Khwaja Khurshid Anwar

Khwaja Khurshid Anwar Biography

Khwaja Khurshid Anwar was one of the earliest cine artists of Bollywood who contributed in the form of film making as well as music direction. After partition he moved to Pakistan, where he continued with his film making. He is credited to promoting Indian classic music through his compositions and even after leaving India, he kept the music tradition through his amazing compositions. Bollywood film industry honored him with Mortal-Men-Immortal-Melodies Award (1982) for his significant contributions to Bollywood. He died two years later. Anwar is quite popular in both India and Pakistan. He was awarded the coveted Sitara-e-Imtiaz award by the Government of Pakistan in 1980.

Khwaja Khurshid Anwar was born on 21 March 1912 in Mianwali, Punjab of present-day Pakistan. His father Khwaja was a well-known barrister from Lahore. Yet this jurist had a great love to music and a huge collection of music records as well. The collections included - Indian classical and neo-classical music. He also arranged musical concerts at his home frequently. Thus Khwaja Khurshid Anwar got attracted to the world of music. In 1934 he became a disciple of Khansahib Tawakkal Hussain. In 1935, he completed Master’s in Philosophy and was University topper. Though he appeared in the examination for Indian Civil Service exams, it was not easy to achieve success in British Empire.

In 1939 he joined All India Radio as Programme Producer (Music). It was during this time when he was invited by Abdur Rashid Kardar, the renowned film producer to come to Mumbai and join Hindi film industry. "Kurmai" (1941) was his first film as a music director and his maiden directorial venture was "Ishara" in 1943. The movie included popular songs - "Panghat pe muraliya baje" sung by Suraiya, "Shabnam kyon neer bahaye" sung by Gauhar Sultan, and "Dil deke dagha nahin dena" sung by Vatsala Kumthekar. Till partition, he was fully engaged in Hindi cinema, before he moved to Lahore.

As an Indian film director, Parakh (1944, with Saraswati Devi), Yateem (1945), Aaj Aur Kal (1947), Pagdandi(1947), and Parwaana (1947) are his best works. Parwana was the last movie of K. L. Saigal as an actor and singer. "Singaar", "Nishaana” and "Neelam Pari" were some of his movies later. Hamraz, Ghunghat, Chingari, Intezar, Zehr-E-Ishq and Jhoomer were his noted movies in Lahore, where he shined as a screenwriter, producer and director.

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Updated: March 06, 2016