India: Javed Akhtar: literature not given importance it used to
The Bollywood poet, lyricist and scriptwriter talks films and politics on the eve of his Dubai show: Gulf News
I would have called him a “yesteryear” lyricist and script writer but Javed Akhtar will give you no reason to believe so. He may have been on hiatus from the big screen for close to a decade after Lakshya but he now has a script ready to be shown to the right director, and has been constantly in the news due to his strong political and social beliefs and films such as the remake of Zanjeer and Sholay.
Akhtar, who will be in Dubai this Friday for An Evening with Javed Akhtar… In Conversation with Gagan Mudgal, hails from a family studded with literary jewels. His great-grandfather was Allama Fazl-e-Haq Khairabadi, one of the main figures of the Indian Rebellion of 1857; his father, Jaan Nissar Akhtar, a famous lyricist and Urdu poet; his maternal uncle, Majaz, was another famous Urdu poet. He was married to Honey Irani, an award-winning Indian screenwriter and mother to Farhan and Zoya Akhtar. Even his wife Shabana’s father, Kaifi Azmi, was a renowned poet and lyricist of his times.
