Hasrat Mohani

He was born at Mohan, a town in Unnao district; "Mohani" refers to Mohan, and his ancestors had migrated from Nishapur in Iran ¹. His birth date is contested in every direction: the English article gives 1 January 1875 while warning that many books give 1880 or 1881 ¹, the Urdu article gives 4 October 1875 ², and the Arabic article gives 14 October 1878 ³. He topped his school examinations in mathematics, studied at the Muhammadan Anglo-Oriental College at Aligarh — from which he was expelled three times for criticising the British — and took his BA in 1903 ¹. His teachers in poetry were Tasleem Lucknawi and Naseem Dehlvi ¹.

From 1903 he published the magazine Urdu-e-Mualla ¹. His works include the Kulliyat-e-Hasrat Mohani, a commentary on Ghalib's poetry, Nukaat-e-Sukhan and Mushahidaat-e-Zindaan, his observations in prison ¹. His ghazal "Chupke Chupke Raat Din" became famous across the subcontinent, and he also wrote verses expressing deep love for Krishna and often went to Mathura for Janmashtami ¹.

He belonged to the Congress for many years and to the Muslim League, whose president he was in 1919 ¹. He was jailed repeatedly, first in 1903, and campaigned until complete independence became Congress policy ¹. He was among the founders of the Communist Party of India; his Kanpur house was a centre of preparation for the first all-India Communist conference of December 1925, whose reception committee he chaired ¹. He opposed the Partition of India, resigned from the League when the partition plan was declared in June 1947, chose to remain in India to represent its remaining Muslims, and sat in the Constituent Assembly — though he never signed the constitution ¹.

The English article calls him personally "a religious practicing Muslim" who led a simple life, stayed in mosques rather than official residences when in Delhi, and performed Hajj several times ¹. No article names a school for him, and Wikidata records his religion as Islam only ⁴. His communism was a political commitment, recorded above as politics; the museum's data record leaves his school unknown and sets out the evidence exactly.

He died on 13 May 1951 at Lucknow ¹². A Hasrat Mohani Memorial Library and Hall stand in Karachi, and India Post issued a commemorative stamp for him in 2014 ¹.

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