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Biography Professor Doctor Sheikh Muhammad Iqbal, resident 131-Rehmat Park, University Road Sargodha, lost his eyesight at the age of eight. Despite obviously insurmountable difficulties, he forged his way ahead and accomplished his brilliant academic career with many a distinction and position, which further encouraged him to give a valiant combat to the heavy odds and carved a line of action for his practical life. In order to have a glimpse of his struggle, following few points deserve special attention: He matriculated as a private candidate in First Division, stood second in his College in the Intermediate Examination, got Roll of Honour (Academic), won scholarship, passed his B.A. with English Literature in First Division and won scholarship. He got Roll of Honour (Academic) in M.A. English as well. He was first blind person to have his master’s Degree in Pakistan and in his case, more astonishingly in English Literature, by attaining the Fifth position in University of the Punjab and First position in his College (Government College Faisalabad). The First blind person in Pakistan to be posted as lecturer (Government College Sargodha) in 1968 at the age of 23. Took his Master’s Degree in Urdu and M. Phil (Iqbaliat) from Allama Iqbal Open University Islamabad, in which he got First position in Pakistan and was Degree from Allama Iqbal Open University Islamabad on the thesis “The Impact of British Poets on Allama Iqbal”. In his service tenure, spreading over Thirty years, he earned a name as an Educationist in the College, remained the incharge of English Study Circle and English Literary Circle for Post Graduate Classes and in many a forum at large, got retirement eight years before his actual date of retirement in 1997 as an Associate Professor. As the Poet of Urdu, having the honour of being the First Blind Poet to publish his poetic collection “Sahil-e-Tishna Lab” and afterwards his second collection “Sawalia Nishan” and the third collection “Ek Hamsafar Achha Laga” and had the honour of receiving a ‘Letter of Appreciation and Recognition’ from the Federal Government as a Poet of Urdu. His first collection, “Sahil-e-Tishna Lab” got second award, in the book competition, held by the Board of Intermediate & Secondary Education Sargodha and Faisalabad. He had the privilege to attend the 6 th Ahle-Qalam Conference in 1986. Apart from being a poet, he is also a prose writer and a Critic. His publications on the works and personalities of John Donne and John Keats in Urdu, are the first ever attempts on these English poets in the Sub-Continent. It is also important to note that he has been elected every year the Executive Member of Editors, Council Sargodha Division, ever since he joined it. In addition to this, he has to his credit the release of an Audio Cassette, consisting of the compositions of his poetry, sung by renowned singers like Fida Hussain, Badar-ur-Zaman, kausar Ali and few others. He has not only endeavoured hard to attain this position, but has the privilege of struggling strenuously for the Socioeconomic Rehabilitation of the blind, through education and training in the Centre of excellence being run by Pakistan Association of the Blind District Sargodha, under his Patronage and President-ship. The Centre has been working for the last 28 years, rendering meritorious services. He has been President, both of the Provincial and Central Body of Pakistan Association of the Blind, a nationwide movement of blind persons. He is the Editor of Monthly “Sufaid Chhari” whose wide circulation has been changing the attitude of the public regarding the blind as well as catering to the tastes of people in the field of Literature and learning. The Editorials of this Magazine are almost a guide line and a research study of different problems of the blind which have been published for public reading under the titles “Zouq-i-Tamasha”, “Dida-e-Dil”, and Kab Rat Basar Hogi”. His all round activities are also extended to the sighted world. Bazam-e-Fikr-o-Khyal”, a Forum for the development and cultivation of faculties in arts, literature and learning, has been enthusiastically in operation for the last 18 years. It is also his privilege to organize a body for the welfare and development of his colony ‘Rehmat Park’. In recognition of his social services, he was given Punjab Social Services Award on 3rd December 1997, by the Social Welfare and Woman Development Department Punjab in Al-Hamra Hall Lahore. Pakistan Social Association also honoured him with “Sitara-e-Simaj” for his services in the Welfare field. In view of his services in Scouting, he has been granted a “President’s Award” at Governor’s House Lahore. Anjum Art Society and Qasim Art Society Sargodha granted him “Punjab Anjum Award” and “Award 1998″, respectively, for his services in Arts and Literature. He also received Shield and Gold Medal from Editors’ Council Sargodha for his services in Journalism. For his services in Education and enlightenment, he received a Shield from Government College Sargodha and another Shield from Quaid-e-Azam Law College Sargodha. He is heading an N.G.O named “Thinkers’ Forum for Social Uplift” Lahore. He hails from a noble family, his father being simply a Matric S.V. Teacher, with horribly limited means. He is leading a successful social life with his three children, one daughter, lecturer in English, son B.Sc. Mechanical Engineer and one daughter, B.A. B.Ed Teacher. PUBLICATIONS Poetry

Sahil-e-Tishna Lab Sawalia Nishan (1st Edition 1989,2nd Edition 1993) Ek Hamsafar Achha Laga Tilawat-e-Dil (Collection of Naats)

Criticism

John Donne, Shakhsiat aur Shairi John Keats, Shakhsiat aur Shairi Iqbal, Bahozoor Iqbal

Prose

Zok-e-Tamasha Dida-e-Dil Jahan-e-Maho Parveen Kab Raat Basar Hogi

Magazine Number Professor Sheikh Iqbal Number (Monthly Sufaid Chhari) Dr,Sheikh Iqbal Number dastk muree(Murree), monthly "sputnik(LAhore)",Khayal-o-funn(Doha,Lahore), Belaag(Karachi), Sarguzasht(karachi) latest poetry book "Us k Name" contact No.0300-4489399 editor Mothly sufaidchari sargodha. Email.iqbalsheikh68@yahoo.com

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thumbnail|First Blind Lecturer in Pakistan] [[www.sufaidchari.com

I HAVE already made mention of Prof Dr Sheikh Muhammad Iqbal in one of my recent columns. I have known him since the days of my posting at the PAF Base, Sargodha, where I had to accompany my base commander who was to preside over a White Cane Day function. There I saw Prof Iqbal taking an active part in the proceedings.

Undaunted by losing his sight at the age of eight, Sheikh Muhammad Iqbal forged his way ahead in life and carved a place for himself in the field of education. Appearing as a private candidate at the matriculation examination, he passed it in the first division. Thereafter, he took the intermediate examination to stand second in his college and won a scholarship. Going ahead to graduate in the first division, with English literature as a subject, he again won a scholarship.

Later, he became the first blind person to get a master’s in English literature, securing the fifth position in the University and the first in Government College, Faisalabad. Sheikh Sahib did not stop at that; he went on to get a master’s in Urdu and M. Phil. (Iqbaliyat) from the Allama Iqbal Open University, topping the list of successful candidates. He also got a doctorate from the same university through his thesis, The Impact of British Poets on Allama Iqbal. “Ultimately, it was in 1968 that Dr Sheikh Muhammad Iqbal was appointed a lecturer at the Government College, Sargodha, the first blind person to achieve the distinction.

Prof Iqbal has varied interests. Besides working for the socio-economic rehabilitation of the blind he has a claim to journalism as well by having been the editor of the monthly, Sufaid Chari. However, he is better recognised as a poet and literary critic of Urdu. Besides four collections of poetry, he is probably the only one to have written about English poets in Urdu. At the moment I have before me his, John Keats: Sakhsiat aur Shairi, which, unfortunately, has been produced very poorly by a printing house of Sargodha.

In this book, Prof Iqbal has started by giving a detailed introduction to Keats. He was born in London on October 31, 1795 to well off parents, but when his father died at an early age, leaving behind four children. The family started facing financial problems. Things worsened when his mother married again only to be separated very soon. All this had a deep effect on the mind of young Keats who was the eldest in the family. But there was a bigger shock awaiting him. His mother contracted tuberclosis and the 15-year old had to look after her. She ultimately died in 1810.

Unable to continue his education, he took an apprenticeship with a surgeon but, at the same time, developed a taste for poetry. Soon he was published in journals and by the time he was 21, he had found a place in literary circles. In March, 1817, his first collection of poems was published but it was not well received. However, he continued writing poetry. Then his brother, Tom, fell victim to tuberclosis and died in 1818. Having remained in close contact with him during his last days, Keats also contracted the same disease.

Prof Iqbal has written in detail about the odes by Keats and his most well known poems, Endymion and Hyperion. Mention has also been made of his love affair with Fanny Brawne although he has not mentioned that he got engaged to her but kept it a secret.

One finds lyricism in John Keats but Prof Iqbal goes to discover attributes of drama in him which he thinks are akin to those of Shakespeare. He quotes what he said about Byron: He describes what he sees, I describe what I imagine; mine is the hardest task.

Dr Sheikh Muhammad Iqbal has also dealt at length with the letters written by Keats. He says his prose can well be compared with his famous contemporaries, Lawrence Sterne, Tobiaz George Smollette and Henry Fielding. His letters, according to Dr Iqbal, enjoy the same importance in English as Ghalib’s letters do in Urdu literature. He quotes from one of his letters to James Hessey in which he has referred to his critics:

“Praise or blame has but a momentary effect on the man whose love for beauty in the abstract makes him a severe critic on his own work.”

This treatise by Prof Dr Sheikh Muhammad Iqbal shows his deep study of the romantic poets of English literature. But permit me for a few dispassionate words in the end. His work is commendable, no doubt, but I wish the author had paid more attention to his poem, La Belle Dame Sams Merci. In that he has dealt with the supernaturanal and in which one finds him in the spirit of a true romanticist. Why forget that it was his romanticism with grief, sorrow and suffering which gave Keats his universalty.

P.S. Prof Dr Iqbal has moved over to Lahore permanently and would be a regular at literary functions.—Ashfaque Naqvi

19 oct 2003 dawn features ............................................... LOVE IS NO CRIME (A REVIEW) (BY: SAHID ISLAM DANISH)

He is not a Satan but he has made hell of heaven. Prof. Dr. Sheikh Muhammad Iqbal has passed through so many trial and troubles in his life. He faced all the slings and arrows of life when he got blind at an early age of 8. Life in itself is no less that a half. Family politics plays havoc with man. Blindness is no less than a hell in this mundane world. Most of all is the mind that has a thinking faculty and a heart that feels the pangs and pains of life and its miseries. Sheikh Iqbal has faced all these. A man of average physical strength, a soul having a thinking mind and a feeling heart would have been crippled and crumbled under the load and pressure of all such trails. But Mr. Iqbal has not only survived but also made his mark on the firmament of literature and life as a whole. He is a devotee of Shakespeare and Milton. He is a lover of Keats and Shelley. He has been a profound reader of Hardy and Tennyson. All those great minds and mighty souls have served to be the guiding stars and beacon lights for Iqbal in the dark and dismal world and its sorrows. He has faced all the slings and arrows of Life. To him, life colds have been but full of sounds and furies, a tale, told by an idiot, signifying nothing. He has seen the men, sit and hear each other groan. He has observed the world where palsy shakes a few, spectre thin and die, where to think is to be full of sorrow, where Beauty cannot keep her lustrous eye and New Love pine at them beyond tomorrow. Beauty and Love are the very words which are like a bell which opens the magic casements for him on the perilous seas, which brings him back to the very world of reality and truth. Beauty and Love are the words which become the focal point and pivotal mark in Mr. Iqbal’s new book of English poems “Love’s no Crime” Like Keats, Beauty is the only reality which surrounds the whole universe. It is the only reality which lives and dies. In his poem “Never Count the Cost’ he reflects.

“If there be something nice, With life blood buys, For only Beauty Lives, For only Beauty dies”

This Beauty opens the doors of nature and Love for him. Only Beauty can make him cry as well as smile. Beauty is love as well as deprivation for Sheikh Muhammad Iqbal. In his poem “Bower of Bliss, he says. The beauty blesses the boys, And opens every door Of nature’s lovely lore, Of Love’s melodious strain Which removes every pain To Iqbal Nature is killing for its beauty as well as for having been lost because of his blindness. Darkness covers all senses of Beauty for him for time being which frightens him as it had frightened him when he actually lost his eye-sight. To Sheikh Iqbal nature was once his Jill and John as he says.

When you have gone My Jill and John And feels the pains I ponder over life, I wonder over life I am taken aback, The white becomes black When you have gone, My Jill and John (“Return of the Native”)

When Mr. Iqbal was a boy and enjoyed the physical aspect of life with his open eyes, it was a joy for him. But with lose of nature as a result of lose of eye-sight, all was lost.

We knew all joys, But now our joys Have made us Toys In this darkling sphere “This and That”)

However, the darkness stays no longer when Prof. Iqbal comes out of the quagmire of confusion and complexity with more that ordinary vigour and force. He cries for love but nature comes to him as a guide and guardian, an important factor for him, not as a consolation but as fascination and ecstasy. He can feel the presence of beauty with the help of his imagination as did Wordsworth. But more than that, his imagination is so powerful that while imagining the elements of nature, his heart aches and a drowsy numbness pain his senses.

Go and seek the beauty out Is fled to the moon and stars? Is she hid in the vale of flowers? Has she taken another birth? She is prone to ever-new mirth. (“Go and seek the beauty out”)

Now beauty has taken another birth and this new beauty has the promise of excitement and ecstasy, for not for an outward eye but for an eye that opens inward. Now life is a joy and attraction for Prof. Iqbal.

Life is a charming lovely thing Always its attractions sing, Paint the pomp of Beauty’s noon Pens the picture of Love’s boon. Play the flute of eyes wine Sing to the ears a tale benign. Fill in life some thrill and shrill Call on dinner Jack and Jill. (“Life’s Anthem”)

Now Jack (John) and Jill are back and they are dancing. Now Prof. Iqbal has mustered up the courage, strength and power, power of mind, power of soul and power to feel the beauty’s bloom. And thus Beauty appears to him like the light of dawn. Colours, smells and sounds belling. Only to one who’s strong. Strong in soul, strong in mind Strong to feel the beauty’s bloom Of love’s bride. (“Present is a ready cash”)

Love thought not a crime, has always been a haunted place for Sheikh Iqbal. He fears the realm of love. Yet he feels himself bound to visit the haunted caves of love. He feels disappointed but he feels that is better to love even if it is lost afterward.

To Prof Iqbal, love certainly means physical love, love for a physical being. But to him intellectual love is far more important than the physical one. He wanted and aspired love. He does not count sympathy and respect as synonymous to love as he has already received these from his sincere friends and respectful students. He has a paramount idea of love which is sincere, sober, and intellectual in nature. Love seems to be a riddle for him as he reflects. I heard the name of love And sought it every where, I fell in love with one And courted day and night But she was what she was! I fell in love with world, And chased it ever more, But purpose served it none. I fell in love with I	And heard a dreadful cry. (“A riddle”)

This poem seems to be the reality of Mr. Iqbal’s life and his voyage of love. He fell in love but it is terrible to love one, you really love. It was a frustration and disappointment for him as he remarks in his “Dispersed Mediation” (Preface): “My first love was unexpected but natural and which went a long way to culminate into marriage. I had good times hut something in me perhaps was unusual and extra-ordinary which blessed me as well as damned me……… I tried to explain it to my spouse but she was perhaps awfully simple, awfully mechanical awfully domestic which proved to be a great irritant in the ideal of my love.

The reality of Shattering of the ideals of love was awfully alarming. Alarming for a mind that thought and alarming for the heart that felt. This could really shatter and scatter the peace of mind and heart of Sheikh Iqbal. This desperate expression finds its reflection as 	A beauty dawned upon my youth I loved and married there and then I wept on my wedding night Wep I and made her weep. A love and marriage could be a joke. But not the life long love. (“Golden Night”)

The very same feelings are also reflected in his poem “What a Smile”

I smiled one night And that is all I wept out left I wept out right What a poor Plight --	A moment’s delight A deadly spite. (“What a Smile”)

This particular event of a frustrated love went a long way to develop a general view about love in the mind and heart of Prof. Iqbal. Now “Love” was a crime and Sheikh Iqbal was convinced to say “No” to Love.

If anyone calls me now “my love” I bow my head “no thanks” I say”. (“No thanks”). But this is not all about love in Prof. Iqbal. A new tide of love again shook Iqbal and that was “Love with I”. He fell in love with himself. This love was not internal but it had also an external aspect. This “book” of love is very interesting and so dear to Prof. Iqbal that he does not want to share it with anyone. I read my book I read it again I read it again T’was a story I never wrote. (“Fate’s Finger”)

Prof. Iqbal believed that man lives hundred thousand lives but he has just one in the form of his daughter. For him she is life, love, and Beauty incarnate. He reflects.

I love you not I love my self You’re my self (“Two in One”)

Sheikh Iqbal’s love for his daughter is in fact his “Love for I”. He deems Kokab Iqbal (his daughter) his “self”. She is the one who has healed many of his wounds by love and tenderness. He thinks that she is the only being who has the intellectual vigour and imaginative faculty to share his high ideas about love, poetry, if, beauty and nature. Prof Iqbal remarks about her,

“Kokab Iqbal appears to have inherited much of me, her liking of poetry and for life, men and things helped her to be close to my should and at very many things. She has healed many wounds of life by love and tenderness” (“Dispersed Meditation”) Now Prof. Iqbal’s love for Kokab assumes a very soft, sacred and holy colour. This love has a very serious, sober, intellectual and binding impact on Prof’s personality,

Love is religion and indeed It is a holy and heavenly seed What to speak, when to blame You may be right, darling mine. (“Complaint”)

Love now assumes a new form and shape and Sheikh Iqbal feels a kind of intellectual satisfaction and artistic solace. He therefore remembers love with very sweet and soft word.

“My Sweet Love, My dear dove.” (“My Love”) Now this sweet love and dear dove is no other than his delicate and innocent daughter. This sweet and dear love also becomes so sacred that the calls it a prayer.

“My love! My care My humble prayer” (“A supplication”)

This sober and sacred love has been reared and tutored by Prof. Iqbal himself. “I was a tutor Tutored her She became a book I went through her My self out, forever out” (“My Last Book”)

So this final and complete book, a daughter that is beauty and love incarnate is the fulfilment of Sheikh Iqbal’s concept of Love. Love which had been once a permanent source of despair and despondency is now a focus of intellectual and spiritual satisfaction for Sheikh Iqbal. Now Love, to which Sheikh Iqbal had said “no thanks”, is now no more a crime. .................. First PAkistani blind who got Govt job,