His legacy: "Babul Mora" Thumri His Bhairavi thumri "Babul mora Naihar chhooto jaay" has been sung by several prominent singers, but the version most remembered is by Kundan Lal Saigal for the 1930s movie Street Singer. In a strange manner this sad song epitomises the pain and agony of the poet king himself when he was exiled from his beloved Lucknow. Devanagari Lyrics : बाबुल मोरा, नैहर छूटो ही जाए बाबुल मोरा, नैहर छूटो ही जाए चार कहार मिल, मोरी डोलिया सजावें (उठायें) मोरा अपना बेगाना छूटो जाए | बाबुल मोरा ... आँगना तो पर्बत भयो और देहरी भयी बिदेश जाए बाबुल घर आपनो मैं चली पीया के देश | बाबुल मोरा ... Urdu Lyrics - بابُل مورا، نیہر چھُوٹو ہی جائے بابُل مورا، نیہر چھُوٹو ہی جائے چار کہار مِل، موری ڈولِیا سجاویں (اُٹھایّں) مورا اَپنا بیگانا چھُوٹو جائے ، بابُل مورا۔۔۔ آںگنا تو پربت بھیو اؤر دیہری بھیی بِدیش جائے بابُل گھر آپنو میں چلی پیّا کے دیش ، بابُل مورا ۔۔۔ The thumri refers to his exile. - Wiki

Babul (बाबुल pronounced baabul) is an old Hindi term for father indicating a daughter's affection. The term is now mainly used in the context of a newly married daughter leaving her father's home in many Hindi songs. In India, the conclusion of a daughter's marriage, marked by the bidaai (farewell) ceremony, is a profoundly sad occasion, because after this she no longer belongs to her father's house, but to her husband's family. The moment thus marks the end of her past life and the beginning of a new one. In Bollywood and regional films particularly, the genuine pathos felt by the close family members of the departing bride is obscenely exaggerated through melodramatic twists and turns that tread along farcical lines. In reality though, other than occasional hushed sobs and blips of tearfulness, everybody endeavours to demonstrate sober calmness and composure, to help make it less painful for the bride. Wajid Ali Shah (1822–1887), the last nawab of Awadh, wrote a popular bhairavi thumri "Babul mora naihar chhooto hi jaay", where he likens bidai to death, and his own banishment for his beloved Lucknow[1] (video search for Saigal's 1938 rendition): बाबुल मोरा, नैहर छूटो ही जाए चार कहार मिल, मोरी डोलिया उठायें ... मोरा अपना बेगाना छूटो जाए | ... आँगना तो पर्बत भयो और देहरी भयी बिदेश ... Translation: My father! I'm leaving home. The four bearers lift my doli (palanquin) (here it can also mean the four coffin bearers). I'm leaving those who were my own. Your courtyard is now like a mountain, and the threshold, a foreign country. The expression is found in the Sanskrit texts also. In Abhijñānaśākuntalam [2] the sage Kanva, who had adopted Shakuntala, mourns: यास्यत्यद्य शकुन्तलेति हृदयं संस्पृष्टमुत्कण्ठया .. ऐक्लव्यं मम तावदीदृशमिदं स्नेहादरण्यौकसः पीड्यन्ते गृहिणः कथं नु तनयाविश्लेषदुःखैर्नवैः||६|| Shakuntala must go to-day, I miss her now at heart .. What must a father feel, when come The pangs of parting from his child at home? - Wiki

Shekar : You read my mind !!

Itz very nyc combination,Nawab&Thumri..

Wajid Ali Shah's was an immensely popular king of Lucknow .His departure from Lucknow to Calcutta turned into a political side-show- a show of public mourning,anger and protest.A crowd began gathering from Qaiserbagh's exit gate proclaiming loudly that a proclamation from London would come,giving him back his throne.A wail arose from womenfolk and the villagers.He was after all their Jan-e-Alam (beloved of the world).As the royal train left, the gardens , orchards and fields of Awadh echoed: Hazrat jaate hain London Hum par kripa karo Raghunandan (our hazrat is departing for London Now we have only your care left O' Lord Rama) And after his departure, a feminine cry was heard from the inner chambers of the houses: Tore bin barkha na suhaye Calcutta wale juya,kab aaoge tum (Without you rains bring no enjoyment O' my lover of Calcutta when will you come back ?) The beloved king departed but he left behind an un-easy Lucknow and a seething Awadh - perhaps the exact intended effect.Wajid Ali Shah was after all a king who began his reign with the military drill rather than the muse.Unknown to many, including the bRitish, he had never given up this hobby.When the Parikhana was resounding with the vibrations of the ghungroo and the jhanjhar, his harem reverberated with the clang of weapons being made by the female platoons of the king.These platoons whose Hindu and Muslim members were drawn from the bylanes of Lucknow, practiced an army drill with perfect discipline in Persian dress. But the king had another ace up his sleeve. This was a woman, one of his wives with no apparent special quality. Only, she smoked the hookah with style and stuck coins of a type bearing no resemblence with the traditions of the harem.While the coins of all other queens bore a symbols of 'be-butay'( stylised floral arabesque designs), hers had a sword and a shield. She was Wajid Ali Shah's 'Mahak Pari' who later acquired a name and a title that was to resonate throughout India and Britain - Begum Hazrat Mahal. Before leaving Wajid Ali Shah indicated that though he did not fight the British, he had left the fate of Lucknow to it's awaam or the public. Apparently, he was leaving all options , including the military one open. He also left Hazrat Mahal behind to guard the interests of the people of Lucknow in their time of trial and tribulation. One of Wajid Ali Shah's couplets written before 1857, praises her golden colour straight nose black hair sophesticated demeanour and then goes on to say: Gharon par tabahi padi, saher mein, khude mere bazaar hazrat mahal To he bayse aesho aaram hai garibon ki gambkhwar hazrat mahal (Calamity visits houses and families in the city My markets were uprooted, Hazrat Mahal.You are the only means of comfort. You who shares the pain of the poor , Hazrat Mahal) Implicit in this couplet , which shows how the annexation had ruined a thriving bourgeoisie economy, was also a tacit recognition that in Lucknow and Awadh a new force had gained predominance : the gareeb awaam or the poor public. It was from this section that the East India Company drew it's Thakur-Brahmin sepoys. They were not exceptionally well off. Mangal Pandey, the first sepoy to train the gun on the British in Barackpore on 29th march 1857, belonged to Faizabad (Ayodhya) Awadh.. He, alongwith wis warrior nephew Bujhavan Pandey, was a typical pre-1857 Awadhi Saryu Parin Brahmin - mercurial , akkhad, rural, passionate and individually oriented, the prototype of the rising new men of Awadh who were as proud of their janeo (the holy thread) as of their trousers and John Company bonds.

I must say the real Nawab is has so much similarity to Amjad Khan who played Wajid Ali shah in Shatranj ke Khiladi

Now that was interesting !! Thank you Digvijay !

He was a Genius ..His Song "Baabul Mora ...is Lyrical " Unforgettable

Till date there exist only two schools of Kathak discipline in India.The Jaipur and the Lucknow schools.Kathak is North India's only contribution to the vast Classical dance performing repertoire (Unless we include Odissi and Manipuri as north-Indian too) .It's literal meaning is ballet or narration (drawn from Katha or story). Nawab Wajid Ali Shah used to himself play the characters of Lord SriKrishna and Devraj Indra in the Kathak performances and plays staged in the Qaiserbagh.Such was his popularity that he was accepted in those roles by his pre-dominantly Hindu subjects.The plays like 'Indra durbar' replete with sabz pari, neel pari and Laal pari were staged later by the Parsi theatres well into the latter half of the 20th century and it was aped in the Ramprakash Theatre established by the erudite Maharaja Ram Singh of Jaipur in the late 19th century. This play is a legacy of nawab Syed Wajid Ali Shah.The Awadh of Wajid Ali Shah and of his predecessors like King nawab Asaf-ud-Daula was a period of awesome cultural synthesis between Hindus and Muslims especially of Persian refinement. The Dataari (generosity) of nawab Asaf of Daula was legion: Jisko na de Maula Usko de Asaf-ud-Daula (One to whom Maula (Ali) does'nt provide to him provides nawab Asaf-ud-Daula) The Lucknow school of Kathak is rated higher than the Jaipur school.Kathak evolved as a dance form in which graceful hand and eye/ face movements predominated as distinguished from leg and waist movements which were frowned upon as it developed and reached it's zenith under a Muslim court. No discussion of Lucknow can be complete without the reference to the peculiar Urdu that it's nawabi legacy embellished. Urdu was an import from Deccan but reached it's zenith in the courts of Delhi and Lucknow.The affectation in the language and it's peculiar flavour as developed in Lucknow is India's unique heritage.

What was d cultural,Educational,social n Industerial development of Awadh at d time of Wajid Ali shah... There is a quot in awdhi- 12saal kukkur(dog)jiye.. 16saal siyaar(fox).. 21saal chhatriye(Rajpoot)jiye baqi jivan Dhikkar.. Becoz at that time it was supposd that Chhatriya was to spend his max time in Battle feild... To nawab sb jo Nikale gaye...Thumri(Babul mora naihar chhuta jaye)suun suun k... To shaheed kyu na hogaye...Amar hojate...