The land of five waters gave the world its first cities, its saints and its songs. Broken by every empire that crossed it, it is still ours to remember, and to make whole again.

Read the manifesto →
PUNJAB WIKIਪੰਜਾਬپنجابCulture
Punjab WikiCulturePoets and writers
AH
Poet

Ahmad Rahi

ਅਹਿਮਦ ਰਾਹੀ

Poet from Amritsar whose Trinjan (1953) gave voice to the women of the Punjab after Partition, and who wrote Lahore's film songs.

Ahmad Rahi, lyricist of Lahore's Punjabi films · Watch on YouTube

Ahmad Rahi was born in Amritsar and moved to Lahore in 1947. His collection Trinjan, poems in the voices of Punjabi women, about the spinning circle, separation and the violence of Partition, is a classic of modern Punjabi poetry.

He also wrote songs and screenplays for many Punjabi films of Lahore, including Heer Ranjha (1970).

More poets and writers

▶ Watch
Mian Muhammad Bakhsh
Mian Muhammad Bakhsh1830 – 1907

The Sufi poet of Mirpur whose Saif ul Malook is recited across the Pothohar and Kashmir.

▶ Watch
Khwaja Ghulam Farid
Khwaja Ghulam Farid1845 – 1901

The Sufi poet of the Cholistan desert, whose Saraiki kafis sing of rain, camels and the Beloved.

▶ Watch
Puran Singh
Puran Singh1881 – 1931

Chemist, mystic and the poet of free verse who wrote 'Punjab lives on the name of the Gurus'.

▶ Watch
Dhani Ram Chatrik
Dhani Ram Chatrik1876 – 1954

The poet of the village fair and the season, who also designed the Gurmukhi type that printed Punjabi.

▶ Watch
Mohan Singh
Mohan Singh1905 – 1978

Professor Mohan Singh, the lyric poet of Saave Patte, who made Punjabi poetry modern and romantic.

▶ Watch
Nanak Singh
Nanak Singh1897 – 1971

The father of the Punjabi novel, who survived Jallianwala Bagh and wrote a poem about it that the British banned.

▶ Watch
Pash
Pash1950 – 1988

Avtar Singh Sandhu, the revolutionary poet of the Naxalite years, killed at 37.

Sant Ram Udasi1939 – 1986

The Dalit revolutionary poet of Barnala, who sang of the landless labourer and was tortured for it.

▶ Watch
Gurdial Singh
Gurdial Singh1933 – 2016

The novelist of Jaitu and the Malwa poor, whose Marhi da Deeva is the great Punjabi village novel.

▶ Watch
Rana Surat Singh
Rana Surat Singh1905, by Bhai Vir Singh

Bhai Vir Singh's epic in blank verse of a widowed queen's search for her dead husband and for God.

▶ Watch
Najm Hosain Syed
Najm Hosain SyedBorn 1936

Poet, playwright and critic who led the revival of Punjabi writing in Shahmukhi in Pakistani Punjab.

▶ Watch
Kulwant Singh Virk
Kulwant Singh Virk1921 – 1987

Master of the Punjabi short story, whose quiet tales of village life and Partition won the Sahitya Akademi award.

▶ Watch
Fakhar Zaman
Fakhar ZamanBorn 1943

Punjabi novelist and poet from Gujrat whose books were banned under General Zia, and founder of the World Punjabi Congress.

▶ Watch
Sharif Kunjahi
Sharif Kunjahi1914 – 2007

Poet and scholar from Kunjah near Gujrat, who translated the Quran into Punjabi and taught Punjabi at university.

▶ Watch
Anwar Masood
Anwar MasoodBorn 1935

Poet of wit and tenderness from Gujrat, whose Punjabi poems about ordinary life are recited by heart across Pakistan.

▶ Watch
Afzal Ahsan Randhawa
Afzal Ahsan Randhawa1937 – 2017

Novelist, poet and politician from Faisalabad, one of the leading writers of modern Punjabi in Shahmukhi.

▶ Watch
Harbhajan Singh
Harbhajan Singh1920 – 2002

Modernist Punjabi poet and critic of Delhi, who renewed Punjabi verse after Partition.

▶ Watch
Lal Singh Dil
Lal Singh Dil1943 – 2007

Dalit revolutionary poet from Samrala whose angry, plain poems spoke for the landless.

▶ WatchHafiz Barkhurdar17th century

Poet of the Mughal age whose Mirza Sahiban is one of the oldest written tellings of the tale.

▶ Watch
Ali Haider Multani
Ali Haider Multani1690 – 1785

Sufi poet of Multan, master of the siharfi, the alphabet poem in which each verse begins with a new letter.

Spot a mistake, a wrong picture or something missing? Help maintain this page →