the lotus of the homeland (with the Yusuf allusion); Band 2 — carefree breezes, thundering clouds, monsoon rain; Band 3 — joy-giving scenes, moon and stars, childhood games; Band 4 — the river-bank evening, dense green trees, the moon; Band 5 — the most personal question: does anyone remember me? Tell me, for God's sake! After that came the Farhang words, talmeeh and istiara, the four kinds of compounds, and the extra-reading poem “Sawan ki Ghata”. Finally the book's whole exercise was solved: 5 short answers, 7 MCQs, summary, allusion-based explanation, feelings, the last band's change of direction, the compounds list, 6 synonyms, the review, and the activities.

Revision guidance: for exam preparation, first memorise the verses of all five bands, then master the Farhang words (especially: ghurbat = exile, kanwal = symbol of beauty, mahtab = moon), then learn the MCQ key with reasons (kanwal-e-watan = istiara, yaran-e-watan = murakkab izafi), and finally practise writing the summary and the last band's change of direction in your own words. A student who follows this order will be fully prepared.