New Delhi hosts conference on Mirza Bedil

TEHRAN,Oct.20(MNA) -- An international conference on Persian-speaking Indian poet Mirza Abdul Qadir Bedil Dehlavi (1644-1721) was held at the National Islamic University in New Delhi. The conference, which was attended by several Iranian, Tajik and Afghan scholars, was held on October 17 and 18. During the conference, the head of the Persian Language Research Center Alireza Ghazveh made a short speech about Bedil. “It is an honor for the Persian language speakers to have such a poet in their geographical region”, he said. Bedil not only is a Persian poet and philosopher, but also the best poet in the Indian poetry style,” he said. Bedil is wise man who knows math, music, philosophy and other subjects, the Iranian cultural attaché Ali Fuladi mentioned during the event. He also pointed to the impact of Bedil’s poetry on contemporary Iranian poets including Mohammadreza Shafiei-Kadkani, Seyyed Hassan Hosseini and Ali Moallem. The spirituality in the poems of Bedil is derived from Rumi and other Muslim intellectuals, He said. The head of the Cultural Center of the Islamic Republic of Iran in India Ali Dahgahi also talked about Bedil during the event. “It is an honor that the ideas and thoughts of Bedil are known in the world and we are proud that these ideas are rendered in the Persian language,” he said. Bedil Dehlavi was a famous Persian poet and Sufi born in Azimabad, present day Patna, India). He mainly wrote ghazals and quatrains in Persian and is the author of 16 books of poetry, which contain nearly 147,000 verses and include several from the Masnavi. He is considered as one of the prominent poets of the Indian School of Poetry in Persian literature, and has his own unique style. His books include Telesm-e Hairat, Chahar Unsur and Ruqaat. The event was held by the Persian Language Department of the National Islamic University, the Persian Language Research Center and Iran’s cultural attaché’s office in New Delhi.