Akbar Allahabadi

Life and career

Early life Akbar Allahabadi was born in the town of Bara, in the district of Allahabad, to a family of Sayyids who originally came to India from Persia as soldiers. His grandfather, Sayyid Fazl-i-Mohmmad, had Shia leanings but his three sons, Wasil 'Ali, Waris 'Ali and Tafazzul Husain were all Sunnis. Akbar's father, Moulvi Tafazzul Hussain served as a Naib Tehsildar to his brother Waris 'Ali, who was the Tehsildar, and his mother belonged to a zamindar family of Jagdishpur village from the Gaya district in Bihar.

His second marriage to Fatima Sughra (died 1910) was more successful and brought him happiness. Together they had two sons, Ishrat Husain and Hashim Husain. Ishrat was sent to England for 3 years to become a lawyer but did not return even after 6 years. He obtained his Bachelor of Arts degree from Cambridge University with difficulty and never sat for the bar examinations. Instead he fancied himself a person of the arts and applied to be a playwright and an actor without any success. He attributed this to the prejudice against Indians in England of that time. He became too Anglicised in his ways of thinking and living for Akbar's liking. Later in life, Ishrat became a collector.

The younger son Hashim pleased his father and stayed with him until his death in 1921.

Death Akbar retired in 1905 and lived on in Allahabad. He died of a fever on September 9, 1921 and was buried in Himmatganj locality of Allahabad. Explaining this as a conscious tribute, the film's lyrics writer Varun Grover explained that he wanted to show one of the female leads Shaalu (played by Shweta Tripathi) as a person whose hobby is to read Hindi poetry and Shayri.