One of India and Pakistan’s great actors, Begum Khursheed Shahid started her illustrious career in Delhi at the tender age of nine, both as a singer and actor at All India Radio. As a singer, Begum Shahid received training from four great teachers – Roshanlal Bhagat, Feroze Nizami, Bhailal Muhammad Amritsari and Roshanara Begum – but found greater success in acting, a craft that she learnt on her own through observation, diligence and experience. The young Begum Shahid migrated to Pakistan in 1947 and became a major player in the theater of Lahore. She joined Pakistan Television Corporation in 1964, and acted in some of the best plays produced by television in the next two decades. In the nineties, she started becoming disenchanted with television. She felt that the medium was becoming commercial very rapidly and was in a constant state of decline. Begum Shahid gradually disassociated herself from television completely. The winner of one of Pakistan’s highest civil awards, the Pride of Performance, Begum Khursheed Shahid leads a life of quiet dignity in her tastefully decorated home in Thokar Niaz Beg, Lahore. The great actor is at peace with herself and happy about what she accomplished in life as an artist.
A truly beautiful woman never loses her ability to fascinate, enthrall and enchant. Her beauty never withers. Age, adversity, illness, nothing affects her beauty which is rooted in more than just good looks. Intelligence, wisdom, poise, dignity, modesty, patience, and self-esteem are the primary contributors to beauty. These do not fade with time; if anything, they make a beautiful woman more radiant as time passes, making her beauty eternal.
Begum Khursheed Shahid is one beautiful woman.
Photograph by Ammar Sharee
I met her after a period of more than three decades, in Lahore, recently, and found her to be as lovely as I had when I first met her thirty-five years ago. Nothing that is important had changed. She still had a regal manner and haunting eyes, she still conducted herself with remarkable dignity, she still spoke clearly in both Urdu and English, and she was still highly intelligent. Hers was a perennial beauty. Time had not been able to touch it.
[quote]She speaks clearly in both English and Urdu[/quote]
Begum Khursheed Shahid was well-known and well-liked at Pakistan Television Corporation. People looked up to her both as a person and as an actor; her warm and sincere persona made her popular with everyone who worked with her. Everyone knew when she was in the studios, thanks to the perfume that she always wore in abundance. Her presence made the Pakistan Television’s staid corridors and dull studios fragrant. She liked strong perfume and wore a lot of it. Shalimar, Joy, Diorissimo and Chanel No. 5 were her favorite fragrances. She always carried a bottle of perfume in her handbag to refresh herself during the day. One could always find her in the studios by following the trail of her scent.
Fragrance was not the only thing that Begum Khursheed Shahid brought to the television studios; she came with contagious professionalism that affected everyone working with her. Everyone knew that Begum Shahid would arrive on time, have her lines memorized, understand what she had to do well, and be in character as soon as she was on set. They had no choice but to rise to her level of professionalism.
[quote]Ramlila laid the foundation of modern theater in India and Pakistan[/quote]
Begum Khursheed Shahid was born with an ‘innate’ talent for acting and singing. “I was the youngest of my sisters and had one brother,” she recounts. “My sisters and I were very boisterous and spent a lot of time singing, dancing and acting. These were happy times in Delhi. One of the unoccupied homes in our neighborhood had a large marble platform in the garden. This was our stage. We would sneak into the house and perform on our makeshift stage for hours. This is where I decided to have a career in acting and singing.
“One of the biggest influences in my childhood was that of Ramlila. The theater used to hold performances in Shivaji Park which was close to our home on Minto Road. Ramlila fascinated me. I used to watch all its performances with rapt attention and had the lines of many of the characters memorized perfectly. I would perform scenes from Ramlila with my sisters and, sometimes, when I was alone.”
Ramlila is a highly dramatic and vivid portrayal of the life of Ram (seventh avatar of the Hindu god Vishnu) based on the Hindu epic, Ramayan. The tradition of staging Ramlila started in the 16th century when Hindu saint and poet, Goswami Tulsidas retold the Ramayan in Awadhi, the language of the masses, instead of the language of the elite, Sanskrit, in which it was originally written. Ramlila is performed over a period of ten consecutive days: the Navaratri (festival of nine nights dedicated to the worship of Durga) and the Dusehra (tenth day of the festival). The performance ends with an enactment of the final battle between Ram and Ravan (demon king and villain in Ramayan); Ram’s victory in the battle signifying the triumph of good over evil.
“My sisters and I used to wait for months to see Ramlila,” remembers Begum Shahid. “The productions were colorful, theatrical and flamboyant yet very serious. They laid the foundation of modern theater in India and Pakistan. I have never seen better dialog delivery and voice projection than in the productions of Ramlila. The plays were staged outdoors for audiences of hundreds who watched while seated on the ground. No microphones and speakers were used in these productions. Actors had to make sure that their voice reached each and every member of the audience. I am often complemented on the clarity with which I deliver my lines, and the way I enunciate words. I learnt this by watching Ramlila.
[quote]He was astonished and exclaimed that I had composed the poem in raag Darbari[/quote]
“My father was a civil servant and worked in India Posts and Telegraphs. He was an open-minded and liberal man. Muslim girls at the time were discouraged from acting and singing but he supported my interests wholeheartedly. It was my father’s encouragement that gave me the courage to audition for Aruna Asif Ali who was a member of the Indian National Congress and Indian independence activist. She use to scout for young talent in local schools. She liked my singing and selected me to sing at All India Radio when I was nine years old. I met the great music director, Feroze Nizami, and insisted on singing for him. After listening to me, he gave me a poem to memorize and promised to compose it for me after I had it memorized. I was an ambitious young girl, always looking to surprise and impress people. I not only memorized the poem but composed it as well. When I sang it for Feroze Nizami the following day, he was astonished and exclaimed that I had composed the poem in raag Darbari (melody composed by Tansen). I did not know Darbari, or any other raag, at the time, but concluded that he liked my composition. He managed the orchestration when I sang the poem but did not change the tune that I had composed.
“All India Radio was located on Alipur Road in those days. This was not too far from our home. I enjoyed being on radio and started visiting the radio station on a regular basis. Famous music director, Roshanlal Nagrath, took a great interest in developing my skills as a singer and provided me with invaluable guidance and advice. I used to call him bhaiya (brother) because he always treated me like a younger sister. In those days, I used to sing geet, ghazal and thumri (genre of light classical music) for All India Radio.
“My acting career started at All India Radio as well. There was no television at the time and plays were produced on radio. I became a member of the team of actors who performed in these plays. I was acting and singing – the two things that I enjoyed most in life. Life couldn’t get any better.”
[quote]I wanted to stay in Delhi[/quote]
The partition of India and Pakistan was heartbreaking for the sixteen year old Begum Shahid who was enjoying her life and career in her beloved Delhi. “It was a tragedy of epic proportions,” says Begum Shahid. “I did not want to migrate. I had lived in Delhi all my life and could not bear the thought of leaving the city. My friends were all in Delhi. Everyone I cared for was in Delhi. I was in love with the sights, sounds and smells of the city. My career as an actor and a singer was doing well. I wanted to stay in Delhi even though the city had become increasingly unsafe for Muslims. My father was a huntsman and had a large collection of guns. My siblings and I were comfortable using the guns. I tried to convince my family that our facility with firearms would protect us in Delhi but could not change their mind. In the end, violence against Muslims escalated to the level that we had no choice but to leave Delhi. We boarded a train to Lahore in the summer of 1947.
“Once in Pakistan, I joined the Pakistan Broadcasting Corporation. The station director was a kind and gentle man named Mahmood Nizami. He encouraged me to make singing my career and arranged lessons for me with Bhai Lal Muhammad Amritsari, of the Gwalior gharana (school of music). My teacher shared the history, intricacies and secrets of classical music with me. The more I learnt about our music, the more I became interested in singing. This was a time when I wanted to be nothing other than a classical vocalist.
“I was introduced to Malika-e-Mausiqui Roshanara Begum in Lahore and immediately took an immense liking to both her person and her music. This developed into a lifelong friendship. I started visiting her regularly at her home in Lala Musa. I used to call her didi (elder sister). I had immense respect for Roshanara Begum who I considered to be a mother, teacher, sister and confidante. Her music was magical. I had never heard anything like that in India or in Pakistan, and I had heard a lot.
“I had a great desire to become a student of Roshanara Begum and requested for a formal initiation on several occasions. She relented one day and asked me to sing for her. I started singing a vilambit khayal (genre of classical music sung in slow tempo) in raag Jait Kalyan (a pentatonic melody sung in the evening) that I had learnt for Bhai Lal Muhammad. Her husband, Chaudhary Ahmad Khan, was sitting in the verandah and could hear me sing. He asked, “Roshan, kaun ga raha hai? (Roshan, who is singing?)” When he found out that it was me, he remarked, “Wah! Jootha paani peenay se itna asar aa jata hai (Splendid! How one learns by serving and being with a great singer). He then walked inside and complimented me on managing to keep Jait Kalyan distinct from raag Bhopali and Deskar, (both pentatonic ragas that employ the same notes as Jait Kalyan). The next morning, Didi sang Bibhas (a pentatonic melody sung in the early morning) for us. It was her subtle way of acknowledging my performance by singing a raag similar to the one I had. That has her style, always understated and discreet.
[quote]"I cannot bear to see you cry"[/quote]
“Didi’s singing always had a profound effect on me. It touched my soul. I accompanied her on the tanpura (musical instrument used for droning) for decades. During her performances, she would sometimes look at me after rendering a particularly complex taan (musical passage sung at fast speed) to make sure that I had noticed it, and smile lightly. There was, however, one performance in which she never looked at me. She was singing, Piya Bin Nahin Awat Chain her famous thumri in raag Jhinjhoti (an early evening raag) in an open air concert. The thumri always touched my heart but this performance was particularly poignant. Tears kept rolling down my cheeks throughout the song. When the show was over, I congratulated Didi on her masterful rendition of the thumri and asked her why she had ignored me throughout the performance. ‘Khursheed, I knew that you were crying throughout my performance,’ she replied. ‘I have to be in a good mood to sing. Seeing you in tears would have ruined my mood and hurt my performance. That is why I decided not to look at you while singing tonight. I cannot bear to see you cry.’ ”
[quote]She did not look at me throughout the performance[/quote]
Begum Khursheed Shahid did not get great success in singing. “I have few regrets in life,” she says. “Not becoming a successful classical vocalist is one of them. I have never really understood why I did exceedingly well as an actor but failed as a singer. When I visited India in, 1962, the actor Motilal Rajvansh suggested that I return to India and work with Roshanlal Nagrath as a singer. I was considered a singer in India and an actor in Pakistan. People in Pakistan seemed to appreciate my singing but always viewed me as an actor. I remember a concert where I performed alongside Mehdi Hassan and Iqbal Bano. My singing was greatly appreciated and I had to return to the stage for an encore. Journalist Ibn Abdur Rehman was amongst the audience and remarked that an actor sang as well as professional musicians that evening. Even when I sang well, I was considered to be an actor!”
Begum Shahid started her acting career in Pakistan with theater. She acted in a number of stage plays mounted by the Lahore Arts Council (now Alhamra Arts Council) and became one of the biggest names in Pakistani theater in the late fifties and early sixties.
[quote]We had a collective hatred for mediocrity[/quote]
“Faiz Ahmed Faiz, Sadat Hasan Manto, Sadequain and other literary stalwarts of our country were involved in theater at that time,” reminisces Begum Shahid. “The company of such great individuals motivated all of us to do as well as we possibly could. We had a collective hatred for mediocrity. Our goal was to produce excellent theater. Nothing less was acceptable.”
Pakistan Television Corporation was established in 1964. The first program director of the institution, and the father of Pakistani television, Aslam Azhar knew Begum Shahid through her work in theater and invited her to join television. “I was flattered to be asked by Aslam Azhar,” says Begum Shahid. “My only demand was that I be paid more than all other actors on television. The demand was not prompted by greed – I do not love money – but by my desire to preserve my dignity as an artist. I wanted my more than two decades of acting experience to be recognized and valued appropriately.
[quote]My biggest regret is not becoming a successful classical vocalist[/quote]
“Pakistan Television used to transmit live between the hours of six and nine in the evening, in those days. There was no transmission on Mondays. Aslam Azhar had assembled a remarkable team of extraordinarily talented people. We produced better programs in the eighteen hours we were on air each week than the more than one hundred and twenty-four hour channels do today.
“My first play for television was a comedy titled Ras Malai. It was a huge success. After this play, television became my life for many years. The institution treated me with respect and afforded me many opportunities to do well as an actor. I must have done hundreds of plays for television including Samandur, Saahil, Man Chahaly Ka Sauda, Chabi Aur Chabiyan, Waadi-E-Purkhar, and Fishar but there are two that stand out for me - Masoom and Fehmida Ki Kahani, Ustani Rahat Ki Zubani.
“Masoom was written by Dr. Javed Iqbal. I played a woman who hypnotizes her husband to get him to commit crimes unwittingly. It was a complex role. The long mantra she used to hypnotize her husband was based on text from Kashf-Al-Mahjoob (Revelation of the Veiled) by Hazrat Data Ganj Baksh. It was written in archaic Urdu and included numerous Arabic and Persian words and phrases. It was not easy to memorize and deliver. The director was skeptical of my ability to deliver my lines accurately on live television. He had instructed the crew to fill the set with cue boards to assist me with my delivery. I prepared the lines with an obsessive zeal making sure that I knew the correct pronunciation of each and every word. I memorized the entire passage over a period of three days, doing little other than work on my lines. In the end, I did not need the cue boards. I recited the mantra flawlessly. A few days later, I met the vice chancellor of Punjab University who complimented me on my performance and invited me to come to the university and teach memorization techniques to students.”
[quote]My biggest regret is not becoming a successful classical vocalist[/quote]
Fehmida Ki Kahani, Ustani Rahat Ki Zubani was one of the most memorable plays of Begum Shahid’s career. Ashfaq Ahmad’s powerful play dealt with the effect of ostentatious display of wealth on society. It focused on the suffering of an impoverished young girl, Fehmida, who could see displays of wealth all around her but not comprehend why she had been denied prosperity by God. The cruel contrast between the glittering display of riches that surrounded Fehmida and her own grim poverty was the cause of her agony and misery. It ultimately took her life. Begum Shahid played the role of her mother, Ustani Rahat, who worked hard to make a modest living and preserve her dignity in a decidedly materialistic society. Begum Shahid channeled Chekhov, Cojar, Chubbuck, Meisner, Stanislavsky, and Strasberg when playing Ustani Rahat by inhabiting the character and making its soul her own. “Once I was inside Ustani Rahat, the rest was easy,” remarks Begum Shahid. “The schoolteacher’s gait, mannerisms, style of talking and emotions all came naturally. I did not have to work on them. I succeeded at simultaneously portraying the mother’s innocent lack of understanding and instinctive empathy for her daughter’s misery. The monologue at the end, after the death of the daughter, left me in tears. I was not acting. I remember that everyone on the set was crying when the scene was recorded. It took some time for the crew and a few days for me to recover. It is probably the best performance of my life.”
Begum Shahid’s extraordinary performance was appreciated all over the country and Pakistan Television Corporation selected her as the winner of the annual award for best female actor. She was informed of the award and asked to make herself available for travel to attend the award ceremony. A few days later, a competing female actor used her considerable influence to replace Begum Shahid’s name with her own as the winner of the award. Begum Shahid was unaware of the behind-the-scene machinations and kept contacting PTV to enquire about her airline ticket. No one would give her a straight answer and she had to figure out what had happened on her own. Begum Shahid handled the gross contravention of fair play with her characteristic dignity. “The award would not have made my performance better than it was,” she commented. “It would not have made the slightest difference to me or my self-worth and esteem. I am sure the other lady needed it more.”
“Professionalism is the key to success,” says Begum Shahid. “A good actor has respect for himself and for his craft. He does not denigrate his profession by not taking it seriously. He has respect for other actors, directors, playwrights, musicians, engineers, technicians and everyone else involved in the production, and demonstrates it at all times, in all his actions.
“Actors work with a large number of people, some that they like and others that they do not. They have to deal with a lot of different circumstances, both expected and unexpected, and situations, both pleasant and otherwise. The best actors are highly professional and know how to deal with people, circumstances and situations of all kinds. More importantly, they never let anything affect them in a manner that would hurt their craft. Getting flustered does not become an actor. No one should be able to ruffle the feathers of an actor.”
Begum Shahid was the quintessential representative of the golden era of television, a time in which some of the best plays and serials in Pakistan television’s history were produced. Fame and fortune – which has always been incompatible with the arts in South Asia – did not come with a career in television, at that time. People worked at television because of their love for the medium, with a desire to do excellent work and create programs of high quality. They were paid very little, and sometimes nothing, and did not enjoy any perks of stardom. Their only reward was the satisfaction of knowing that they had done something well. These people produced programs that do the medium proud and that have remained unmatched – in content, quality, and technique – ever since.
“Acting is not easy,” says Begum Shahid. “It asks for a lot and gives back little other than satisfaction. Not everyone can become an actor and not everyone should.
Begum Shahid found satisfaction in doing good work and not in receiving medals and awards. She held herself and everyone else to high standards. “In my career, I worked with a lot of actors but was never really impressed by anyone.” she says. “They were mostly competent but no one, with the possible exception of Muhammad Qavi, ever knocked my socks off. Qavi had real acting talent. I used to enjoy working with him.”
“Things have changed in television over the years and not for the better. I no longer wish to be associated with television. Glamour and glitter have taken the place of talent, intelligence and experience. Preparing for a role has come to mean buying clothes, dressing up and wearing load of make-up. Every woman on television – whether poor or rich, healthy or sick, young or old, awake or asleep – is always in full make-up and designer clothes. Austere but appropriate sets have been replaced by irrelevant exotic locations. Creative thought and intellectual acumen are no longer the driving forces in the industry. They have been replaced by advertising revenue, ratings, sycophancy and greed. Television is not a lovely place anymore. I no longer belong in it.” n
Ally Adnan lives in Dallas, Texas, where he works in the field of mobile telecommunications and writes about history, culture and art. He can be reached at allyadnan@outlook.com.